In Hungarian the stress is always on the first syllable of the word. It's something that stays with a lot of Hungarians when they speak other languages (of course that becomes better over time) Build in a stressmistake here and there to make it sound more authentic.
Your 'r'-s are very much English, whereas in Hungarian, all 'r'-s are fully thrilled (even more than rhotic English dialects, more similar to Spanish 'rr'), which more often than not bleeds into their English pronunciation. Something you should bear in mind is that Hungarian writing is very strictly phonemic (unlike English or French) and especially beginner speakers tend to simply phonetically read out the English letters, a feature that is sometimes retained to a degree, even when they get better. When it comes to vowels, Hungarian has a set of long and short "pairs" of each, that generally tend to fall on either side in the general Western European vowels, in terms of "openness". For example Hungarian short 'e' can be considered as a very "flat" 'e' in English 'let'. Another very peculiar feature is the inability to pronounce English 'th', which becomes either 's' (if unvoiced) or 'd' (if voiced). Also the stress is strictly on the first syllable of words which gives it a rather rhythmic character. Maybe not as prevalent, but when something is written with double consonants (like: 'wall'), Hungarians sometimes tend to elongate that sound (as gemination as a valid phenomenon in Hungarian, unlike in English).
Your Hungarian accent still sounds too English to me. You should pronounce every letter separately, every vowel and consonant must be a clear, distinct sound.
The funny is...Every english people think about me that I'm French...just because of my accent...The truth is, you can not compare the Hungarian language to any language in europe or even in the world,there is no any other language which sounds like hungarian.Once one of my colleagues said when I had to speak my own language front of 'em: -Man, Your language sounds like from an another planet,seriously...(She was english working together with a loads of different nations around the globe) They could recognize the spanish and slavic accents but no one could tell about me that I'm Hungarian...even one of the hungarians asked me: - R U French? Yes, I am, mate... I won't cover up myself :D stay hidden :D ki érti ezt:D...
I'm not a professional. I'm just a hungarian who usually try to hide his accent and as I observed, the biggest difference between the two laguages is being articulate. The hungarians tend to pronounce every letter of every syllable. And also a huge differentiation between the vowels. We have very clean vowels which do not tend to differentiate through words if it is an "A" or an "E" than it sounds pretty much the same every time. I thought you accent was good, I could be improved by pronouncing clearly every letter. His accent is quite thick, but this might help... ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-6UGdjQcF_Ag.html
the hungarian accent based on, that we have more sounds, but they are more exact. hungarians try to use these (originally hungarian) sounds - it is very obvious at speking of another languages (eg german) too.
Thanks for that demo of this accent. I think that you have a wonderful occupation going. I love and use audiobooks a lot as I drive a lot. the narrator absolutely makes or breaks an audio book. Many sound like they are reading the story, not living it. A huge difference. I don’t know you but will make an effort to look for you work. It you Take this much effort to “ get it right”, you are probably good. To me,, a really good narrator is Ray Porter. I look for almost anything that he narrates. When he narrates, each character is clearly defined with great skill. He is there, in the story. Again thanks.and I will look/listen for you!
This was great, you identified a lot of the issues! As for #4, I think Hungarians default to their own sound kit, and which vowel gets used depends on how the particular English vowel is pronounced. In last, it resembles the Hungarian 'á' vowel. In that it resembles 'e'. So the Hungarian accent is inconsistent, because English is inconsistent.
I think the Hungarian accent has changed in English. My mother's parents (who died in the 1970s and who would have been like over 110 years old if they were still alive today) and all her aunts and uncles had Hungarian accents that were very strong. They sounded like Lugosi Bela and Gabor Zsa-Zsa when they spoke English. I can recognize an older Hungarian people (often Jews) a mile away any time I hear that accent . Younger Hungarians who grew up in post-Communist Hungary don't sound like that any morew when they speak English. I can't tell the difference between their accent and r Slovakian or Serbian or Croatian, they all have a general kind of nondescript Central European accent that I can't pinpoint; neither German nor Eastern European.
