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In this blog post, I will talk about one widespread challenge that arabs face when pronouncing words in English, especially when these words are in long sentences.

In Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) the sound of “P” is inexistent, therefore making native Arabic speakers change the “P” sound to a “B” sound in words in English, but how is this a challenge? Why do native Arabic speakers need to focus on pronouncing these words correctly?

Well, although many English teachers say pronunciation is not highly important, we at Vostè Academy disagree. Pronunciation is as important as grammar. Do you know why? Pronunciation is a big part of your communication skills. There are some words that, if mispronounced, can have totally different meanings, for instance, the words:

Beach and Bitch. 

The beach is a place where you go with your family in the summer, where you have sand and the ocean.

Bitch is a naughty and nasty word used to offend men and women.

For MSA native speakers, words like pay, peace, people, price, and palace can be challenging and are pronounced like bay, beace, beoble, brice, and balace. And this can be very difficult for people to understand.

How can you stop making these mistakes?

Well, it’s not easy to take away a habit you’ve acquired back when you started learning English; this is why you need to choose wisely when deciding what teacher to guide you in your language learning journey. Some teachers will let you make these mistakes so you don’t frustrate yourself in class, but the frustration happens one way or another if pronunciation isn’t taught properly.

So, here is how you can correct your pronunciation:

First, you need to understand that in MSA, we don’t have voiceless sounds; these sounds are made when your vocal cords don’t vibrate when trying to make the sound. Put your hands on your throat and say the sound of “B” (it will sound like “ba”). You will notice that your throat will vibrate when you pronounce the sound of “b”. When pronouncing the P sound, your vocal cords should not vibrate; it should be just an explosion without a sound.

Try saying these words slowly, using the explosion P

P-ay

P-eace

P-eople

P-rice

P-alance

Now try to say these words, putting the sounds together.

P-AY  P-EACE   P-EOPLE   P-RICE   P-ALACE

After you managed to say these words, joining the sounds together, you’re going to try to say them in a sentence, for example:

“I will PAY for your dinner today.”

Say it as many times as you can until you have the correct pronunciation inside a sentence.

Do this with all the words you have difficulty with, especially when it comes to sounds that are nonexistent in MSA but extremely important in the English Language.

Why not practice only the words?

Although learning isolated words for pronunciation purposes is very important, we cannot understand words in isolation. In the English language, you might have noticed that when speaking, we join many sounds, so even if you do learn only the words, putting them into different sentences can be very beneficial for your pronunciation studies, because it can teach you how different sounds are together.

So, when practicing pronunciation, don’t practice isolated words; practice words + sentences, this is the real way to succeed.

If you’re looking for help to improve your English and pronunciation skills, click here for private and personalized classes.

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Comment below your thoughts on this post, and what are your difficulties when it comes to pronunciation?