Better. English. Pronunciation
Better. English. Pronunciation
https://t.me/knowledge_transfer
This is the new edition of a highly successful and widely-usedtext on pronunciation. It provides a systematic and thoroughintroduction to the pronunciation of English to help intermediateand more advanced students improve their production of thespoken language.
After a short introduction to pronunciation problems the authorexplains how the speech organs work; he then deals with eachsound separately before dealing with words in combination,rhythm-patterns and intonation. Practice material is given atintervals throughout the book. The particular difficulties of thespeakers of certain other languages arc noted, and remedialexercises provided. A recording of all the practice material in thebook is available on cassettes.
\ .. can quite safely be said to be the most effective [book] everwritten to help the ordinary learner to improve his pronunciation.
J. Windsor Lewis in The Tin es Educational Supplement
The complete course consists of:Book
Set of 2 cassettes
ISBN D-521-231S2-3
Cambridge
UNIVERSITY PRESS
9 780521 231527
Better EnglishPronunciation
Second edition
J. D. OConnor
Professor of Phonetics in the University of London
#oooot
oo@oo
oo
etc .:?008-^00oeo-io^o#co&ooo
BRITISH COUNCIL
MOSCOW
IP Cambridge
UNIVERSITY PRESS
PUBLISHED BY THE PRESS SYNDICATE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE
The Pitt Building, Trumpmgton Street, Cambridge CB2 irp, United Kingdom
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 2RU, United Kingdom40 West 20th Street, New York, ny iooii 4211, USA10 Stamford Road, Oakleigh, Melbourne 3166, Australia
Cambridge University Press 1967, 1980
This book is in copyright Subject to statutory exceptionand to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,no reproduction of any part may take place withoutthe written permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 1967Second edition 1980Twentieth printing 1998
Printed in the United Kingdom at the University Press,
Cambridge
A catalogue record for this book is available fromthe British Library
Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication data
OConnor,Joseph DesmondBetter English pronunciation. 2nd ed
1 English language Textbooks for foreigners
2 English language PronunciationI Title II. Series
428' 1 pei 128 79 41438
isbn 0521231523 Paperback
isbn 0521281342 Low priced edition
isbn o 521 26349 2 Set of 2 cassettes
Contents
Acknowledgements viiForeword to the second edition ix
1 Problems in pronunciation 1
1.1 Introduction 1
1.2 Lend me your ears* 3
1.3 Which English? 5
1.4 The basic sounds 6
1.5 Letters and sounds 7
1.6 Sounds and sound-groups 9
1.7 Words and utterances 11
1.8 Exercises 12
2 How the speech organs work in English
2.1 The vocal cords 13
2.2 The palate 15
2.3 The teeth 17
2.4 The tongue 17
2.5 The lips 21
2.6 Exercises 22
3 The consonants of English 24
3.1 Friction consonants: /f, v,0, d, s, z, J, 3, h/
3.2 Stop consonants: /p, b, t, d, k, g, tj, d3/
3.3 Nasal consonants:/m, n, q/ 48
3.4 Lateral consonant:/I/ 53
3.5 Gliding consonants: /j, w, r 7 57
3.6 Exercises 63
4 Consonant sequences 64
4.1 Initial sequences 64
4.2 Final sequences 67
Contents
4.3 Longer consonant sequences 76
4.4 Exercises 78
5 The vowels of English 79
5.1 Simple vowels /i:, 1, e, ae, a, a:, d, d:, u, u:, 3:, 0/
5.2 Diphthongs /ou, au, ei, ai, di, ia, ea, ua/ 84
5.3 Vowel sequences 87
5.4 Exercises 88
6 Words in company 90
6.1 Word groups and stress 90
6.2 Stressed and unstressed syllables 91
6.3 Weak forms of words 92
6.4 The use of strong forms 95
6.5 Rhythm units 95
6.6 Fluency 100
6.7 Changing word shapes 102
6.8 Exercises 105
7 Intonation 108
7.1 Tune shapes 109
7.2 The falling tune - the Glide-Down hi
7.3 The first rising tune - the Glide-Up 114
7.4 The second rising tune - the Take-Off 116
7.5 The falling-rising tune - the Dive 117
7.6 How to use the tunes 120
7.7 Exercises 125
Conversational passages for practice 128Answers to exercises 134
Appendix 1 The difficulties of English pronunciation for speakers of Arabic,Cantonese, French, German, Hindi and Spanish 138
Appendix 2 Useful materials for further study 147
Glossary 149
I
Acknowledgements
Every writer of a textbook owes a debt to his predecessors, to histeachers, to his colleagues and to his pupils; I gratefully acknowledgemy deep indebtedness to all of these. In addition I wish to expressparticular thanks to Mrs M. Chan of Hong Kong, Miss Afaf M. E.Elmenoufi of Cairo and Dr R. K. Bansal of Hyderabad for verykindly helping me with regard to the pronunciation difficulties ofCantonese, Arabic and Hindi speakers respectively. Last, but far fromleast, my very sincere thanks go to my friends Pauline Speller, whotyped the whole of a by no means easy manuscript and did it admirably,and Dennis Speller, who drew for me the original illustrations.
The responsibility for the book is mine; any credit I happily sharewith all those mentioned above.
J. D. oc.
Foreword to the second edition
Since this book was first published, in 1967, my attention has beendrawn by users of it to various errors and omissions, and suggestionshave been made for improving its usefulness. In this second edition Ihave now remedied the errors and omissions and I have adopted thosesuggestions which I think improve the book. To all those readers whowere kind enough to write to me on these matters I offer my sincerethanks.
My old readers will no doubt consider the greatest change in thisedition to be the use of a different phonetic transcription, and I agree.The reason why I decided to change the transcription is this: when thebook was first published I used the transcription of Daniel JonessEnglish Pronouncing Dictionary (Dent), which I considered to be the bestguide to English pronunciation for foreign learners (as I still do). Thepresent editor of the dictionary, A. C. Gimson, decided, rightly in myopinion, to change his transcription for the 14th edition of 1977- Thismeant that my transcription no longer corresponded to any of thosefound in the major dictionaries commonly used by foreign learners.