Our vowel harmony is different from English. Also we pronounce every letter which contributes to our accent. There are a few Hungarian You Tube channels to listen to Hungarian. Although I lived here in the UK 20+ years I haven’t managed to lose my accent. Good luck though!
The reason for the two different short 'a' pronunciations...when it sounds like the 'ah' in father is because nearly all Europeans learn Oxford English in school. So, they follow the rules of British Standard/Oxford English. Yes, I am a dialect coach. :)
I think you did an excellent job. You didn't focus on everything, but what you mentioned did it well. I have read a few good comments. Rothic R and stress is on the first syllable are big differences compared to English. And Hungarian use hard consonants. But Hungarian use strong form in general. For example, aɪ wʊd laɪk sʌm fɪsh end chɪps instead of ɑ wəd laɪk səm fɪʃ ən tʃɪps . These differences are due to the characteristics of the language. But there's an other problem with Hungarian accent and it's the way how they teach English language. Until I got into linguistic education, I struggled with my Hungarian accent. Anyone who has a degree in English, teaches differently than those who are 'just' English teachers. In public education and courses don't teach phonics and phonetic writing, and very little time is spent on practicing pronunciation. There's only learning after hearing (from the Hungarian teacher)... copy of bad copy? From primary to high school, I had 5 different teachers with 5 different accents (or tried to imitate accents). In addition, we watch American and English movies, series. So, therefore, it is not consistent how and how much we distort a vowel (like the a sound problem what you mentioned). Another typical example is 'got', it often sounds like 'gut'.
Like all Eagles songs, I have heard this one 6 billion times. In America, the Eagles are one over-exposed band, to say the least. This is the first time I listened to the lyrics with interest. I like the mystery you put into it. It's the first time the song has made sense to me.
Why thank you! Sometimes when rehearsing a passage for a book, I'll do it in an accent just to keep myself fresh. You ever tried something like that when getting ready for a meeting?
@@lyndraski4152 Wonderful. And welcome to the field. it's a wonderful way to make a living. Keep encouraging yourself every step of the way. I'm in your corner, too.
@@narratormatt Thank you Matt - I'm VERY impressed with how friendly and helpful people are in this industry. Yourself included! Perhaps we'll see each other in an APA social....
It does remind me of the educated speech of the Martians: Wigner, Szilard, von Neumann. What is missing is a thrilled R and the stress *always* on the first syllable of the word.
@@narratormatt Im an actor and VO artist and have come to your videos a few times to become familiar with a new accent: I really appreciate all your work!
@@narratormatt Awww thank you!! By the end of my acting career, I aim to have watched all of your accent analyses at least once. And I love the song transformations at the end. Great talent. Later!
Hi! You are great but let me give you some advices. I am a Hungraian and I work on Software developement sector. I have heared a lot of really bad Hungarian accents (including my accent as well) 1. Slow down! Speaking a foreign language is hard, if you have accent you definetly not so familiar yet, so look for the words. 2. The consonants in Hungarian language are hard and break the speak flow ... try to speak more fragmented (hmm .. I don't know the good word for thet) 3. Vocabulary: Use "very" as often as you can. Hungarian language is really rich in words, and has a complex grammar but in adjectives we have not so much. We add very for our adjectives.
Hungarian is a very difficult language. Especially when they do the “r”. They don’t roll or make an “er”. It’s a “ur”. I say this because my father was Hungarian. He always would shake his head. I couldn’t get the R’s right until my cousin taught me.
