Liverpool is a city in the north of England with a distinctive accent (the way words are pronounced) and dialect (the actual words that are used). The accent here is completely different from accents spoken even just a few miles away.

Watch this video of footballers Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher being interviewed about a charity football match at Anfield, home of Liverpool F.C. As you’re watching, try to notice the ways that this accent is different from my accent and from a standard British accent.

Below the video you’ll find my notes on a couple of the key accent features and below that, a full transcript of what they’re saying (and, by the way, this is my own transcription and is much better than the one automatically generated by YouTube!).

Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher talk ahead of kick-off at All-Star charity match at Anfield.

You should notice a couple of differences with the consonants:

Firstly, the r-sound in a Liverpool accent is what’s called a tap. This means the tongue briefly hits the roof of the mouth. This sound is far more similar to the pronunciation of /r/ in languages like Arabic, Spanish, Portuguese, Bengali and Korean than it is to most British English accents.

Secondly, did you notice anything about the voiceless plosives, the /k/, /t/ and /p/? You may have noticed that this is far more aspirated than you are used to hearing from British speakers. This means there is a lot of air released when these sounds are said.

Here’s your transcript in full:

Interviewer: Well, welcome to the tunnel. I have the two skippers with me. How you both feeling?

SG: Yeah, excited. Erm, it’s a bit surreal really you know, seeing all the faces in the dressing room and having prematch earlier with so many star names and obviously ex team mates and current team mates, it’s a great occasion. Er, I’m gonna try and enjoy it and hopefully we get the win.

Interviewer: When we launched it a couple of weeks ago some of these names you wondered if they’ve still got the make it (???)  but when you see all of them walk into the dressing room it’s it’s brilliant the way it’s come together.

JC: Yeah, Stevie’s right. Yeah some great names and players that are still playing you know great names within the Premier League. I think the best player in the Premier League Thierry Henry’s involved he’s just he’s just retired as well but for all ourselves just meeting up with the lads beforehand seeing the old faces laughing and joking in the dressing room I’m sure that’ll continue all day but you know Stevie’s right you want it to be a competitive game and to – we’re both desperate to win. He’s picked the old stars, all the big heads so it’ll be er interesting.

Interviewer: There’s a bit of zip on the pitch isn’t there, a bit of rain. Who’s gonna be the first one to commit a rash challenge do you think out of the two squads?

SG: Oh I think everyone’s been warned you know. We do want a competitive game of course but we’ve gotta be respectful to all the clubs and all the players involved so there’ll be no – no one going over the top, not like last week er we need to move on from that so. No, as I say yeah we want the tempo to be right for the supporters who’ve paid good money. We want it to be entertaining and good fun but at the end of the day we’re both two winners and we both wanna win the game.

Int: Quite strange with some of them walking into the top of the tunnel not knowing which dressing room to go in. John Terry was a bit confused walking in to the one on the left wasn’t he?

JC: Well well that’s what I mean, I mean the size of the away dressing room compared to the size of the home dressing room, normally wherever you go that’s the bigger the better dressing room but-. I remember going in there as a kid but I’ve never been in there for a game really so it is completely different I’m so used to being in the other one as you say. Well it’ll be the same for both players, players who’ve never been in the home dressing room and are probably surprised how small it is.

Int: What about you now. How have you ticked over have you done any 5 a-sides between all your trips, done TV work?

JC Nah, I’ve been keeping fit but I haven’t kicked the ball for a long while so the warm-up’s vitally important for me.

SG: Excuses, getting the excuses in. Get them in early.

Int: Well listen, we wish you all the best. Thanks for joining us.

 

The United Kingdom is famous for the range of regional accents we have relative to our size. It’s possible for travel even a few miles and find the accent has completely changed.

The Geordie accent is spoken by people in the Newcastle area. Watch this clip with comedian Sarah Millican. First watch it without subtitles then watch it again with the transcript I have provided for you.

What differences do you notice between her accent and Standard British? Are there any words she’s using differently? (Hint: yes!) Let me know in the comments.

