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

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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.