Want to Lose or Gain a Southern Accent?

By Bonnie Engel Lee, Ph. D.

“The Speech Doc”

Do you have a “southern” drawl you’re trying to lose? Or a voice over job that requires you to use one? I just found a good website that, believe it or not, is hosted by the BBC. Here’s the link… http://www.bbc.co/uk/dna/h2g2/A30501695 to the article on “The Southern Drawl”.

There are too many aspects (word choice, durational changes, etc.) to address all of them here. However, I’ve included some minimal pairs (pairs of words that illustrate some of the distinctions) to enhance your awareness of the differences. (See below)

After you’ve read the article, return here for some practice materials to help isolate some of the features of southern dialects. Examples are numbered. The first word after the number shows you how a word might be pronounced by a southern speaker; the second word is provided for contrast. In the center is a comment to explain the major differences.

Vowel Additions

Southern Speech/ Not Southern Speech

1. pay-ut - pet

2. say-ut - set

3. may-ut- met

4. way-ut - wet

5. fray-ut - fret

Vowel Differences

1. mah/ m…”eye” (my)

2. bah/ b…..”eye” (bye)

3. dah/ d….”eye” (die)

4. sah/ s….”eye (sigh)

5. crah/ kr…”eye” (cry)

Other Vowel Differences

1. Mon-dee/ Mon- day

2. Toos-dee/ Tues-day

3. Wins-dee/ Wens-day

4. Thurs-dee/ Thurs-day

5. Fri-dee/ Fri-day

R sound variations

1. holl-er / holl-oh (hollow)

2. foll-er/ foll-oh (follow)

3. yell-er/ yell-oh (yellow)

R sound with another vowel

1. har/ high-er (hire)

2. bar/ bye-er (buyer)

3. far/ fie-er (fire)

4. tar/ tie-er (tire)

5. lar/ lie-er (liar)

Primary Stress Patterns

Sometimes, the syllable which receives the primary stress is different in some of the variants of southern speech. In the BBC article, some of the examples given were “GEE-tar (guitar) or SEE-mint (cement), where the first syllable may receive the primary stress in some southern dialects.

First Syllable-Primary Stress Second Syllable-Primary Stress

1. ‘gui- tar / gui ‘tar

2. ‘ce-ment / ce-‘ment

3. ‘out-side / out-‘side

4. ‘be-long / be-‘long

Hope you enjoyed this little “exercise”. Have fun, y’all. (I used to live in Texas).

If you have any voice or speech questions for the “Speech Doc”, feel free to comment here or email your questions/comments to:

speechdoc@gmail.com

Accents- A Manual For Actors

by Bonnie Engel Lee, Ph. D.
“The Speech Doc”

I just found a great book to help you learn a variety of accents. It’s called, Accents: A Manual for Actors. It’s by Robert Blumenfeld (2002), who has been a professional actor and a private and production dialect coach in New York City for more than 25 years. You can find his book by the ISBN number (978-0-87910-967-752995).

It contains some general principles and advice about accents including warm up exercises. There are four features of any accent, according to Blumenfeld:
• The physical positioning of the vocal apparatus
• Sounds changes, shifts and substitutions
• Stress (rhythm) changes
• Pitch patterns (intonation)

Blumenfeld describes a variety of North American accents and also has chapters on “how to do……” many of the world’s accents including the romance language, Germanic accents, Slavic language accents, African accents and Asian accents.

Included in the book are two CD’s the contain examples of the different accents described in the book. The book also contains a significant number of practice materials. It’s a great resource if you have a North American accent you are trying to “lose” or are trying to acquire an accent for a voiceover job you just got.

If you have any voice or speech questions for the “Speech Doc”, feel free to comment here or email your questions/comments to: speechdoc@gmail.com

What American dialect do you have? Take the US Dialect test!

By Bonnie Engel Lee, Ph. D.

“The Speech Doc”

Ever wonder if others can tell where you are from? Here’s a website (see below) where your responses to a test can identify what area of the US you come from (if you are honest). It’s fun and may give you some insight into the features of your own dialect. Enjoy!

www.gotoquiz.com/what_american_accent_do_you_have

If you have any voice or speech questions for the “Speech Doc”, feel free to comment here or email your questions/comments to: speechdoc@gmail.com

The Golden Rule of Intonation:
Questions rise…. Statements fall?
By Bonnie Engel Lee, Ph. D.
“The Speech Doc”

Rising and falling intonation patterns are what make a message sound interesting. Without them, we’d be speaking with the same pitch and drive ourselves and our listeners crazy! Enter the Golden Rule of Intonation. When you ask a question, the pitch of your voice rises toward the end, usually on the final word, to express uncertainty. Your pitch falls toward the end of a statement to express certainty or the termination of an idea. The Golden Rule doesn’t take into account that there are a variety of question types and they have their own unique intonation patterns.

Let’s take a step backward and a think about intonation, which is made up of a series of pitch levels that we use. If we use our optimum pitch level and assign it a number “2”, then a “1” signifies a lower pitch and a “3” signifies a higher pitch. The word optimum assumes that you are using the pitch that is best for your vocal mechanism. To find your optimum pitch, you can hum a song or vocalize an “ah” sound at a conversational level but don’t try to force it out. (J.Moncur and I. Brackett, Modifying Vocal Behavior, Harper and Row, 1974).

