I am sure you know exactly where this is going, having gone through countless arguments about who's right and who's wrong. However, there really is no distinct answer. No one is wrong and no one is right in this argument. The way you say specific words depends on your accent. For instance, growing up in the South, I say words like ambulance and Alabama with a long drawn out 'a' sound. This is simply because of the environment from which I was raised.But what about English learners? When English learners speak, they do not have the clean cut standard American accent we speak here in southeastern Wisconsin. Instead, they have their own accents, deriving from their native language. Some accents are thick and we have trouble understanding them, while others are not so terrible, yet still distinct. Accents are normal, no matter the language, native and learned, accents are going to be prevalent. Despite this, there are still professionals that can help learners achieve this standardized accent, people known as accent coaches. I, for one, would be really interested in this professional, simply because of the linguistic engineering behind it.
The first point I would like to focus on is what exactly is an accent and are some accents better than others? I also know that most people think that standard English is based on American English, not British English. Why exactly is this? Is this because linguists simply said so? British English came before American English, so why is American English more important? Also, why do people care so much about how 'American' they sound? The next point would be to teach the standardized American English sounds, doing this via the IPA chart.
After some poking around, I found a couple sources to help begin my research (Note that this will most likely change):
- Why do Americans and Brits Have Different Accents?
- A History of American English by J.L. Dillard - I want to look at this one and see if I can find any information regarding the change to standardized English.
- IPA Chart
- Learn How to Pronounce the Consonant R
- Ship or Sheep? This would be a great resource to use in the classroom.
This topic has social linguistics feel that I think will be of high interest for teens or adults learning English as a second language. I remember when I lived in Madrid, I taught English conversation courses to Spaniards wanting to improve their English. They always wanted to talk about the British accent and how it was different than the American accent. I look forward to seeing what texts you decide to use with your students.
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