How in the Heck Do You Pronounce This Word?

Ayo!

Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu.

How in the world do you pronounce this word? Here is a video of me trying it out. Give me some tips on how you think it should be pronounced, or try it yourself!




Oh, and here is a bonus video of me testing out the hardest tongue-twister in the English language.

Tongue-Twisters

Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis

On Twitter* I follow germanlanguage, which is an extension of German Words of the Day. Each day, a new German word is posted with its English translation. Occasionally, links to their blog entries will be posted. A few weeks ago, a link to Zungenbrecher, anyone? was posted, and being the curious person I am, I had to read it. Zungenbrecher is a German word meaning tongue-twister, though literally translated it means tongue breaker (which is an interesting spin on the concept, I think). As I was reading the entry, I found a version of the tongue-twister we recited in the Ausspracheübungen (pronunciation practice) class I took while studying in Germany. My interest was piqued and the idea for this post was born.

To be quite honest, up until this point, I have never been much of a fan of tongue-twisters. My writing has always been far better than my speaking skills - and it shows - so I have never felt it necessary to throw tongue-twisters into the mix. I can twist my tongue on my own, thanks. But the more I searched the Internet for information about tongue-twisters, the more I came across non-native speakers using tongue-twisters to learn pronunciation of their target language. A couple things clicked in my brain at this point. 1) It explained why my Ausspracheübungen teacher had us recite a Zungenbrecher. And it was not, as previously believed, to make things as difficult for us as possible. And 2) as a future ESL teacher, I was curious as to whether using tongue-twisters as an aid to teach pronunciation actually works. This question was never really answered, so I pose the two-part question now to anyone who is an ESL (or EFL or whatever) teacher: Do you use tongue-twisters to help with pronunciations? If yes, do you think it works?

One thing I wanted to find out was what makes a tongue-twister a tongue-twister? Besides the obvious "It's really hard to pronounce this danged thing!" of course. An important feature of tongue-twisters is the alternation of similar sounds within a phrase. Take the Pearls Before Swine comic for example: the sounds /s/ and /sh/ are used in "She sells seashells by the seashore." Said quickly, it is easy to mix up the sounds. Tongue-twisters can also consist of rhymes and alliteration. "Say that three times fast!" is a common statement used when a phrase is difficult to pronounce and these difficult phrases are often tongue-twisters.

Did you know they also have naughty tongue-twisters? There are some twisters out there specifically designed so that a mispronunciation or mistake will result in a swear word or something of that sort. Take a moment to ponder the phrase "Pheasant plucker" and how it could be messed up.

Now onto the tongue-twisters!


Three English Tongue-Twisters

--->She sells seashells by the seashore

--->Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
How many pickled peppers did Peter Piper pick?

--->The sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep's sick (this is supposedly the hardest tongue-twister in English - what do you think?)
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A German Zungenbrecher



The above tongue-twister is the one I recited in my Ausspracheübungen class. It basically means: Fisher's Fritz fishes for fresh fish, for fresh fish fishes Fisher's Fritz.
For more Zungenbrecher check out Zungenbrecher, anyone? They have a couple other German tongue-twisters, as well as a fun video from a German game show of a man reciting a bunch of tongue-twisters in one minute.
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Dos Trabalenguas in Spanish

Thanks to CancunCanuck for suggesting:
--->Yo vi en un huerto un cuervo cruento comerse el cuero del cuerpo del puerco muerto.
(I saw in an orchard a bloody crow eating the hide of a dead pig's corpse)

Both Sara and CancunCanuck suggested versions of:
--->Tres tristes tigres tragaban trigo en un trigal en tres tristes trastos.
(Three sad tigers swallowed wheat on three sad platters)
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What are other tongue-twisters? Which is your favorite? Which never fails to trip you up? Please share! And you can also click here for a list of tongue-twisters.


*Don't know what Twitter is? Twitter is an awesome social networking tool which allows you 140 characters to answer the question: What are you doing? In addition to me, Sara, Tasha and even CancunCanuck are all on Twitter! Kyle is too, but he doesn't update his, so he doesn't get a link (sorry Kyle). Check us out, say hi, and don't worry, we're friendly. :)

McGurk Effect

What do you hear with?

This is my favorite video that I can find on the McGurk effect. Ignore the German, and listen to what is being said. When you see the man speaking, what do you hear? Da da or ba ba? When you no longer see the man, what do you hear?



The McGurk effect says that we hear with more than just our ears. A majority of people will hear da da when they are watching the person speak, and ba ba when they are not watching the person speak. Did you hear a difference?

Interested in learning more? Start here.

Music Set to Speech Patterns

Ayo!

My sister sent me a link to a couple of videos where Henry Hey has composed music based on the speech patterns and intonations of George W. Bush, Sarah Palin and John McCain. It is so interesting to hear how the music follows the rhythms of speech, and could actually be cut into a real song.

I am interested in the language side of it (speech patterns), but anyone interested in Music Theory might also find this interesting as well!

Enjoy!

BUSH SONG:



PALIN SONG:





PALIN AND MCCAIN SONG:

Ohkay, so here's da Minnesoda accent.. doncha know?

I was reading some of the comments on my last post and some of you seem to think that "Them ones wasn't what I was looking for!" is a regional dialect. It's very possible. I still maintain that it sounds horrible and, regional dialect or not that lady could try a little harder to speak properly. Anyways, I know how much everyone loves a good accent. Especially Sarah Palin's cute, folksy accent that she so famously slipped into when asked a difficult question. I found an article that traces her accent to the (you guessed it!) Minnesota north woods.

Then for your enjoyment, I found a video of Amy Walker who was on the Today Show and can effortlessly speak in 21 different accents.


Next, this is a video of a man doing his best Minnesotan accent. I find it hilarious, but he does swear a bit, so if you have any little ones around you might want to cover their ears.


Which accent was your favorite or least favorite? Is there an accent that you think makes a person sound more intelligent? What about less intelligent?

Then if you are wondering which American accent you have, take this little quiz.

Here are my results, j.i.c. you are curious. I can't believe they said I sounded like the movie Fargo. Of course I think those accents sound ridiculous.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: North Central "North Central" is what professional linguists call the Minnesota accent. If you saw "Fargo" you probably didn't think the characters sounded very out of the ordinary. Outsiders probably mistake you for a Canadian a lot.
The Midland
Boston
The West
Philadelphia
The Inland North
The South
The Northeast
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Fake English?

Ayo!

Can you speak fake English?

That's the question a Youtuber called Crenquist asked his subscribers nearly two years ago, after giving them his own impressions of what French, Mandarin Chinese and Spanish sound like to his non-native speaking ears.

The video is not meant to offend, nor reinforce stereotypes about the speakers of those languages, but is actually being used as "edutainment" piece. Not only is it a fun activity, but you can learn something from it. It offers a real glimpse into what certain languages sound like to non-native speakers.

We've all heard that English speakers have this retroflex "r" thing going on, that German has a biting edge, and that the French language sounds like a rush of syllables, but nothing is as honest as seeing another person from another part of the world imitate your language.

Here is Crenquist giving us his impression of 7 fake languages, each based on Chinese, French, Italian, Russian, Spanish, German and Japanese.

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You can click around Youtube to watch other videos of people imitating what English sounds like to them. All of those videos are insightful, not to mention hilarious, but I will leave you with a cute young girl from Quebec. She really hits the nail on the head with the sounds and idosyncrasies of English phonetics.



Once I get my camera up and rolling, I will upload myself speaking fake Italian and fake Arabic. I invite all of you out there to do the same!

Until next time, peace out!