Job Discussion Forums

[gugelhupf]

What is the most difficult word for a non-native English speaker to pronounce?

I know that many linguistic groups have their own particular difficulties - Arabs and the letter P, Malays and final plosives for example - but except for a few clever Germans I've never had much success trying to teach the plural CRISPS.

[dmb]

consonant clusters can be a problem. For crisps try a few warm exercises.


/SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS P SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS P SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS P SSSSSSSSSSS P SSSSSSSSSSSS/

[Snoopy]

See my previous posting about tongue-twisters and spoonerisms. One I did not include was about Theodore Oswaldtwistle, the thistle-sifter.

[Afra]

Try back chaining - ps sps isps risps crisps

[Lynn]

I don't know what the linguistic term is, but it's when you swallow a consonant. For example, "red", especially when another word follows it. These kinds of words are difficult for Japanese because Japanese consists of vowel endings.

[denise]

Problem sounds: r/l, th, sh, g/k, b/v, etc., etc....

The one word that comes to mind is "rarely." I've had quite a few students stumble over it. (And not just in Japan.)

d

[FGT]

Crisps was the example I thought of before reading the initial post. Here in Turkey consonant clusters are a nightmare but Turkish people call a cat by saying "Psss Psss Psss" so just get them to call a cat first and then....No problem.
Worse is the difference between /w/ and /v/. "wet" and "vet" often sound the same. They can't even hear (or see) the difference.
Also getting students to pronounce "arm" in an RP/British way /a:m/ is impossible because it sounds too much like the Turkish for vagina. They will insist on sounding the R.
I love drilling pronunciation of the fruit "peach" and the football ground "pitch" because of the similarity to the Turkish word for ba:stard. After some initial inhibitions, students really get into it!

[arioch36]

For my Chinese students, the biggest difficulty is "Smile" "smell"

First it takes a lot of work for some of them.

Seconed, the confusion between the two words is quite a problem. If you knew how many speech contest I have been at, when the importance of "smiling was a key part of the speech...

It sounds like this, " I like it when someone smells" "I want to smell you" (meaning I want to make you smile), etc. It can be real bad (also here, there is no deodrant in China, students where the same clothes sometimes every day of the week, etc)

[yaramaz]

FGT, ever find yourself avoiding using the term 'sick' referring to illness because the students break out into giggles? Its right up there with peach and pitch...

[curveegrrl]

A number of my students have trouble making 'walk' and 'work' sound different.

[guest of Japan]

Japanese students would have great difficult with "curveegrrl."

[schwa]

There was a debate on the Korea board about this a while back & there was some consensus that "yield" might pose the toughest challenge here.

[Lanza-Armonia]

I get severely pi$$ed off when every EVERY!!!!! chinese person says yer-al-li as apposed to usually. I've have Chinese peeps argue with me with the pronounciation of this fecking word. The worst thing is, I know I'm right. It's just that these Chinky computer-produced voices on the net/personal oganiser-dictionary thingy is 100% correct. Well I now have one and I can say it's a total peaca shi-te!

GGGGRRRRR!!!

LA

[Snoopy]

Spanish-speaking students have great difficulty with "wallet" and "stop".

[Kurochan]

How about "th," as in the, and clothes. Most Chinese people can't say it, nor can many native German speakers. A lot of Americans don't say it properly either. In all the cases I mention, it comes out as d -- you know, as in "dees and dose."