The SCHWA /ə/ in Weak Syllables | Modern RP British Pronunciation

so if we want to sound more British we want to sound clearer we want to sound good when we speak English especially if we're learning British English we need to first learn how to be lazy so those of you who've been following me for a while you would know that I am a pronunciation teacher and one of the most common questions I receive from everyone people taking my pronunciation course people who are subscribed to this channel people are always asking me about the schwa sound now I have made a video about the schwa sound before you can go and watch that first if you don't know how to pronounce it or how to do it in case you don't want to watch that video we pronounce the schwa sound when we have weak words in a sentence for example a word like four can often become fir what did you do for Christmas okay it can also happen at the end of words which finish with earth so for example teacher would be pronounced as teacher so it's an earth sound but the one that we're learning about today is probably one of the most difficult and most important situations which is when the schwa sound happens in a weak syllable in a word British people use the schwa everywhere it's the most common sound in British English and we need it we need to learn how to add this lazy sounds into our spoken English to sound more fluent and more like a native so firstly just so we understand why we use the schwa sound and this is my favourite sound in English it's my favorite sound to teach because it's so easy to teach but but it is a little bit difficult because we don't always know when it's going to happen it happens in an unstressed syllable a weak unstressed syllable so for example when we have the word about about the stress is on the second syllable bout bout I'm saying it's strong my pitch is going up and it's becoming a little bit longer well what about that letter A at the beginning I'm not saying about and no people will say about will always say it has and remember it's not stressed it's a weak syllable so we still need to keep it relaxed about about you should notice that more power is going into the bout and the up is just there to help you carry the word this happens in lots and lots of different words now just very quickly to pronounce the schwa sound the tongue should be relaxed in the middle of the mouth just floating relaxed in the middle of the mouth and we just open our mouth like we're breathing now practice that word with me about so yes it can replace every vowel in English it can replace every vowel in English but not always so this is why it's important to always have a dictionary with you which can show you how to pronounce the words you're learning let's just take a look at a few more words which have the schwa replacing the letter A in a weak syllable amazing so the stress is on May and at the beginning we have a amazing away-away alone let's try one where it's in the middle of a word vitamin Victor min so the stress in the word vitamin is on V and we have this weak syllable in the middle of the word where the a is we're going to replace it with the schwa sound vitamin the reason we do this number one I think it's because British speakers are a little bit lazy but this is the way to pronounce it this is the way that we're supposed to pronounce it an American would say vitamin and the same in Australia also so what we always need to remember is that these words have a stress syllable so sometimes not always the vowel in a weak syllable in a word can be relaxed and become but we have to know when we just have to listen to people and kind of just hear it and understand when it happens we can't just decide I'm going to put a schwa in this word doesn't work like that unfortunately we just have to practice from listening and the dictionary so now let's try some words where the schwa replaces the letter e present so the stress is on prep we finished with sunt present this one's a little bit tricky because there are a lot of syllables in this word experiment schweiz at the end month experiment now always remember that schwa is not in a stressed syllable so we say it fast we say it relaxed tongue is just chilling it's just relaxing in the middle of the mouth we don't need to do much to pronounce the schwa sound confident confident celebrate celebrate celebrate now sometimes with the letter I it has a regional variation but if you look it up in the Cambridge dictionary the pronunciation of cousin would be with an a cousin cousin cousin remember that stress is on the first syllable so it's stronger more power on that first syllable cut as in cousin and of course it can also happen with the letter O the word occur occur now this one's also tricky because lots of people have problems with that final Earth sound it's actually a very similar position to where we put the tongue for the schwa and the mouth position is also very similar but it's longer so a cur what about the word continue so we've got the schwa in the first syllable continue big word coming up now collaborate we have two schwarz here so this is a great way to practice it kur lab BRR rate collaborate where's the stress it's on lab collaborate and we can also use the schwa to replace the letter U for example support support stresses on port so we're relaxing the first syllable support so one of my students told me once a great way to remember the schwa sound is to imagine you're having really boring sex so you're making noises just to sound polite like you're not bored you want the person listening to think that you're enjoying the experience right so the sound you'll probably be making would be a little bit like this now put that on the end of a word teacher teacher same sound right so it's the boring sex sound maybe that will help you remember it anyway that's it for today thank you very much for watching guys I'm sorry this video is short I'm actually very sick at the moment and I didn't really have much energy so I didn't have much time to make a long video but I hope you found it useful and I hope you can start improving your schwa sound remember you can enroll in my British pronunciation course and start improving your spoken English right now if you go to ETJ English comm I can't wait to see you all there have a lovely week I will see you next Thursday and cheers guys [Music]

Channel: ETJ English

Views: 99,428

Keywords: schwa, ə, british pronunciation, british accent, etj english, etjenglish, british english, pronunciation, english lesson, learn english, weak syllables, syllable stress, sentence stress, english pronunciation

Id: uZZLRQLnR50

Length: 8min 1sec (481 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 22 2018