I keep coming back to this one. I have been teaching Chinese kids phonics through your videos. It really helps me to teach them correct phonics, not just the "A is for Apple" that everyone else is doing. As an American native speaker (with a little bit of Native American heritage btw) I just speak it well, but until now didn't know how to tell others what I was doing. Thank you for helping me educate my students and for educating me as well!
Thank you for your feedback, we really appreciate it. We hope to include more information on phonics in our future videos. We see now that people and teachers are interested in this information. 😊👋
This video has really blown my mind . I have been learning English since I was twelve years old, now I am 39. Always the teacher says the difference is the long or short of vowels. This video really changes my front knowledge, I will practice more using your method. Now I am teaching my kids phonics, your Chanel is really a treasure to me. Thanks so much!
Glad to hear that this video was helpful! Let us know if you have any questions. By the way, we've shared a lot of content on phonics on our RU-vid Community page, check it out: ru-vid.com/show-UC-MSYk9R94F3TMuKAnQ7dDgcommunity
Oh boy, there are tons of material explaining the long/short vowels, mostly to kids. Poor kids. Besides phonics, there are lots of wrong or inadequate lessons, from the linguistic point, about grammar and other language teaching. As a Brazilian ESL teacher, it´s a frustration. But there still are few teachers like you That bring some lights to this darkness. Thanks so much.
Thank you! We're glad that our videos are helpful, especially for teachers. We love having teachers in our community. By the way, we share a lot of useful materials on phonics and IPA on our RU-vid Community page, check it out: ru-vid.com/show-UC-MSYk9R94F3TMuKAnQ7dDgcommunity Let us know if you have any questions or feedback !
This video is so interesting. Couple years ago I read a book called "American Accent Training" by Ann Cook. I loved it so much that I decided to translate the whole book into Vietnamese and would share it with other English learners whose English was not good enough to read the original version. But I was like 80% done and it was still in my computer. That's why now I don't feel much trouble understanding the video, it feels like I'm revising what I learned 2 years ago = )))). There's still mistakes in what I translated, tho. Ann didn't explain well about the misuse of vowel length and vowel tenseness that I thought they are the same, one is used in America and the other is use in IPA. So for the sake of simplicity, I transferred the whole transcription symbols in her book back to IPA in my translation. How stupid! And thank God I didn't deliver that my translation to other people. Thank you so much so that video!!!
+LAN NGUYEN Lan, we also want to say THANK YOU for translating the subtitles for all our videos into Vietnamese. It's been very helpful to a large number of our viewers. You're our ⭐!
The vowel length symbol IS used to represent a longer vowel in IPA. It is merely that the British are using some traditional transcription systems, which are using the length symbol due to traditional reasons. It's also why in both British and GA transcription, ʌ is used. The quality of the "ʌ" vowel is distinct from ə, but in English transcription, it is used for the same quality, but in stressed syllables. It comes historically from a short u, and used to have a distinct pronunciation, but has since merged.
At last, I've been able to understand why in many translators they have different phonetic writing, I have studied so much phonetics and there's always the same pattern, that division that I don't see much sense, between short and long vowels. Thank you change the way I see the world.
I've had to get very cross with education majors in meetings when explaining that "no, English doesn't really have vowel length. No, we don't have long vowels, at all. No, those are called diphthongs. No, I don't care what your kindergarten teacher told you." (Education majors are not generally very smart, though I've met exceptions. I know that I got stupider when taking education major classes.)
WOW AMAZING you have revealed the best rule, this didn't tell me in my school and neither in my institute .I really love this lesson it is really helpful , thanks a lot you have changed my mind .
There are other factors affecting the length of vowel sound. First, whether it is stressed emphatically or not (whether tone is rising or falling or more complex also matters) Second, the number of unstressed syllables before and after it. Third, the duration of the pause after it (if present). The maximum length is at the end of a sintagma.
this video really changed my mind! I teach English and have my students associate i: and I as being tense and relax, but I use this relax and tense concept only with those letters, because they are the most difficult to dinsinguish. Now, this is the first time I ever heard about the "length of the vowel". I am going to use it in my lessons. I noticed that I unconcioulsy sue longer vowel sounds before a voiced consonant, and in fact it sounds weird when it is shortened. Thanks much !!!
