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Pronunciation index

Listen and mimic

The first we learn about a language as children are its sounds and melody. By listening to and mimicking the sounds in our immediate surroundings, we learn to say our first words with perfect pronunciation. For adults, pronunciation is usually the biggest difficulty when we learn a new language. Learning pronunciation is thought by many to be the hardest part of learning a language, and many believe it is impossible to learn to pronounce "perfectly".

As adults, you expect to learn a new language with the help of rules. When it comes to grammar, you can get relatively far in your proficiency with the help of rules, but learning pronunciation is a completely different process. You learn pronunciation by listening to and hearing the language. This was what we all did as children when we learned our mother tongue. The first two years, children listen to and imitate their surroundings intensively. Children imitate the rhythm and melody of language, and you can even hear from children’s babbling if they are Swedish or Chinese. It is also known that when they move to a new country children quickly learn the new language with perfect pronunciation, while adults have problems with pronunciation above all. Children react spontaneously and without restriction to their environment and mimic the language they hear, while adults who are fully aware of the strange surroundings can find it less natural to imitate.

Hearing is the most important instrument

It is important that you realise that learning pronunciation is not an intellectual but a physiological process. Adults have the same neurological and physiological conditions as children to learn any language. Hearing is the most important instrument for learning pronunciation. You have to trust your hearing and concentrate on trying to mimic the sounds you hear.

Adults often have more trust in written texts than their own hearing, and it feels safer to fall back on written texts. That can be misleading for learning pronunciation since writing does not reliably represent pronunciation.

The difference between pronunciation and spelling

The relationship between sounds and letters can vary. In Standard Swedish, kål and kol are pronounced exactly the same, for example. On the other hand, certain letters can represent different sounds. For example, k is pronounced differently in the words kär and kår. In English, the vowel sound in the words buy, lie and try, for example, sound the same. And if you compare different languages, the difference between spelling and pronunciation becomes even more striking. The vowel sound /å/ is spelled with the letter å in Swedish, as in the word mål, while in English it is spelled with an a in the word call, and in German with an o in the word oben, and in French with the letters eau in the word cadeau. This development depends much on pronunciation changing in all languages over time and not least in different directions. However, it usually takes a long time for spelling reform to be carried out.

If your mother tongue has the same writing system as the new language, it is important that you are aware that writing has lost the absolute direct link with pronunciation, and letters are now more or less arbitrary symbols for sounds.

How do you learn pronunciation as an adult?

How do you now go about learning pronunciation in the new language as an adult without a teacher, as in this course? Why not check out children’s learning and trust that it will be just fine learning the new language like them.

Start with just listening, listening and listening to the new language so that you learn to hear. Listen to the dialogues in the course, but also listen from the beginning to Swedish radio and TV programmes that are available online. At this stage, it does not matter if you do not understand what is said. It is in fact better that you do not know WHAT is said, because then you can concentrate better on HOW it sounds.

It is important that you do not use the written texts, but just practice with sound. By just listening and imitating, you will become more aware that it is hearing that guides your speech organs.

Only after you have listened carefully many, many times should you try to say the phrases yourself. Do it by speaking at the same time as the model voice at the same speed, which makes you automatically tune into the rhythm of the language with its stresses and melody. Practice the same text so many times that you get used to your own pronunciation. It is important not to be in a hurry at the start of language learning. It is better to repeat too many times than to move on before you find the right rhythm and melody with the right sounds which have to be carefully got used to. The very best is that in the end you know the phrases by heart with the "perfect" pronunciation. It should feel natural, almost as natural as when you speak your mother tongue.

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