Speak English like a native!

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Группа Learning English.

Amber: Hello! Today, we learn how to speak English like someone from Yorkshire, in
the north of England, and like someone from the USA! Our teacher is Penny
Dyer – she’s one of the most respected international film and theatre voice
coaches. voice coach teaches actors to speak with different accents.
An accent is a way of saying words that shows what country, region or social
class someone comes from. So we talk about ‘a Yorkshire accent’ or ‘an
American accent’, and you may have heard of ‘RP’ – which stands for
Received Pronunciation. RP is a way of speaking British English that is
considered to be the standard pronunciation in the UK. And we have the verb
‘to coach’, which means to teach someone a special skill.
Penny has worked with many famous actors such as Nicole Kidman, Cate
Blanchett and Helen Mirren (whom Penny taught to act the role of the Queen!).
So, time for our first lesson – how to speak English with a Yorkshire accent or
‘dialect’. Penny’s advice to actors is to ‘use your imagination’ – in other words,
try to see the place, or ‘the landscape’ in your mind, and try to feel the weather!
As you listen to Penny, try to catch what the weather is like in Yorkshire.
Penny Dyer
Getting in through the actor’s imagination is always the way forward with dialect. So I
suppose, when you listen to someone like Kelly from Doncaster, what she’s doing is talking
about how lovely it is to get all snuggle-ly and wrapped up against the biting cold, wet
Yorkshire weather, and there’s something about that that you need to battle against when you
do a Yorkshire accent. So actually talking about the landscape, the topography, the history -
that sort of gets you into other areas and that opens up the imagination really for the actors.
Amber: So Penny says to speak with a Yorkshire accent, you need to imagine you are
trying to keep warm in the face of ‘the biting cold, wet Yorkshire weather’!
That’s a strong description - isn’t it? - ‘the biting cold’. Penny says you need to
think about ‘the topography’ of Yorkshire – the features of the Yorkshire
landscape – for example, the open countryside, the hills, the winding roads.
Listen again and try to hear the sound of the rolling Yorkshire countryside in
Penny’s Yorkshire accent!
Penny Dyer
Getting in through the actor’s imagination is always the way forward with dialect. So I
suppose, when you listen to someone like Kelly from Doncaster, what she’s doing is talking
about how lovely it is to get all snuggle-ly and wrapped up against the biting, cold, wet
Yorkshire weather, and there’s something about that that you need to battle against when you
do a Yorkshire accent. So actually talking about the landscape, the topography, the history -
that sort of gets you into other areas and that opens up the imagination really for the actors.
Amber: Next, we learn how to speak like a native American! As you’ll hear, the trick is
the same as before. We have to imagine the place, and in the case of the USA,
the huge place! So we need to think of putting some ‘space’ into how our
English sounds!
Notice Penny also talks about emphasising ‘the vowel sounds’ – vowel sounds
are the sounds you make without closing your mouth or throat. Penny says
Americans put a lot of ‘the emotional meaning’ into their vowel sounds. That’s
interesting, isn’t it? See if you can hear that the next time you hear an
American accent, in a film, for example. Here’s Penny again. As you listen, try
to move your face and mouth in the relaxed way she suggests!
...