The numbers 1,2, and 3 are used below to indicate the pitch level to be used when saying each question. Number 2 relates to your optimum pitch, the pitch level from which you rise or fall. Each number relates to a syllable in each sentence.

Questions Types

Yes/No Questions-Simply, these are questions to which a yes or no answer is given as a reply. The following questions are written in syllables. Therefore, a two syllable word like “go-ing” is separated by a hyphen, to reflect the two syllables in the word.

Are you go-ing? 2 2 2 3
Did he stop at the store? 2 2 2 2 2 3
Is he leav-ing now? 2 2 2 2 3

WH Questions-These questions begin with a question word such as “who”, “what”, “where”, “when”, “why”, or “how”. These questions are characterized by a rising intonation on the syllable or word just before the last syllable or word.

Where is he go-ing? 2 2 2 3 2
How will he get there? 2 2 2 3 2
When is the par-ty? 2 2 2 3 2

Tag Questions-These questions consist of a statement followed by a question. The question is a request for clarification and expresses uncertainty and a response from the listener. There are two common patterns of intonation with tag questions.

Pattern 1 (Say the tag question with rising intonation)

He was-n’t rea-dy, was he? 2 2 2 3 2, 2 3 (rising intonation)
She isn’t com-ing, is she? 2 2 2 3 2, 2 3
He has a lot of mo-ney, does-’nt he? 2 2 2 2 2 3 2, 2 2 3

Pattern 2 (Say the tag question with falling intonation)

He was-n’t rea-dy, was he? 2 2 2 3 2, 3 1
She isn’t com-ing, is she? 2 2 2 3 2, 3 1
He has a lot of mo-ney, does’nt he? 2 2 2 2 2 3 2, 3 2 1

Choice Questions- In these questions, a listener is asked to pick one
of the choices given. There are two patterns, which vary depending upon when the choices are limited to those given (one or the other) or not.

Pattern 1- The choices are restricted to those listed.

Would you like rice or po-ta-toes? 2 2 2 3 (rising) 2 2 3 1

Pattern 2- The choices are not restricted.

Would you like rice or po-ta-toes? 2 2 2 3 (rising) 2 2 3 3
(If you don’t like either of these, I can offer you something else.)

Are you ready to try a few by yourself?

Read each question and then listen and mark the intonation pattern using the numbers 1, 2 and 3. Good Luck!

Where are you going?
You got the job, didn’t you?
What time do you have to be there?
Will he be coming late?
Did you join a union yet?
Is he your brother or your cousin?
You know the answer, don’t you?
Who gave you that information?
When are we meeting?
What do you like better, ProTools or Audacity Audition?

If you have any voice or speech questions for the “Speech Doc”, feel free to comment here or email your questions/comments to:

speechdoc@gmail.com

Want to speak naturally? Use reduced forms!

Want to (wanuh) speak naturally? Use reduced forms!

By Bonnie Engel Lee, Ph.D.

You might be wondering what reduced forms are even though we use them every day. According to Jane Morley of the English Language Institute at Ann Arbor, these words make up nearly 60% of the spoken English in daily use. When said in isolation, most of these words have stronger forms but weaker forms are used in the context of a phrase or sentence spoken in the natural rhythm of conversation.

The words we typically “reduce” can be grouped into grammatical categories. Here are some examples of the words we “reduce”

pronoun forms-he, him, she, her, they, their, your, me, my, mine, us, I

verb forms-can, could, would, may, am, are, been, will, had, have, is, was

negatives-not

prepositions-to, from, in, of, by

conjunctions--and, with, that, but

articles-a, an, the

adjectives-some,

When we say “and” in conversation, instead of saying each sound in the word, we might say, “en” or even “n”. Try saying a few of the following sentences and listen to how you say “and”.

• cream and sugar (kreem‘n shuger)
• coffee and tea (kawfee “en” tee)
• salt and pepper (sawlt ‘un pepper).

The articles “a”, an” and “the” are almost always reduced in naturally- sounding speech. Saying them as they are spelled makes it sound as if you are reading the words.

Here are a few to try.

• It’s an easy thing to do. (Its un eezee thing tuh do).
• I have to buy a book for school. (I havtuh buy uh book fer skool).
• I smell the aroma of fresh bread. (I smell thuh aroma uhfresh bread).

Since the “v” sound in the word “of” adjoins the “f” sound in fresh, we typically drop the “v”.

By now, I’m sure you are getting the idea. So, here are a few sentences that might be more challenging. How do you think you would say these? Which words are reduced?

• It’s an easy as pie.
• I would have been happy to do that job.
• Don’t you know where I live?
• Did you see a movie last night?

Hint: After a “t” sound, the word “you” is pronounced “chew” or “chuh”. After a “d” sound, the word “you” is pronounced “jew” or “juh”.

Thinking about “reduced forms” is one way to make your “voice over” sound natural.

If you have any voice or speech questions for the “Speech Doc”, feel free to

email them to speechdoc@gmail.com