@@MasterofJambons oh, no kidding! I was about to counter with "no, it's a steriotyped Mexican" but actually, you are correct, it's based on Peter Lorre. Nice one.
late to the party, it may be that in the a=e example you run into hungarian vowel harmony, where vowels become similar in what I've read is meant for ease and aesthetics, my guess for last= lahst is british english input possibly when the sound is isolated
I’m hungarian and your accent sounded like a british trying to be an american 😃 we more sound like an indian or an arabic person while we’re talking english 😃
It really doesn't sound like a Hungarian accent so I don't know what people are saying. Hungarian learner of 4 years married to a Hungarian here. Just sounds like transylvania/German mash up. Forget swapping w for v, roll the rs and pronounce every letter in the word. The intonation and rhythm is also important.
@@narratormatt I stand corrected as my wife said it was a decent attempt. I appreciate this video was from quite a while ago so it's probably not relevant to comment anymore! You know what It's hard to say but I think Hungarians emphasise the start of words, they're heavy at the beginning. With the w/v, we'll I suppose that is slightly true, it depends how good of an English speaker they are as to if the correct that mistake. What you said about the vowels is a good observation. I'm no expert dont get me wrong I just tend to walk around the house imitating my wife's parents Hungarian English accent which is not a very large sample size I know!
I'm Midlamds English so I don't know about you but when I say Butter, Cup, But, Cut, Hut, Mutt, my 'U' is very deep in the throat. Hungarian's is much higher like you said, something like Botter, Cop, Bot, Cot, Hut, Mott. Actually more similar to RP, no deep U sounds. The rhythm could be said to be something like Swedish perhaps?
@@danieltraynor5339 don't know about the Swedish *but* I'm finding that in Eastern Europe and Russia, the short "u" tends to turn into that sharper-upper sound you describe. I interpret it as a short "a." I hold onto that idea because I had a Russian roommate when I was in college and I remember him being upset with me and saying "Fack you."
I know this video is hella old, lol. But I grew up with Hungarian grandparents and a small tip I can throw you is to focus on emphasizing the first syllable instead of any other one. Most Hungarian words have the first syllable emphasized and when they speak English and force the emphasis on a later syllable, it sounds wierd. Lol. My grandmother says comfortable and Canada so weird. She says comfor-TAB-le. But like comfor-table. Like a table you eat at. Lol. And Can-AD-a. That might help push it over. Oh, and also tap your r's instead of doing the American r. Like the Spanish r. Not rr. But r. 😊
@@narratormatt probably because when they were learning, they had to memorize where the syllables were put and usually they're good at it. But with a few words, they guess wrong, lol
@@SheIsABear3811 you're hitting me with my Kryptonite: Pronunciations on a case-by-case basis. YARRRRGH! Okay, I challenge: We can do this... see if you and your friends can put together a list of at least 20 words that are frequently mispronounced, as you mentioned. Won't be perfect but it'll give us an edge.
@@narratormatt, MediocreGamerGirl is right, ALL Hungarian words are stressed only on the first syllable. However, this is only obvious when pronouncing the words individually. Sentence intonation sometimes overrides this rule, or at least makes it hard to apply.
Just having fun with accents, this is the first video I've ever viewed on the topic. How would they say the u in "surely". Definitely not tip number 5 correct... "sarely"... tried saying it and it is A- Hard! B- Sounds wrong! C-Maybe I'm saying the "re" part wrong.
Well, "surely" is a tricky one because while it should be pronounced in American as "SHOO-er-lee" we tend to say it like "SHER-lee:" My guess would be to let it be that sound with the Hungarian *or* turn it into a long "a" like SHARE-ly. What do the rest of you all think?