I love this channel!! I did not know that long sound is not that long, and the symbols of the phonetic alphabet differ between American and British English. Wow. Your videos are full of useful information and examples! Brilliant. Thank you.
Now i see very clear that the sound of each vowel is determined by the consonant follow and becomes even easier knowing the sound of the four stop sounds consonant c k t and b
I've got a question for you guys; is it true that in American English there's a particular tempo/speed of speech? Like, the slower you speak, the better, I've heard stuff like if you want to sound more American it's necessary to slow down the speed of speech down to about 2 words per second, does it make any sense to you?
This is probably the best academic learning Chanel in all RU-vid. So profesional, and you explain very well, even I like the graphics of your videos. So glad you are here and so glad I subscribe to the Chanel
Thanks so much for posting this video! The widespread promulgation of this incorrect information about English vowels being "long" and "short" bothers me to no end (I know, I really should have bigger things to worry about, that's another matter). In fact, I have been looking for a source to reference so I can correct some online entries about vowel length which correctly discuss languages such as Japanese and Finnish (which do have long and short vowels in that saying the vowel longer changes the meaning, there are many minimal pairs of long and short vowels), but then some grammarian inserts a lengthy discourse about long and short vowels in English! And deletes my correct explanation that in fact what are called "long" and "short" vowels actually are different vowels. ! I've been trying for years to fix this, aside from this excellent video, do you guys know of a book or other source I could cite to stop my revisions being undone? I learned this stuff in linguistics 101, everyone who studies linguistics knows this but oddly, I cannot find an actual source that says explicitly what you guys present in this video. Can you guys help out in sourcing? Thanks!
Hello there! OK, we tried to find some books and articles that you can look up and read on the internet. It's a little easier with articles and for the books we chose the ones that can be previewed via Google Books. 1. Article. The Vowels of American English. Marla Yoshida: ocw.uci.edu/upload/files/vowels.pdf (see the "Vowel Length" chapter) 2. Book. "Vowel lengthening One other important example of positional variation in English concerns the length of vowels. A vowel is longer when it occurs before a voiced consonant than it is before a voiceless one." EHRLICH, Susan; AVERY, Peter. Oxford Handbooks for Language Teachers: TEACHING AMERICAN ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION (Kindle Locations 1105-1107). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition. 3. Book. Finegan, Edward. Language: Its Structure and Use. United States: Cengage Learning, 2014. You can find this book via Google Books and if you enter the "vowel length rule" as a search query, it should provide a preview. Check the Phonological Rules and their Structure chapter, the rule is on page 123 - 125. Please, let us know if this helps!
I also concluded rightly or wrongly that a long vowel length is used before a voiced consonant or a vowel so you can actually hear it. There are also diphthongs and triphthongs. It also will be consistent with the voiced consonant or vowel. If you used a short vowel before a voiced consonant. The shorten vowel will get lost in the sound of the word. In other words, it will get washed out. There is an inconsistency here. In one of your own videos, "ae" you said to tense your lips and tongue. However, that same vowel is listed on the right column of relaxed vowels. I guessed the overall effect is relaxed.
Thanks God you're back !!! Miss you a lot. The issue about long and short vowels isn't going to be the same anymore: outstanding ! It would be great if you can post some videos on linking and reduction of sounds with the same structure as you have used in isolated sounds. Hope to hear from you asap.
+Alejandro García Vidal We missed you too! 😀 Glad you liked this video! Thank you for your suggestion, we'll cover these topics later after we are done with the fundamental stuff. Stay tuned. 😊👋
Keep up your good work! This video is so interesting because it gives some added value which is not obvious. Perhaps it would be a good idea to make a video on lax and tense vowel sounds, I mean, what they sound like if a vowel sound that should be tense is pronouced as lax and vice versa. That might give some food for thoughts.