To help you out, I’ve provided a transcription for you. I’ve transcribed this myself rather than use YouTube subtitles and it’s definitely correct even if it does differ from YouTube a little bit.

Transcription from 30 seconds in to the clip:

Yeah cos there’s something really arrogant about writing an autobiography. It’s like, oh I bet you all wanna know about my life. They’re like, er no not really. So in order to kind of like square the circle I thought I’ll put some- cos I’m quite practical when things happen to me I think well I’ll try and fix it and make myself feel better and I thought maybe those tips might help other people so that’s why it’s called How to be Champion because it’s about sort of being alright, not everything has to be perfect all the time.

What kind of tips?

Er so a good one, so if you er broke up with somebody for example I suggest that you change their name in your phone to like swearing. So mine was swearing I’ll not say what mine was but my friend changed hers to DNR for Do Not Resucitate

In my monthly membership, Time to Talk, we meet a native British English speaker with a strong regional accent. Members can ask questions, develop listening skills and really develop their confidence with unfamiliar accents. Let me know if you’d like more details, or follow this link.

Lots of learners, whatever their first language, find vowel length difficult especially in words like

Ship / sheep

Live / leave

Rhythm / reason

There are two differences between these vowel sounds. The most obvious is length – you can clearly hear that the vowel in sheep, leave and reason is longer than that in ship, live and rhythm.

The second difference is just as important though – how open your mouth is.

If the only difference you make in the way you produce these sets is in the length, you’ll still find the distinction isn’t as clear as it needs to be for clear and confident communication.

This video on my Instagram account explains this in more detail.

You can watch this video here

Now you understand the difference, try practising with these pairs:

Bit / beat

Clinic / clean

Rip / reap

And now try the pairs in full sentences:

1. The music had a great beat.
2. I’d like a bit of cake please.
3. It’s important to keep clean.
4. I took my baby to the clinic.
5. If you work hard you will reap great results.
6. I had a rip in my trousers.

Keep practising this pair. It’s one of the most common mistakes I hear and getting this pair right will transform your pronunciation.

How do you feel when you read phrases like:

• “speak like a native”
• “improve your accent”
• “perfect pronunciation”

Do they inspire you or do they make you feel second best?

If they make you feel like your English isn’t good enough, I completely understand. These phrases can be horribly judgemental and perhaps assume that you should be ashamed of your accent if it isn’t 100% perfect (and who knows what that even means).

They can be rooted in racism and prejudice and come from the point of view someone’s accent being second best. I’m never going to be okay with someone judging someone’s voice in this way.

Our voice is unique to us and it’s something that is, honestly, amazing.

But I’ve been thinking about this whole issue in more detail recently and I’d really love to hear your thoughts. 

If a dancer is allowed to practise and practise and practise until a move becomes perfect, it doesn’t mean the dancer isn’t satisfied with the way she moves in everyday life. It doesn’t mean anyone believes she’s second class for not managing the perfect pirouette.  It means she’s focused on her body and reaching a high level of control in a specific skill. 

If an athlete can…..If a painter can …. You get the picture (no pun actually intended!).

Can’t these high standards also apply to students who want their pronunciation to be the very best it can be?

And yes, I know “best” is subjective and I know there is more than one English accent.

But I see so much judgment online that suggests that wanting your accent to be “perfect” is an inherently bad thing and I’m honestly not sure that it is.

So truly, genuinely I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.

Do phrases like “native speaker standard” and “improve your accent offend you?

Are you striving to reach “perfect pronunciation”?

