Hello, everybody!
It’s not a secret that EC is one of the best places not only to communicate but to improve your English. To do it we should develop different skills, such as listening, reading, speaking and writing. It’s great that we have different interesting activities here to develop our written skills. Our dear teacher Tara has a wonderful ability to find and give us various exciting tasks. We are very grateful to her for it.
But I noticed that only few members here try to improve their spoken English, their pronunciation. And this is the most important part of learning a foreign language! Bernard Shaw ( a famous English writer) tried to prove the importance of good pronunciation even in the beginning of the 20th century in his famous play “Pygmalion”. It was written in 1912 and it describes the story of Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics, who makes a bet with his friend, Colonel Pickering, that he can transform a common flower girl, Eliza Doolittle, into a ‘proper lady'. Higgins succeeds in teaching her how to speak with a proper upper-class accent.
In Shaw’s time, upper class people pronounced their words clearly. However, the working class in London spoke with a strong Cockney accent and often used incorrect grammar, as well. In ‘Pygmalion’, Higgins believes that he can teach anyone to sound like a member of the English upper class.
The play is extremely popular, and many variations of it have been made. In 1938 it was made into a film and in 1956 the Broadway musical ‘My Fair Lady’ was produced. In 1964 a film version of the musical, starring Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison, was released. In 1999, the film ‘She’s All That ‘ told a modern version of Shaw’s story.
Here are two videos showing us how Professor Higgins is teaching Eliza. We can understand that it’s not so easy to improve your pronunciation, but it’s possible and rewarding. The main thing here is to do all the exercises regularly.
In this video Eliza Doolittle ( Audrey Hepburn) drives Professor Higgins ( Rex Harrison) mad with her Cockney accent:
And here we can see the the joy of Eliza and Professor Higgins, when she acquires a perfect pronunciation:
Now you have a wonderful opportunity to acquire good pronunciation here in EC. Gabriel Sowrian conducts English Pronunciation Virtual Class. Now the learners are doing their first audio assignment in Study Session 3. So, you are just on time to join! This is the link:
If you don’t know how to record your voice, you may use some tips of advice, which Gabriel Sowrian gives in his blog " Make your voice heard":
http://my.englishclub.com/profiles/blogs/make-your-voice-heard
So, you are welcome!
Comments
Hi teacher Galina, thanks for sharing... someday I'll make my video and up load it here *note: just when I'm ready... I never get bored to be here as my daughter says, "mom, back to the ground" as she always sees me so excited - hehe... Thanks for all friends and teachers here who are so kind and helpful to new members... love love love...
Nida, you can't imagine how glad I am to see you here with your appreciative words! It's great that you find this blog informative. I tried to connect the topic of pronunciation with something from Literature, Theatre, Music. And then I remembered Bernard Shaw and his brilliant play. I was so excited about it, as I love the play, the musical and the film. I myself was fascinated with this idea of writing a blog about it. Thanks for your nice comment!
Sorry for the late reply....
Wow! Nafis, it seems we're getting closer to each other every single day! What a nice comment you've left here! Sorry for the late reply ( I went to Moscow after posting the blog), but I'm so glad that you liked this movie, too. It seems we have much in common. I like your positive attitude to life and the sence of humour. Thanks a lot for your nice comment!
Selma, without any doubt you made my day today! Thanks for one more appreciative comment! I completely agree with you that pronunciation has become the focus of EC members ( at least more and more members are realizing the importance of it). I really admire your passion for phonetics. I'm so happy that you liked the blog!
Hi Galina,
Thank you for this great blog.
To see fully handling the pronunciation problems in EC, I can't explain that how happiness !
We are on way now to the real spoken English.
Thank you Tara for your support.
Cheers !
@Tara,
You can't imagine how glad I am that you like this blog! I like to study everything connected with phonetics and pronunciation. Maybe because I have always wanted to have good accent but I'm always dissatisfied with my intonation. It sounds Russian. I always listen to you in "Be a Newscaster" and try to imitate your intonation. How I love your English! I always repeat it 10 or more times and then record myself and listen to but I don't like my English very much. I even download your news on my flash drive ( I don't have Internet in the class room) and we listen to you with my students. Some of them listen to you in EC.
