Here is another example (for the first, see here) of what can go wrong when non-native speakers put too much effort into their American accent (in this case a successful German scientist who has been living and working in the US for many years). The name Kelvin, used for the unit of temperature and referring
The pronunciation of Chicago, home of Al Bundy and Al Capone, seems to be tricky for many non-native speakers. The problem is that the ‘ch’ is not pronounced as in words such as change, chance or chocolate. Instead, it is pronounced like the ‘ch’ in champagne or chandelier. The phonetic spelling is [ʃˈɪkɑːɡəʊ] or, also,
You all know that the plural of man is men. In line with the different spelling, the words man and men also have different pronunciations, namely [mæn] for man and [men] for men, respectively. Listen to both pronunciations here, and make sure you can tell the difference. The motivation for this post comes from a whole
The names of books and their authors are frequently used in any language. However, correctly pronouncing a book title or its author’s name (or the names of some of the characters) seems to be quite hard. Here are some interesting examples. In some cases, the problem is a general one, namely a lack of interest
Whenever I watch Formula 1 on German TV, I notice that the commentators pronounce Caterham incorrectly, namely either as cat-er-ham [ˈkætəhæm], listen here, or as cater–ham [‘keɪtəhæm]. In both cases, the letter r is not pronounced, and the second part, –ham, is pronounced just like ham. The problem is that—as is often the case with
If you ever talk about circles in English, it is useful to know how to pronounce the words radius, circumference, and diameter. radius: Both the British and the American pronunciation is [ˈreɪdiəs], listen to it here. German native speakers should be careful not to pronounce the word in the German way, [‘rɑːdiʊs]. Finally, the plural
PayPal™ (I’ll drop the trademark symbol from here on) has become a ubiquitous name in online shopping. For many years, I had never thought much about its pronunciation. However, since I encountered a different pronunciation recently on German television, and could not find a satisfactory answer online, I decided to explore this topic. The most
Although we all heard about this one in school, the correct use of a and an can cause a lot of confusion. There is a very clear rule when to use a and when to use an. However, this rule seems to be often forgotten or remembered incorrectly. a is used when the following word
Many non-native speakers try to speak with an American accent by strongly pronouncing all the r’s. Experts refer to the typical American accent as a rothic accent, as compared to a non-rothic accent such as British English. A nice example is the word hard, which is pronounced as [hɑːd] in British English, but [hɑːrd] in
Here is a post for those among you who completed (or will complete) a thesis as part of their university degree. In the course of the Bologna Process, many European universities adopted the Anglo-Saxon system of awarding Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees. To obtain such a degree, you usually have to complete a corresponding Bachelor’s or