Let me know your thoughts

 

 

 

 

—

1. Be prepared: make sure you know the material you are presenting well.
   • Not knowing your topic will result in you feeling nervous for reasons that you could have dealt with.
   • Make sure you know what key information you want your listeners to learn or understand
   • Create a handout for your audience and use this yourself as your prompt – don’t write down too much or the temptation will be for everyone to just read what’s in front of them.
2. Give your listeners time: they need to digest the information you’re giving them
   • use short phrases with little content to give their brains time to process what you’re telling them. For example….
     1. Another reason why this is true is that ….
     2. I’ve explained x, now I’m going to explain how y relates to it
     3. Next, it’s important to consider x. x means …. And is important because…

3. Understand what a presentation actually is: this is not a spontaneous conversation.
   • You can predict what you need to say and you can predict to a greater extent what questions you are likely to be asked.
   • This means that you can carefully plan what you need to say. You can practise the phrasing of the sentences, how to pronounce difficult words, how to explain challenging concepts and so on

Linked to this …. A presentation has for more in common with an essay than it does with a chat with your mates. As such, the listener will expect a clear introduction, clearly signposted arguments and a clear conclusion

4. Focus on your body language:

• This includes your tone of voice, how you stand, the volume of your voice.
• Support yourself to feel confident by not making things difficult – wear clothes you feel good in, make sure you have a drink with you
• Make sure you don’t speak too quickly.

 5. Remember why you’re giving a presentation at all – for the audience not for you:

• This means that it’s important that you think about the needs of your audience and make it easy for them to understand the key messages of the presentation.
• Do not confuse anyone with unusual vocabulary
• Keep your sentences as short and simple as you can and introduce complexity only as it is needed, not to show off your amazing brilliance

 

When is a vowel pronounced short or long?

English, as we know, is a language that has borrowed from everyone and his dog. This has blessed us (!) with a highly complex and irregular system of spelling and pronunciation which you, dear language learner, now need to navigate. I’m sorry about that.

While there are no hard and fast rules for English spelling and pronunciation, there are some guidelines which, if you follow, will help you make accurate guesses for unknown new words. Be warned though, for every guideline there’s an exception. That’s why I call them guidelines and not rules.

Guideline 1: If a vowel if followed by a single consonant at the end of a word, it is pronounced as short vowel: sit, log, had, men, bus

Guideline 2: If the two consonants after a vowel are different, the vowel is also usually short: link, hand, rock, dish, mark, sing. Exceptions: short, climb,

Guideline 3: If a consonant in the middle of a word is doubled, the vowel before it is short but if it is single then the vowel before it is long. Examples: diner, dinner; caned, canned; biter, bitter

Guideline 4: If a vowel is doubled, it is usually a long sound: fleece, sheep, goose, moon. Notable exceptions: book, foot, blood – all these are said with short vowels

Guideline 5: If two different vowels appear next to each other, the second is usually silent while the first is prounced the way you would say it if you were chanting the alphabet: wait, dream, loan. Exceptions: said, head, riot

Guideline 6: If a vowel is the final letter in a word, it is pronounced as a long vowel: she, me, he, go, domino, flamingo

Guideline 7: If e is at the end of a word, the vowel in the same word becomes long. This is a basic rule taught to young children and is sometimes called Magic E: same, late, bake, slate, blade, deviate, magistrate

 

Finally – remember this:

When we add a suffix to the end of a word, there are times when we double the final consonant and times we don’t. Whether this consonant is doubled or not may or may not impact on the pronunciation of the word.

Be careful here because there is much to trip the unsuspecting language learner up. Let’s look at some examples:

If a root word ends with e, we drop this e if we want to add ING but we don’t double the final consonant. Because the word ended in e in its base form this is still reflected in the pronunciation even though it’s no longer there in the spelling.

Make → making

Bake → baking

Hate → hating

Bike → biking

If the word didn’t end in e then we double up the final letter of the root word. Because the root of the word did not end in e, it follows the rule of a short vowel before a single consonant.

Bat → batting

Begin → beginning

Slam → slamming

Sit → sitting

Things can appear complicated around doubling consonants and knowing how to pronounce them but actually they’re not. Just remember the guidelines above about root words.

Look at these pairs. All of them follow a logical pattern of pronunciation. Can you confidently say these words?

Hoping hopping

Scraping scrapping

Waging wagging

Caped capped

Diner dinner

Maned manned

Biter bitter

Need more help? Use the Cambridge Dictionary to check your pronunciation if you need to or contact me for details about my British accent coaching course.