Study English | American English Pronunciation | What Makes American English Sound AMERICAN?

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Today is the third video this December where we're using the Friends Christmas episode,
The One Where Rachel Quits Her Job to study English.
Last week, she had a job interview.
Now in this episode, she's gotten the job and it's her last day working at the coffee shop.
We're going to study this scene and everything we can about American English pronunciation
to figure out what makes American English sound American.
Here's the scene.
There you go. Enjoy.
>> Should I tell her I ordered tea? >> No.
Excuse me, everyone.
Uh, this is my last night working here.
And, uh, I just wanted to say that I made some really good friends here.
And, uh, it's just time to move on.
As of this moment, I will never have to make coffee again.
And now let's do the analysis together.
There you go.
Okay our first thought group here is three words long.
What is the stress?
What's the most stressed word?
There you go.
There you go.
There you go.
There you go.
There you go.
The stress is all going up towards the peak.
The energy peaks out on the word go that has the O diphthong.
You will need some lip rounding for that.
There you, going up and pitch, going up in energy and volume,
there you go and then the up-down shape on the stressed syllable
There you go.
There you go.
There you go.
Try to do that. Try to do it really smoothly connected with that peak of stress on go.
You'll listen to it three times then there will be a little pause for you to try it.
There you go.
There you go.
There you go.
There you go. Enjoy.
Enjoy.
Enjoy. Second syllable stress.
Enjoy.
Enjoy.
Enjoy.
Enjoy.
So, the context here, this is Rachel's last shift.
The end of her last shift.
She did get a job in the video that we studied last week.
This section of the episode
she had just had an interview where she didn't feel like she did very well,
but she did get the job
and so this is her last shift and she knows that she has a job to go on to.
Enjoy.
Enjoy.
Enjoy.
>> Should I tell her I ordered tea? >> No.
Okay Chandler didn't actually order coffee.
What is the stress of his question here?
Should I tell her I ordered tea?
Should I tell her I ordered tea?
Should I tell her I ordered tea?
Should I tell her, the verb, should I tell her I ordered tea, tea and the pitch goes up.
It's a yes/no question.
Those are our two most stressed syllables there.
Should I,
the word should. I would say is I would write that with a SCHWA should, should, should I, should I.
The D is a flap sound because it comes between two vowels or diphthongs.
The L is silent here, so it comes between the SCHWA and the I diphthong.
So, it says should I, should I, da, da, da, da, da.
The tongue bouncing on the roof of the mouth should I tell her.
Should I tell her...
Should I tell her...
Should I tell her...
Should I tell her.
Tell begins with True T
because that starts a stressed syllable.
That's always going to be a true T
unless it's the TR cluster then it might be a CH sound, tell her.
We have a dropped H the ER, the SCHWA R ending just links on to the word before tell her,
tell her, should I tell her.
Should I tell her...
Should I tell her...
Should I tell her I ordered tea.
I ordered both a little flatter, lower in pitch I ordered, I ordered, I ordered, I ordered tea.
Before the stressed word tea
and again that is a True T because the T there begins a stressed syllable.
I ordered, I ordered, I ordered these two words flatter in pitch simplified less clear.
I know the word order
can be really tough I actually have a video that goes over how to pronounce that word when it's stressed,
you can check it out.
I'll put a link in the video description.
...I ordered tea?
...I ordered tea?
>> I ordered tea? >> No.
No. No. No.
Quick up-down shape no, no.
No.
No.
No.
Excuse me, everyone.
Excuse me, everyone.
Stress on 'scuse.
Notice the word is not excuse but it's scuse. She turns it into one syllable.
This is pretty common, so the letter X here represents two sounds K and S,
ex-cuse but it's not uncommon to drop the first vowel and drop the K
and just say scuse, scuse S sound K, U diphthong Z 'skjuz, 'skjuz me excuse me
and that's what she does here, stress on that syllable.
'Skjuz me, everyone.
Excuse me, everyone.
Excuse me, everyone.
Excuse me, everyone.
Uh, this is my last night working here.
Uh. Okay after the word uh what is the stress of this thought group?
Uh, this is my last night working here.
Uh, this is my last night working here.
Uh, this is my last night working here.
This is my last night, this is my, this is my.
These first three words said pretty quickly
this is my last then we have more stress there, last night working here.
this is my last night working here.
this is my last night working here.
this is my last night working here.
