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How to speak english fluently with british accent
I'm sure you know there are many types of English. There are a large number of English
accents which differ not just between different countries (eg Britain, America, Australia) but also within countries. You will notice that the accents are very different depending on which part of the country you are in, and if you are used to a particular English accent, you may find it difficult to understand when people speak (even native speakers often have difficulty!!).Let's take a look at the British accent.So I'm going to call this RP, which is "received pronunciation", and it's sort of your more upper class British accent. It's not really spoken today on the streets of London unless you were born maybe before 1950. But it's a really important accent to have, especially as an actor, because RP is used for a lot of period dramas.RP is non-rhotic, which means that the letter r is usually “silent”, unless it is followed by a vowel. Here’s how it works:In words like car, tower, inform and first, r is silent (r is not followed by a vowel).In words like red, foreign, print, r is pronounced (r is followed by a vowel).R is also pronounced at the end of a word, if the next word starts with a vowel, for example: number eight, far away.Most RP speakers also insert an r in phrases like: the idea(r) of, Africa(r) and Asia, law(r) and order. This r is not in the spelling; they just use it to separate two vowels.The following pairs sound exactly the same in RP: or/awe, court/caught, sore/saw, farther/father, formerly/formally. In General American, they all sound different.
accents which differ not just between different countries (eg Britain, America, Australia) but also within countries. You will notice that the accents are very different depending on which part of the country you are in, and if you are used to a particular English accent, you may find it difficult to understand when people speak (even native speakers often have difficulty!!).Let's take a look at the British accent.So I'm going to call this RP, which is "received pronunciation", and it's sort of your more upper class British accent. It's not really spoken today on the streets of London unless you were born maybe before 1950. But it's a really important accent to have, especially as an actor, because RP is used for a lot of period dramas.RP is non-rhotic, which means that the letter r is usually “silent”, unless it is followed by a vowel. Here’s how it works:In words like car, tower, inform and first, r is silent (r is not followed by a vowel).In words like red, foreign, print, r is pronounced (r is followed by a vowel).R is also pronounced at the end of a word, if the next word starts with a vowel, for example: number eight, far away.Most RP speakers also insert an r in phrases like: the idea(r) of, Africa(r) and Asia, law(r) and order. This r is not in the spelling; they just use it to separate two vowels.The following pairs sound exactly the same in RP: or/awe, court/caught, sore/saw, farther/father, formerly/formally. In General American, they all sound different.
How to speak with a posh accent
Listen and copy
Find videos of The Queen and other people speaking in a posh accent and try to copy them. Pay close attention to how certain words are pronounced and how they form their sentences. Do this with a friend so they can check if you sound the same as the person in the video or record yourself and play it back to compare the accents.
Pronunciation and enunciation
Pronunciation is the way you say words and enunciation is how clearly you say them. To speak like The Queen, you need to make sure you pronounce words correctly AND you enunciate everything you say (speak very very clearly and with confidence).
If you want to speak with a posh accent, you will probably need to change the way you pronounce certain words and letters. For example the ‘r’, ‘u’ and ‘t’ sounds are pronounced differently. Visit some website for a detailed lesson:
http://www.bl.uk/learning/langlit/sounds/
http://www.wikihow.com/Speak-in-a-British-Accent
A simple trick for Received Pronunciation is that many words are pronounced as they are written (e.g. when people say the word ‘February’ they usually pronounce it ‘feb-you-ry’ or ‘feb-you-air-ree’ but if you want to speak with a posh accent, you should pronounce it ‘feb-rue-air-ree’). You should also try to make your vowel sounds longer (e.g. instead of pronouncing ‘lovely’ as ‘luv-ly’, posh people pronounce it ‘laahh-v-ly’).
Learn posh vocabulary
If you want to speak like The Queen, you will probably need to start using different vocabulary. For example, you should start using ‘the royal one’ to replace ‘I’, ‘me’ or ‘you’ and you should replace ‘common’ words with more ‘elegant’ ones. To accept a dinner invitation, instead of saying “Yes, let’s go for dinner”, you could say “Indeed, one would be delighted to join one for dinner”.
Practise practise practise
When you have mastered all these new ways to speak, it is important that you practise as much as possible. The more you practise, the easier it will become and the more natural you will sound. Why not arrange a ‘talk like The Queen’ evening at your house where everyone has to speak with a posh accent all night?
If you want to learn how to speak with a British accent, book a course at Bloomsbury International, an English school in central London. You probably won’t learn The Queen’s English but the teachers will be able to help you if this is the accent you want to use!
If you want to learn how to speak with a British accent, book a course at Bloomsbury International, an English school in central London. You probably won’t learn The Queen’s English but the teachers will be able to help you if this is the accent you want to use!
[id]Lifetime level 1 - Oxford English;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vb700j5-YoU|Lifetime level 2 - Oxford English;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7elCw-bpXSM|Extra English Episode 1;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHQYAlE6PFk|Extra English Episode 2;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWlla0-GB5c|Extra English Episode 3;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MybpNiurdE|Extra English Episode 4;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7yxxTK99RE8|Extra English Episode 5;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyvtM_jp-9c|[/id]
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