Sorry man, this is pretty awful. I genuinely appreciate the interest and attempt though. The reality is that many sounds in the Hungarian language are very difficult to develop later in your life (when your speech and mouth muscle memory have already been molded). I'm fortunate that Hungarian was the only language spoken in my NYC household. So, it was all I knew as a toddler. The critical building blocks are were embedded in my muscle memory and allow me to this day to pronounce Hungarian words properly. I'm sure nobody cares about my story, but it does illustrate how difficult Hungarian is to learn (as a full grown adult).
weeeeeellllll...I'll be strict here and tell you that your hungarian accent is not quite there. You are totally right about the "V" at 2:24 and your "O" at 2:46 is perfect but you missed the single most important thing, which is the letter R. You need to spell that by rolling your tongue so to say. It's like when you try to imitate the sound of the airscrew of an airplane, but when spelling R you just do the beginning of that. But I'm not sure that explains it well, so basically your tongue needs to touch your palate a bit while rolling your tongue backwards. But it has to be done quickly ofcourse. That's the most important but I'll try to explain the rest by going though the alphabet with examples. Keep in mind that the hungarian alphabet contains more letters than the english alphabet. Oh yes, and for the examples - you need to read it in american accent, because I plan the sound according to that and otherwise it doesn't necessarily give the right sound. One more thing, in the examples, I will highlight the letter itself with capital letters. A: wAter Á: Eye. lUst. B: no difference C: caTS CS: CHeck D: no difference. except it's a really clear D. DZ: heaDS DZS: Jay E: nAp É: hEy. plAce. F: no difference G: Gay :D GY: I don't think the english has anything with GY. It sounds like the one in the french Adieu (meaning farewell) H: Hill. we always spell out the H! I: big. But you have to be more precise with this because americans don't pronounce i quite like hungarians. For americans, it sounds somewhere between É and I. Its actually like ee, but short Í: keep (our long I) J: yay K: no difference L: no difference LY: this one is special because it's technically the same as J, so we often make grammatical mistakes when writing certain words where we use the wrong one :D M: no difference N: no difference NY: meNu O: Aw (refer to 2:46) a good example: or. Ó: Awwww Ö: bUrn Ő: bUUUrn :D (long Ö) P: no difference Q: cool. we don't say it like Kyoo, but Koo. But we actually don't even have words with Q. But we still have it in our alphabet? strange. I just noticed this :D R: RRRRR S: SHit SZ: Sex T: Tackle. Say it like it's in the beginning of a word, not in the end, like for example part, because the T is clear. TY: english doesn't have this sound in any of their words I think. It sounds the same as it looks, T and Y together, but blended together. U: menU Ú: fOOd. except its not fewd, like americans actually pronounce food. also: crew. Ü: fewd :D Ű: feeewd! V: refer to 2:24 W: sounds the same as V. But there's no real hungarian word with W, so it's the same case as with Q. :P X: no difference Y: we don't have words with Y alone. We only use them embedded in our other letters, which we actually do use: GY, LY, NY, TY. Z: no difference ZS: garaGe. Ok in the meantime I realized this alphabet doesn't really help so let's take other examples. Like how we pronounce numbers with our disgusting hungarian accent: 1: one, Vun. almost the same but more clearly. 2: tOO. not tew, like americans actually say it. 3: Free/ Tree / Sree. Depends, some say it like free, others say tree, some say Sree. So we are different in the way we deal with this. It's probably the most difficult for us. But hey, the way americans say it is actually close to tree, unlike the way real englishmen say it with the real th sound. which is kinda difficult. 4: fohRR. FawRR. something like that. 5: f-eye-v 6: Six. except: refer back to I in our alphabet 7: ok, try to combine these letters from our alphabet, and that's how its prounounced in real hungarian accent: SZ E V Ö N 8: ate 9: nine (same). 