Mastering the American Accent with Online Audio (Barron's Foreign Language Guides)

Description

Mastering the American Accent is an easy-to-follow approach for reducing the accent of non-native speakers of English. Well-sequenced lessons in the book correspond over eight hours of audio files covering the entire text. The audio program provides clear models (both male and female) to help coach a standard American accent. The program is designed to help users speak Standard American English with clarity, confidence, and accuracy. The many exercises in the book concentrate on topics such as vowel sounds, problematic consonants such as V, W, TH, the American R and T and others. Correct lip and tongue positions for all sounds are discussed in detail. Beyond the production of sounds, the program provides detailed instruction in prosodic elements such as syllable stress, emphasis, intonation, linking words for smoother speech flow, common word contractions, and much more. Additional topics that often confuse ESL students are also discussed and explained. They include distinguishing between casual and formal speech, homophones (e.g., they're and there), recognizing words with silent letters (e.g., comb, receipt), and avoiding embarrassing pronunciation mistakes, such as mixing up "pull" and "pool." Students are familiarized with many irregular English spelling rules and exceptions, and are shown how such irregularities can contribute to pronunciation errors. A native language guide references problematic accent issues for 13 different language backgrounds. Publisher's Note: Products purchased from Third Party sellers are not guaranteed by the publisher for quality, authenticity, or access to any online entitlements included with the product. Review: Practical, Clear, and Effective - Are you sometimes misunderstood by your American co-workers or customers - even though you have lived in the United Staes for years? Do you sometimes mispronounce words causing needless confusion and sometimes stress? Do you give professional presentations and want the native English speaking audience to clearly understand your words and ideas? Have you been looking for an excellent self-study guide to improve your American English pronunciation? If so, you will find this exceptional pronunciation book and audio CDs quite helpful in "mastering the American accent." Written by Lisa Mojsin, a Santa Monica professor and linguist who works with professionals to gain an American accent, this systematic book respects the time, intelligence, linguistic needs, and social desires of English language learners. Each self-contained chapter provides a practical lesson with clear instructions. The compelling CDs provide an effective tool to hear and practice the sounds. I also appreciate the number of inspiring quotes throughout the book that recognize the sophistication and culture of the book's readers. Like Targeting Pronunciation Communicating Clearly in English (Book with 5 CDs) , Mastering the American Accent with Audio CDs systematically reviews the most difficult sounds and easily confused words in English for ESL and EFL students and provides excellent audio CDS. And like Planaria Price's outstanding Realistically Speaking: A Practical Approach to the Basic Sounds and Rhythms of American English , Mojsin provides a cultural context and bias toward what works in creating the core sounds in American English for adult immigrants. This excellent pronunciation book, however, combines the best parts of both Targeting Pronunciation and Realistically Speaking in a powerful, practical book that identifies effective methods to reduce accents and improve clarity for business professionals. As an ESL teacher who focuses more on fluency and comprehension than pronunciation drills and absolute mastery of American accents, I learned many valuable tips from this book. This book will make me a better teacher in correcting pronunciation errors, especially for professionals who are already basically comprehensible and still want to "sound like an American". This book is a real contribution and fills a clear need in the increasingly diverse American workplace. If you only buy one pronunciation book to improve your American English, this is it. Review: ALL AUDIO FILES ARE INTERNET ACCESSIBLE AND DOWNLOADABLE - DIRECTIONS ON THE BOOK'S INSIDE COVER - I get so tired of bad reviews by people who don't bother to read the directions and, instead, complain that no CDs are included. No, they're not, because most computers don't come with CD players anymore. That's why the author has kindly put all 390 audio files ON THE WEBSITE FOR DOWNLOADING to your computer, phone, tablet, or other digital device AND has put the directions for downloading on the inside of the front cover of the book. This is a great book. The audio files are clear with correct Standard American English accents and use both male and female voices. I only wish there were also audio tracks for the very last section of the book that covers problem words for native speakers of various languages. The first part of the book provides practice in vowel and consonant pronunciation, first at a basic level, and then in more depth. I found only two small errors in this section, which is in contrast to some popular books that consistently provide incorrect pronunciation guidelines in this area. The section on "The Various t Sounds of American English" in the "Problematic Consonants" chapter is second-to-none. The chapters on syllable stress, including some coverage of prefixes and suffixes, and word stress, including reduction, are also quite good, as is the section on problems specific to native speakers of various languages. There is also a brief section on intonation. Overall, I find this book to be a very useful book for introducing the intricacies of the American accent.