vowel troubles

Hi guys,

Often times I make mistakes in reading new words or the words I know but
whose pronunciation I've never heard before. I've already got an apology
from my English teacher for the language and all people speaking it, but I
still need some clue as to how I should pronounce the vowels.

Before I begin, I must tell you that I live in the US and try to speak
American English, whatever it is, but definetely not British or something of
that sort.

Basically, the vowel problem is manyfold:

1. the ugly fact that the vowels do not sound the way one would naturally
want them to. For instance, to someone naturally speaking Russian (my case)
or Spanish (almost my case, I've been learning Spanish for a while too), the
e sound in the word man would never be attributed to the letter a or vice
versa. Same with sounds of long e, ee, oo, short i (it would be more like
long e or ee to us but to English speakers it's not the same thing, it's
different), short u (a) and short o (a in case of American English) and
apparently there's much more to it...

And then again, there're horrible things like the letter a (its sound) in
the word corporate. It's an i, not a!

2. the variety of vowel flavors, their sounds. I mean, again, it seems like
there're a number of similar vowel sounds in English yet they're different
and sometimes they can make quite a difference, e.g. robber vs rubber (hot
vs hut), man vs men (bad vs bed, land vs lend), caught vs cut, deed vs did
and many more examples are due here. In all these pairs I (and quite a lot
of other people) would say almost the same vowel sound is used and therefore
I (and they) would use the same letter for it in writing. And that would
loose this subtle difference and make words totally indistinguishable. And
that's what we do with English unless we're tought it in a right way, paying
enough attention to not only the vocabulary and grammar but
phonetics/pronunciation too. I had been tought Enlgish in such a bad way for
a long time. Then I had to force myself to forget many wrong things and
relearn the right ones.

Alright, I'm probably not asking questions at these first two points, just
speaking out all the pissiness I've been through with English. :) But the
following are really the ones that I'd love to get right...

3. absence of strict spelling to pronunciation correspondence, essentially
in vowel combinations (e.g. m*ea*t vs gr*ea*t vs w*ea*pon vs id*ea*; c*ou*rt
vs d*ou*bt vs r*ou*t (2 pronunciations exist) vs t*ou*ch, sl*ow* vs c*ow*,
etc etc). How do I know which is which?

4. "long" vs "short" pronunciation (e.g. am vs ate, egg vs eve, in vs ice,
on vs open, up vs use). When one should treat a vowel as "long" and when as
"short"? Is there a rule or a good set of patterns to rely on?
Out of all, this little prob is probably of most importance to me now.

5. which vowel (actually, syllable) to stress (usually 1st but there're so
many exceptions, e.g. mach*i*ne, probab*i*lity yet there're things like "an
*o*bject" vs "to obj*e*ct"). Is there a rule or a good set of patterns to
rely on?

Any suggestions, explanations, tutorials, whatever?

Thanks a lot,
Alex


.

Relevant Pages

  • =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Re=3A_Redefining_=5Ba=5D_and_=5B=E6=5D=3F_or_using_a_better_vowel?= =?ISO-
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  • Re: Shakespearean HIP
    ... experiment in period English at the Globe it is published by Cambridge UP ... and called Pronouncing Shakespeare. ... > like "Actors usually sound poff, but these sound just like us!" ... > But listening to this expert on Shakespearean pronunciation leaves me ...
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  • Re: URL: Paper on English spelling reform - the case against in the Internet age
    ... >> So we would kindly like to ask the native speakers of English ... We'd just have to undo the Great Vowel Shift (which Chomsky ... I don't know much about Middle English pronunciation, ...
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  • Re: vowel troubles
    ... > from my English teacher for the language and all people speaking it, ... > American English, whatever it is, but definetely not British or something of ... to the "men" vowel, but we think of it as closer to the Russian ... some things you were taught about pronunciation. ...
    (alt.usage.english)
  • Re: vowel troubles
    ... > whose pronunciation I've never heard before. ... > from my English teacher for the language and all people speaking it, ... > e sound in the word man would never be attributed to the letter a or vice ... the variety of vowel flavors, ...
    (alt.usage.english)
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