10: ten. well, basically the same but with our harsh T. 11: refer back to our alphabet and combine the sounds of these letters: I L E V Ö N 12: tvelv 13: surTeen 14: foRteen etc. Ok now some frequently used words like adverbs and such: a: refer back to our alphabet: Ö. (bUrn) the: refer back to our alphabet: DÖ or DI. this: Dis. The i is the important here. these: refer back to our alphabet: D Í Z. or: D-ease those: dose. or british doors. some: sum. clearly. SUM is: iz. with our real I. not your É and I inbetween crap :D are: AARe. americans say it more like, just, R. :D for: FOR. ok so americans say it more like fr (without actually making an O sound) we prounce it fast, and clear, with our rolling R. FOR. to: ok the way americans say it is more like tew. we say TU (refer back to our alphabet) (Tackle-menU) with: vit before: bif-ohh-R after: AfteR. R! Or refer back to our alphabet: E F T Ö R. others might say it like: Á F T E R. "Such a lovely place" SZ Á CS Ö L Á V L I P L É SZ remember: SZ: sex Á: Eye CS: CHeck Ö: bUrn (this is very very imprtant to nail hungarian accent. a is Ö.) LÁVLI PLACE. try to sound as clear as you can and dont say Place with a long A, and not fast. Ok now lets try the lyrics from the video: really, just refer back to the alphabet and how our letters sound: On ö dárk dezöRt hájvéj, kúl vind in máj heR, voRm szmell (remember, sz is s) of kolitász, Rájzing áp tRú di eR. áp öhed in dö disztensz, Áj szó ö simmeRing lájt (remember simple s in hungarian is sh) máj hed gRú hevi end máj szájt gRú dim Áj hed tu sztáp foR dö nájt. Aight this is gonna be enough. I think it would take too much time to check every letter and "translate" the sounds letter by letter. Hope this helps, good luck!
Appreciate your attempts especially as my actor son (native English speaker, no Hungarian accent) vants to add speaking English vit a Hungarian accent to his repertoire. I am a native English speaker with Hungarian ancestry and have undertaken Hungarian language courses. Regarding the "a" sound - I don't think you have this right (you did ask for feedback). There are two "a" letters in Hungarian which are pronounced differently. When speaking English, we are only interested in the Hungarian "a" that has no diacritical mark. Imagine in your head a north American pronouncing the word "Canada". A Hungarian would pronounce it something more like "CON-o-do" with the "a" sound pronounced as in how English English speakers would say the word "con" - to swindle. Each syllable would have a (short, not elongated) "con" sound, with emphasis on the first syllable. For the letter "i", a Hungarian would pronounce this as in "feet". So the word "illiterate" might be something like EEE-leet- ehh-rot (first syllable emphasised). But thanks so much for your work and the valuable resource Matt!
Hmmm..., u=a, for example when we say: 'Such a...' It's probably 'cause we have so many words with tons of e in our Hungarian language but I just guess, not really sure of the reason of this thing. ^^ Btw, great video, it's just interesting to hear about my language on the other hand. :)
Try to use long vowels too like in starch out the a in way a bit longer. The best thing to do is learn all the vowels in Hungarian, there is 12 but it really is just 5 sets of short an long vowels plus a a' The constants are pretty much the same just a bit more articulated and harder.
@@narratormatt Unfortunately no, I don't know any extensive material, but you could search for the Hungarian alphabet on RU-vid there is plenty of them. One other suggestion i can give you is to always put the stress on the first syllable, very important! Speak slow and uneasy with a heavy and articulated manor. I wish i could help you more.
@@narratormatt By the way look up Edward Teller, He was a brilliant nuclear physicist. He speaks with a very thick Hungarian accent, sometimes hard to understand but you could learn from it. Just search for his speeches on RU-vid
Yeah, I've been thinking about that. Answer: It would definitely be easier to demonstrate in IPA for viewers who are fluent in IPA but I find that these other spellings make it easier for me and many others to process.
I'm a Hungarian. Native Scouse and Hungarian. I'm an ER nurse. So I have no problem with the minor differences. But the Hungarian language is too complicated. The Japanese lack of genders is great. Hungarian is genderless, shares the structure of Japanese.
When hungarians say 'could' we usually pronounce it with a long u. The way you pronouced it sounded more like a our own ü sound and we don't do that maybe because we just say what they read, we have nothing like 'earth' where 'ea' make a completely different sound. Hungarians, if they don't know how to pronounce a word will try to say it as it is written.