So, last and work have the most stress.
Even so, even though last is one of the stressed words it does have a dropped sound.
There is no T.
The reason is because it's part of an ending ST cluster.
The next word begins with a consonant.
The T between two consonants like this even when they're in two different words is often dropped.
Last night, it's just the S sound into the N sound,
last night and then we have a Stop T at the end of night.
That's because the next word begins with a consonant and the sound before it was a vowel or diphthong.
In this case the AI as in buy diphthong.
So, the sound before is
a diphthong but the letter before is an H
which we would think of as being a consonant letter
but if the T was between two consonants we would drop it just like here.
We don't talk about letters; the rules are all about sounds.
So here the T is not between two consonants, it's after the I diphthong before consonants.
That's why this T is a Stop T.
If you're completely confused about the T pronunciations
I do have a playlist at that goes over
all of the different ways that we pronounce T's and the rules around them.
this is my last night...
this is my last night...
this is my last night working here.
Last night working here stress, unstress.
Stress, unstressed, unstressed, last night working here.
So, the ing ending and the word here flatter, lower in pitch coming down in vocal energy.
The word 'work' this is a really tough word.
Don't try to make a vowel, it's the R vowel consonant combination wərk.
This is how we do it in American English.
This vowel doesn't really have a sound by itself, it just blends with the R,
wərk, work.
So, work, no jaw drop. We don't need much jaw drop for this sound.
Tip of the tongue pulls back and up a little bit wər, wərking, wərking here.
...working here.
...working here.
...working here.
And, uh...
And, uh...
Okay, it's not that common to hear the D in the word and but
she does do it especially
you'll hear people doing that when they're thinking of what to say next
then they're more likely to fully pronounce and.
And, the D links right into the next sound, which is the UH as in butter sound and, uh.
And, uh...
And, uh...
And, uh, I just wanted to say that...
What's the stress of this next thought group?
I just wanted to say that...
I just wanted to say that...
I just wanted to say that...
I just wanted to say that.
Again, ST cluster followed by a consonant just like last night becomes las' night
just wanted becomes jus' wanted.
I jus' wanted to say that.
I just wanted to say that...
I just wanted to say that...
I just wanted to say that...
Everything links together really smoothly.
We have three more Ts here.
Let's study them what happens with these Ts.
I just wanted to say that...
I just wanted to say that...
I just wanted to say that...
Wanted to say, wanted to say this first T totally dropped.
That's pretty common in this word because it comes after an N.
Lots of other people will do that waned.
So, ED ending here it's funny because we drop the T but it still follows the rules for coming after a T sound.
So, the rules for ED ending is when it comes after T or D it's the IH as in sit vowel and the D sound.
So, even though the T is dropped that rule still holds wan'ed, wan'ed, wan'ed
and when the word before to, t-o ends in a D it's common to just drop the T sound all together
and just put a SCHWA at the end
wanid, wanid, wanid, wanid, wanid to say, wanid to say that.
just wanted to say that...
just wanted to say that...
just wanted to say that...
She does a True T release here at the end of that.
It's also common to make that a Stop T when it comes to the end of a thought group like it does here
but here she makes it a True T.
So, I just wanted to say that.
We have four Ts that are part of the official pronunciation
of those words but only one of them is pronounced as a True T.
The other three are all dropped.
That's crazy. I love English.
...just wanted to say that...
...just wanted to say that...
...just wanted to say that I made some really good friends here.
What's the stress of this phrase?
...I made some really good friends here...
...I made some really good friends here...
...I made some really good friends here...
I made some really good friends here.
I here made, the verb, I made some really good friends, noun, here.
So, the general way that stress works is content words are usually stressed.
Those are nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs
but they're not all always stressed for example, the word good
is not stressed compared to really, really good.
Really has more stress.
I made some really good friends here.
...I made some really good friends here.
...I made some really good friends here.
...I made some really good friends here.
The word some, if that was fully pronounced it would have the UH as in butter vowel.
If it was stressed it would have that up-down shape some,
but I would actually write that with the SCHWA some, some.
It's flatter and pitch. I think the vowel is not full, I think it's reduced, made some really good friends here.
...I made some really...
...I made some really...
...I made some really good friends here.
Friends here, friends here.
I notice she is ending with her pitch going up a little bit friends here.
