Accent Adventure Podcast: Improve English Pronunciation | Learn American English | Learn British English - American Netflix Programs I Watched in 2014 and 2015

American Netflix Programs I Watched in 2014 and 2015

04/15/15 • 14 min

Accent Adventure Podcast: Improve English Pronunciation | Learn American English | Learn British English

Here’s another video where I’m speaking with the General American Pronunciation, and this time around I’m talking about good American Netflix programs I’ve been watching lately.

Well, to tell you the truth, I’m actually speaking a little bit too fast in this video and that’s the reason why I’m not getting all American English sounds right in all words.

For the most part, however, my American English is just fine and I’m quite happy with my performance.

But in case you’re wondering how I can say such a thing without consulting with other people and getting their opinion on it – well, here’s the thing – I watched the video I recorded over and over again and I’m intelligent enough to spot any imperfections and mistakes I’ve been making.

The heck, ANYONE is intelligent enough to be a good judge of their own pronunciation provided that they know what sounds they have to FOCUS on:

On top of that, it’s also important to get the little details right such as using certain hesitation sounds and stretching words a bit as well.

So as you can guess, it’s a matter of practicing your speech and now I’m going to use a cliché:

If I can do it, you can do it TOO!

Anyhow, today’s video is about what Netflix shows I’ve been watching lately, and in case you’re wondering how watching Netflix can improve your American English pronunciation, here’s the deal.

You can SHADOW American Netflix programs and it’s one of ways you can improve your American pronunciation and also the overall English fluency.

That’s what I’ve been doing myself, so check out the video above to see what Netflix shows I recommend!

Cheers,

Robby

Here’s another video where I’m speaking with the General American Pronunciation, and this time around I’m talking about good American Netflix programs I’ve been watching lately.

Well, to tell you the truth, I’m actually speaking a little bit too fast in this video and that’s the reason why I’m not getting all American English sounds right in all words.

For the most part, however, my American English is just fine and I’m quite happy with my performance.

The heck, ANYONE is intelligent enough to be a good judge of their own pronunciation provided that they know what sounds they have to FOCUS on:

On top of that, it’s also important to get the little details right such as using certain hesitation sounds and stretching words a bit as well.

So as you can guess, it’s a matter of practicing your speech and now I’m going to use a cliché:

If I can do it, you can do it TOO!

You can SHADOW American Netflix programs and it’s one of ways you can improve your American pronunciation and also the overall English fluency.

That’s what I’ve been doing myself, so check out the video above to see what Netflix shows I recommend!

Cheers,

Robby

Previous Episode

Ignore Extreme Opinion When Working on Your English Pronunciation!

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT BELOW:

Hello, guys! Hello, boys and girls, and welcome back to Accent Adventure video blog!

I’m Robby, accent learning enthusiast, English fluency expert, and your friend above everything else! And, now, I’m back with another Accent Adventure video blog.

To tell you the truth guys, I haven’t been publishing on this website for more than half a year now, which is a long, long time. And to be totally honest with you, I wasn’t sure for some period of time whether I was going to continue with this blog or I was just going to let it die a slow and natural death.

But, lately, I decided – why not? I just could publish a video every now and then to keep those of you happy who are keen on following my accent learning adventures, right?

And currently, as you may guess, I’m speaking with the General American pronunciation. But, funnily enough, some people think that I don’t sound like an American English speaker AT ALL, which is obviously not true. Yes, I know for a fact that anyone can tell right from the get-go that I’m a foreign English speaker, and I don’t sound exactly like a native English speaker, and I probably never will for that matter.

But, it’s not even my goal. I’m just trying to sound like an American. I am trying to nail the American English sound such as the distinct “R” sound, right? “Or”, “my problem”, “we’re partners, remember?” – it’s one of my previous videos. That’s why I was using this particular phrase, right?

But, I’m just showcasing you what exactly I’m focusing on when trying to sound like an American English speaker. And I know for a fact that I’m getting the general feel of the pronunciation, if you like, when I’m speaking. And I got a comment recently saying that... Let me read it!

It was on my other English Harmony channel, right, on YouTube and I received a comment saying, “Why do you have American accent? I thought you were living in the United States.” So, there you have it! Some people think that I have American accent and they can definitely tell that I do sound like an American.

There Are As Many Different Opinions As There Are People!