Simply amazing! The quality of the diagrams/explanation/examples is insane. Love it! Isn't there a way to sponsor your channel? Because this job is worth of.
I just found your channel. I can't thank you enough. Your videos help me a lot to understand and these graphics are incredibly impressive with your work. I'll be coming back to your channel every day. Thank you!!😊😊
This is just a semantics issue. In English, long (hate,) short (hat,) and flat (ha) simply refer to the different sounds a vowel letter can make. It wasn't until I watched something about Italian that I realized some languages are actually affected by how long the vowel is held. Some dialects and accents soften or drop vowels due to their differences in English.
Tense vowel sounds change their quality during articulation. So they could be referred to as "slightly diphthongized" ones. The same is true for the /æ/ sound before the consonant /n/.
The /æ/ sound is tensed before /m/ and /n/ in all American and Canadian English that I know of, but this is mostly unique to North America. Canadians and some Americans in states like Minnesota or Wisconsin will also tense the sound before /g/, sometimes to the point where "bag" rhymes with "vague." Speakers in New York and Philadelphia diphthongize the vowel before a larger set of consonants, including /b/, /d/, /f/, and /s/. In Chicago and the greater "Inland North" dialect region, speakers will tend to diphthongize the /æ/ sound regardless of the consonant that follows it.
كان عندي إشكال كبير حوف الاصوات القصيرة والطويلة، وكنت أرى هذا غير منطقي في اللغة الإنجليزية ومنى انطق هذا الحرف قصير او طويل في الكلمة وهل هناك قواعد لذالك الان من خلال هذا الفيديو تبين لي وتأكدت أن هذه الطريقة غير صحيحة، شكرا جزيلا على هذا الفيديو، فعلا روعة
Ps: about the video, I think you've been saying this in all your previous videos. Never heard about this long and short vowel sounds. I've always thought of relaxed and tense vowel sounds. But it's great to know the different ways to classify and learn them. Thank you!
+Marquito L Thank you, we missed you too! Yes, indeed, in one way or another we kept reiterating the vowel tenseness topic in almost every video :). Awesome that you mentioned it. Stay tuned, more videos are coming soon!
Grazie for this one. Please, consider putting this one as the second video of vowels playlist as many gets confused by the transcription used by Cambridge & Oxford dictionaries.
Vowel length is quite an issue in pairs such as: LIVE-LEAVE, PULL-POOL, GOOD-FOOD, GIRL-AGO. But definitely NOT with COP-CUP-CAP, where the opening rank plays a huge role. Great video, BTW!!
@@SoundsAmerican Touché. Very smart! Yep, context does make it (almost) irrelevant. Resorting to minimal, isolated pairs, a contrast seems to be aroused. However, in natural, contextualized utterances, it really doesn't matter how this or that word is (mis)pronounced. I must admit, I see your point. Thus, why the heck should we be practicing and practicing these subtleties? Well, I presume the answer is to be found in your video. Thanks again for sharing & making us reflect upon! Rgds.
We asked just to find out what the difficulties were with the vowel length in the pairs that you listed (LIVE-LEAVE, PULL-POOL, GOOD-FOOD, GIRL-AGO) compared to the COP-CUP-CAP. Or did you mean something else? The subtleties, like the vowel length, are often important for pronunciation.
Excuse me sir, but I couldn't get the idea of the voiceless consonant in "beat" and "bead", I just noticed the difference of the first "ea" vs the second "ea" in length...But I heard the first "t" and the second "d".Thanks for your answer :) I found this concept: "Voiceless / unvoiced: a voiceless or unvoiced sound is one where the vocal cords do not vibrate, thus making the sound very whispery and without a pitch. It can tend to make a letter sound harsher when pronounced." But even having read that concept, the difference seems to be very subtle.. :0
You're absolutely right, the voiced sounds are pronounced with your vocal cords vibrating. You can check it if you put two fingers on your throat and pronounce any vowel sound. When making them, you'll feel slight vibration under your fingers. When you pronounce any voiceless sound, like /p/, /t/, or /f/, your vocal cords don't vibrate. In fast speech, when the final stops are unaspirated, it's hard to hear the difference between the voiced and voiceless sounds. So, vowel length really helps, as vowel sounds are longer before voiced sounds and shorter before voiceless. Hope it helps!