That's to show that she's not done talking she has a little bit more to say.
...friends here.
...friends here.
...friends here. And, uh,
And, uh, there she goes again thinking about what to say fully pronouncing the word and
linking the D into the next sound the thinking vowel the UH as in butter and, uh.
And, uh,
And, uh,
And, uh, it's just time to move on.
In this last thought group on this slide what is the stress?
…it's just time to move on.
...it's just time to move on.
...it's just time to move on.
Time, on and part of the phrasal verb it's just time to move on.
Now, we have a lot of interesting reductions here.
First I'm sure you can guess the T is dropped in just because it comes between two consonants.
Just time, the S going right into the next T there's no extra T
and the T in time is a True T because the T begins a stressed syllable.
What about the word it's, it's, how is that pronounced?
...it's just time...
...it's just time...
...it's just time...
T, t, it's just time t. t, the vowel is dropped.
That's not an uncommon pronunciation you will hear that it's, that's, what's and let's can all do this.
I actually have a video that goes over those reductions. I'll link to that in the video description.
...it's just time...
...it's just time...
...it's just time to move on.
So, it's just the TS sounds linked right into the next word, t's just, t's just, t's just time.
Now, the word to, this word reduces usually, almost all the time the vowel will reduce to the SCHWA
and the T changes so it can be a True T, but it can also be a Flap T and it's a flap T here.
That happens when the sound before was voiced.
Not always you don't have to do it that way, but you'll hear it that way a lot time to, time to, time to.
So, it's more like a D sound a flap sound in American English than a True T.
We don't have the true T release, time to.
...it's just time to...
...it's just time to...
...it's just time to move on.
Time to move on, time to move on and then
part of the phrasal verb move on the final word has some stress too - time to move on.
…time to move on.
...time to move on.
...time to move on.
As of this moment,
What's the stress of this thought group?
As of this moment,
As of this moment,
As of this moment,
Definitely the most stressed word is the word this.
As of this moment.
Mo has a little bit of stress too, it's the stressed syllable of that word but this has the most stress.
As of this moment.
As of, those two words link together really smoothly with a Z sound, as of this moment.
As of this moment,
As of this moment,
As of this moment,
As of this moment and she does a True T release here.
You won't always hear that but she's feeling energized, she's excited about what's happening.
She's also speaking to a larger group so in those cases you might pronounce more of your Ts
than you would in conversational English.
As of this moment,
As of this moment,
As of this moment, I will never have to make coffee again.
And then she breaks up this next statement into a few thought groups with some pauses
to bring extra emphasis. I will never, I will never
really stressing that word going up in pitch because she's not done and then a break.
...I will never...
...I will never...
...I will never have to make coffee again.
Have to make coffee and again she goes up in pitch because she's not done talking
and then the pitch at the end, again, goes down because that is the end of her statement.
So, she broke that sentence up into three different thought groups
to just bring extra stress to it, I will never have to make coffee.
So, by putting the break after the word the stress word never and the stress word coffee
just brings more emphasis to those words.
...have to make coffee again.
...have to make coffee again.
...have to make coffee again.
Have to make and actually I'm noticing here she is not reducing the word to;
she's making that a True T and an OO vowel which
again we almost never do but she is bringing emphasis to each word in this phrase.
She is so excited to never have to serve coffee again
that she did actually fully pronounce that word, but it was still flat.
It was still unstressed low in pitch,
have to make coffee again
have to make coffee again
have to make coffee again.
have to make coffee again.
The joke of this episode of course is that the very next scene is of her at her new job
where she is being told that her boss likes coffee and that she needs to make it for him.
Let's listen to this whole conversation one more time.
There you go. Enjoy.
>> Should I tell her I ordered tea? >> No.
Excuse me, everyone.
Uh, this is my last night working here.
And, uh, I just wanted to say that I made some really good friends here.
And, uh, it's just time to move on.
As of this moment, I will never have to make coffee again.
If you love learning English with TV we do have a whole playlist for that.
Check it out and if you love this kind of full pronunciation analysis I do a lot of it in my Academy.
My Academy is where I help students train and really reach their accent, their pronunciation goals.
Its Rachel's English Academy.
There's a 30-day money-back guarantee so don't be afraid to try it.
Also don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel, I make a new video every Tuesday.
That's it guys and thanks so much for using Rachel's English.