Elision
Combining two words to make into one word, while speaking. Native speakers, often squash prepositions, verbs, adverbs etc. to speak faster. Following are the some of those elisions. advanced English lesson
Of
lots of – lotsa.
Cup of – Cuppa.
Sort of – Sorta.
- There are lotsa flowers lying around.
- This is not my cuppa tea
- That’s sorta funny!
Have
Could have – Couldda
Should have – Shouldda
Must have – Musta
- You couldda just said that
- I shouldda gone then
- That musta been very tough
To
Going to – Gonna
Want to – Wanna
Got to – Gotta
Have to – Hafta
- I am gonna sleep!
- I am wanna glass of beer.
- I gotta go, I am getting late.
- I hafta leave to work now.
Relaxed muscles.
While trying to pronounce clearly, English learners tend to stress their muscles. Also they use pronunciation similar to their local languages. advanced English lesson
Lips
Relax your lip muscles when pronouncing F, B and P. While B does not have gush of air coming out when pronouncing it, P has.
Tongue
Place your tongue in between your teeth and pallet when pronouncing D, L, and T. Also, please note in America, when the letter T comes between two vowels, it is pronounced as D. For example, water is pronounced as ‘wah-der’
When pronouncing R
We have to be careful with British as well as American pronunciation. For British, more often than not, R is pronounced as silent letter, for example, water is pronounced as ‘wat-uh’. However, American roll their tongue slightly while pronouncing R
Hi. The preposition ‘of’ is pronounced as /ʌv, ɑv, əv/ with the “v” sound, not with the “f” sound. 🙂