Thanks for your lesson! But in a single word, when a vowel comes before a voiced consonant, it is said a little bit longer. So is this true when we say a long sentence or do we only lengthen the vowel when it is in the stressed word? For example : - In a single word: Good - In one long sentence: "Good bye!" "That's good to hear!" And if we don't want to emphasize the word "Good" in a long sentence, can we pronounce the vowel shorter?
It's a great question. You're right; every English word has a stressed syllable when you pronounce it in isolation, but this can change when you put the word in context. So, depending on the intonation, some words may lose stress. The vowels in these words would be shorter. The point is, given the same context, a vowel before a voiceless consonant is always shorter than a vowel before a voiced consonant.
Damn! I don't know if there's difference frequency in every homophones after vibrate and non vibrate sounds, and now I gotta work on that again. Hmm here I go again! I been pronouncing bad as In bat frequency and now I gotta make it distinguish but I feel greatful thought got it now then 10 years later 😅. Thanks for the lesson I really appreciate you efforts! Keep up the fantastic work!
Is the ae sound tensed or relaxed? In your previous ae video, you stressed that tongue and lips should be tense when pronouncing it. But in this video, you classify the ae sound to the relaxed category. I’m confused about this sound. Hope what I typed makes sense to you. You have the best pronunciation videos on RU-vid. Love from China❤
Relaxed. We made a mistake in the video about the /æ/ sound, sorry. 😭 If you're looking for a reference resource, please check out our website soundsamerican.net, you can find the most accurate information there.
Excellent, what is the page to practice pronunciation, I like the animation and the way it explains pronunciation, I would like to continue practicing, thanks and blessings.
Glad you liked it! In our videos, we're using our own app, but we haven't released it to the public yet. We're planning to do it very soon and we'll announce the release on this channel. Stay tuned!
Hello you said the vowel in the word bead more longer than the vowel in the word beat what bout the vowel at the end of the word as in ( bee ) ? is more longer than bead. Thank you.
+macro Rus First of all, there's no such thing as the "long i," and that's what this video is about. Looks like you're talking about the tense /i/ sound, it's pronounced with your lips tensed and spread in a wide smile. Here's our video about this sound, check it out: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-PIu5WDIco0I.html Hope it helps!
There isn't a Spanish translation. I'm a native Spanish speaker studying linguistics with background in translation work. Would you like a free Spanish translation from me so you add it? I love your RU-vid channel and I use it with my Spanish speaking students learning English. The Spanish captions really help.
We'd love that! :) We have Spanish subtitles for almost half of our videos, but our translator can't help us any more, unfortunately. Could you please send us a note so that we could discuss this in more details? It's team@soundsamerican.net
Thank you. Very informative. Yet, I've still had trouble pronouncing the "short" i correctly. I don't have issues with the "long" one, but the short i is a headache. Especially now that I learned that both vowels have the same length. I feel desperate but I keep practicing.
It's probably just a matter of practicing it as much as possible in various words. Try to focus more on keeping your tongue and lips relaxed, even keeping your entire body relaxed.
i have noticed that were missing letters: L, R, C, H, M ,N NG, Q, W, X, Y before the vowels just do the example. But after I tought that letter C, it will depends if sounds like S or K. Letter Q, always sounds like K. X is a comabination of KS and GS so once like voiceless once like voiced. W and Y are somivowels but sounds like vowel so they're not a problem. R is vibrator What about for L & H ??? In the word HALF, L is dropped so doesn't count like a example.
The short / long difference is not really on the duration indeed. It is on the orthograph. Vowels written with 2 letters are long or diphtongs normally, vowels written with a single letter are short vowels.