Thanks a lot for the list of all places and resourses where we can practise spoken English. I think it will be helpful for all members.
And I myself like the idea of combining the topic about good pronunciation with this wonderful film. I simply adore Audrey Hepburn in it.
I'm very grateful to EC team for featuring this blog!
@Anele,
I completely agree with you that the film is very amusing ,but at the same time it's so impressive and stimulates the wish to learn a proper English accent. And ,of course, I simply enjoy Audrey Hepburn in this film. I don't know about others, but after watching even these short videos I have an irresistible desire to start pronouncing these funny phrases ( about 'rain in Spain' and about 'hurricane'). She's so convincing here.....and her beautiful english......I enjoy it so much.
Anele I also think that only few members will have courage to participate by recording their voices and sending them to us, but I'll be very glad if more people will do it invisibly. They're free to choose the way of studying. The main thing here is to help as more people as possible to start to learn English pronunciation. Without any doubt they'll benefit a lot.
Anele, thanks for your nice words about the blog ( and about me - I wish I had this wonderful ability of putting a spell on people...but...it seems only you notice it ( just kidding). You know your opinion means a lot to me.
A charming Audrey Hapburn.....
@Ha,
I know pretty well what a dedicated learner of English you are! And your written English has been improving every single day just in front of our eyes. I'm very glad if I helped you to understand the importance of good pronunciation for spoken English. Now when you see the way to do it, you'll learn it in no time ( it's only the expression, of course you'll need to take some time, but only time, because you have rich supply of patience - two important things for achieving your goal). Hope Eliza Doolittle will remind you of the way to learn English pronunciation. I'm simply enchanted with her in this film.
Hi Galina,it isAn Impressive blog .
In my place , I am dare to stand firm and tell some doctors “why do you get much more money from patients for writing medicine descriptions?”
Their answers are “ we have spend many years in education , and it is our time to get money “That means they sell their knowledge for money .And many people do as well as doctors do .I think it is justifiable matter.
Here in my EC we have different people , every teacher here , has his own wish to be willingly a volunteer for teaching others .wow , what wonderful place ! I think it is hardship to learn members in free site ,such task is demanded to sacrifice your time and efforts . whereas every person in real life gives you things for just reward , EC gives you knowledge for just love. Thank you our teachers , Gabriel , Galina and Rajesh for their lessons , also Hala and Anele for their great lessons
Pronunciation is the most important skill in English language Many words have different meanings they depend on stressed or unstressed syllables .I am very keen to learn pronunciation , hope to get well from Gabriel lessons.
Many thanks dear friend for your nice blog.
Dear Galina,
You’ve hit the nail on the head! Fine grammar is very important in written English. The same applies to spoken English and there is one more crucial part of the components of the English speech to it, ‘good pronunciation’ as you stressed firmly in this blog of yours.
Having a ‘fine grammar’ doesn’t guarantee that our speech will be intelligible to our listeners if there’s an absence of a ‘good pronunciation’! EC has all the resources to improve one’s pronunciation if only he or she takes a few minutes and search around and get involved as mentioned by our admin Tara. What I’m doing by conducting a virtual class is only a very small contribution compare to the immense free service that EC provides to non-native speakers of English from all around the world.
Thank you very much for mentioning here about the ongoing pronunciation class, Galina! It’s truly a very noble deed of you inviting fellow members to enjoy the benefit out of these study sessions. Let’s hope that many will grab this opportunity.
By the way, I enjoyed both your videos. They echo the very message, learning proper pronunciation, you are trying to convey to us. It’s a brilliant idea to incorporate those videos in your blog – only proving that you are a creative and dedicated teacher. Thanks a lot for coming up and sharing this wonderful blog with us!
Take care! God bless you, Galina!
~* GS *~
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