And then on the opposite scale of the comments we have someone who said recently that “I have to tell you that you don’t sound American at all. You might have a slight American twang, maybe, but you’ve got an accent that is somewhere between soft and medium, and it is a very distinctive Eastern-European sounding accent.”

Well, obviously, all comments and all opinions are welcome to my YouTube channel, and my blog, and everything, and I’m not knocking anyone for publishing their honest opinion on my pronunciation.

But, the reason I recorded this video was just to show you guys that other people’s feedback matters very little.

If you’re on a journey to improve your English generally or acquire an American accent, or a British accent for that matter, or you’re just generally trying to improve your pronunciation and make it clearer, and basically you want to make yourself being understood with ease, right, no matter what your goal is, you should take other people’s opinion and advice with a pinch of salt.

Focus On Your English Pronunciation And Ignore the Naysayers!

Meaning, you shouldn’t take it too seriously because there are people who will think that no matter what you’re doing you’re not good enough.

And, then, there are people who will congratulate you on your achievements and they will actually probably try to compliment you no matter what. They won’t even point out your mistakes or whatever. Do you know what I mean?

So, the best way would be probably to give a very constructive criticism so to speak. And I received some of those in the past. It’s basically when someone tells you, “Yeah. You have done well, but here are the things that you should actually bear in mind” and they actually tell you.

And I wouldn’t be able to find the comment now, but I remember there was a comment saying, “You’re doing well, but here’s what you’re not getting right when trying to sound like an American English speaker. It’s the letter “A,” basically, the “ah” sound in the written word, such as “and” and “actually.”

As a matter of fact, it’s after that comment that I paid particular attention to it. I looked into it. I figured that I was actually pronouncing certain words wrong. And, ever since, I’ve been trying to get them right, okay?

So, it just shows you that con...

Next Episode

Internet – Interview – Interact – Interesting – American Pronunciation

Hi guys and welcome back to Robby’s Accent Adventure video blog!

And in this video we’re going to look at the pronunciation of the following words: interesting, internet, interact, interview, right?

And this is typical for the American pronunciation. If you’re trying to speak like a British English speaker obviously, it’s not really the case. So this is specific to American pronunciation.

And for those of you guys who might not be familiar with me, I’m Robby and I’m a foreign English speaker. My national background is Latvian, it’s an Eastern-European country and I’ve been living in an English speaking country for 13 years now, right?

And I’ve been constantly speaking with myself practicing my spoken English and for a good few years now I’ve been trying to sound like an American English speaker and obviously it has helped a great deal. A few years ago I wouldn’t have been able to speak like this, right?

So what’s so interesting about the words interesting, internet, interact?

If you listen to the way I pronounce them, you’ll definitely notice that letter “t”, basically the “t” sound tends to all but disappear!

So it’s not the “internet”, it’s “INNERNET”.

And it is especially obvious when you speak quite fast, when you pronounce the words slowly, I would imagine even native speakers would say “internet”, right? If you just pronounce that word individually.

But if it’s part of a larger sentence such as for example “Yesterday I was browsing the INNERNET for some INNERVIEW related information and I found very INNERESTING facts in relation to job interviews, right?”

So basically when I speak quite fast, those words are pronounced with the “t” sounds omitted, right? And this is something you may want to take on board if you are trying to sound like an American English speaker.And especially if you live in the United States and you’re trying to blend in in the local society, so, well, yeah, in that case it’s definitely advisable that you pronounce the words internet, interview, interact and similar words without “t” sound, basically you just omit the letter “t”.

And I’m pretty sure that in linguistics this particular phenomenon is known as assimilation.

So basically if the “n” sound is followed by “t”, the “t” gets assimilated and you basically don’t even hear it, all right? But we don’t have to burden ourselves with all these linguistics terms. All that you need to know is that the words internet, interesting, interacts, interview are pronounced this particular way.

So you definitely have to practice them. Basically don’t go about the whole thing trying to sound like that when speaking with real people in real life, right? You have to do some spoken practice beforehand. And there’s no better way of doing such practice than having it all organized in a very well-organized fashion basically using specific software. And that’s where Accent Genie program steps in and you definitely may want to check it out, okay?

Okay. Thanks for watching this video my friends. If you have any questions, please feel free to publish them in the comment section below. Bye-bye!