English communication and dialects

UNIVERSIDAD CENTRAL DEL
ECUADOR-SEDE SANTO
DOMINGO
ENGLISH COMMUNICATION
• ALEJANDRA BARBERAN
• DIANA BEDON
• DIANA MACIAS
• OMAR OCHOA

LANGUAGE
• Language is the human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of
communication.
• Is a conventional system of sound that the people use to expres their ideas or communicate
with other people.
• The language are linked to each other by shared words or sound, or grammatical
constructions.

COMMUNICATION
• Communication is the activity or change information through the exchange of ideas,
feelings, intentions, attitudes, expectations, perceptions or commands.
• Communication requires a sender, a message, a channel or medium and recepient.
• We have two forms to communicate with other people, for example:
• Verbal communication. (system of symbols)
• Non-verbal communication. (gesture, body language or posture, facial expression)

• Improving Your Speaking
• Improving Your Listening
• Improving Your Writing

• Talking to actual native
speakers is the most
effective way to improve
your English skills, speaking
or otherwise.
• Skype Your progress will
be faster this way than any
other.
• English lesson with tourist
• Take a class and get buddy-buddy
with your teacher.
• Offer a language exchange.

• Watch people.
• Watch how their mouths form the
words.
• Watch how emotion is communicated.
• Watch where the emphasis goes on
certain sentences and how that
provides context.

• Above all, if you want to be
understood, slow down.
• Clarity is key -- for some native English
speakers, too!They will be patient with
you. You just gotta be patient with
yourself.
• It's much less frustrating to speak to
someone who you understand even
though they're speaking slowly than to
speak to someone you don't
understand at all.
• Speaking quickly isn't impressive if
your tongue gets all jumbly.

• Its important to know.. What are the
weak and strong points you hear in
your speech? you can concentrate
on what you need to work on. A
great idea is to get a book on tape,
record yourself reading an excerpt
from it (or mimicking the narrator),
and comparing yourself to the
recording. That way you can do it
over and over until you get it right!

• A group class can be cheap, fun, and
work on all your skills, but adding a one-on-
one class, too? You'll get that
individualized attention to your speech
you've been craving. That's a double
dose of improvement.
• There are specialized classes you can
take, too. Accent reduction classes,
business English classes, tourism
classes, heck, sometimes even food
classes.

• You're on the job working partly in English
• You go to your English class, but you go home
and revert back to your native tongue. While
you may be making slow improvements, you'll
never get past that dreaded lingual plateau.
Make a point to speak it at home, too.
• Have only English at the dinner table.
• Stick to English TV at home. Make it as 24/7 as
possible.
• Talk to yourself in English.
• Narrate your actions. While you're washing the
dishes, say what you're doing, thinking, or
feeling.

That's the lazy way of looking at it!
English speakers are everywhere;
sometimes they just have to be found
and coaxed out of hiding. You have to
come to them. Call a phone company and
make small talk about phone plans. Start
a blog. Get into English chat rooms. There
are ALWAYS opportunities to be had.

• If your listening skills feel lacking, don't beat
yourself up. It seems like the easiest skill, but it
can be very, very taxing. The way you're taught
English in school is practically the opposite of
how native speakers actually speak. No wonder
it's such a chore!So the next time someone
says, "Do you want to pass me that bag?" and
you hear, "Djuwanapassmethabag?" you're not
going crazy. Between that and all the "like,"
"uhh," and "umm," you run into it could drive a
person crazy. So when you get in the listening
zone, remind yourself: it's slang time.

• Really. Passive listening is okay, but interacting is
even better. If you want to get good at listening,
you have to ask questions. And this way you have
control of the conversation! If you ask someone
what their favorite thing to do in summer is you
know they're not going to go off on a confusing
tangent on politics. At least, hopefully!And the
more you hear a specific individual talk, the easier
it is to understand them. English has so many
accents you may find yourself not understanding
someone and wondering why. Be patient! Your
mind will get used to their accent in time. English-speaking
people have to adjust for each
other all the time.

• So while talking and listening proactively is
best, passive learning is good, too. So throw
on the telly and sit down for a spell. Try to
keep the captions off! And if you can record
it and watch it more than once, even better.
That way you can see your progress.Even
having the radio on in the background is
helpful, just to keep your mind in the English
zone. But the best case scenario is getting a
movie and watching it over and over until
your mind stops having to worry about
understanding and instead can concentrate
on the little things, like intonation and slang.
And watching TV shows where you have the
same characters over and over so you get
used to their speech. In other words:
repetition.

• If you have a friend who speaks English
that is trying to learn a language you
speak, start an English exchange! Half
the time you speak your language and
the other half you speak English. And
you get to spend time drinking coffee
and relaxing, too!If that's not a
possibility, find some friends who all
want to practice their English. Though
practicing this language with non-native
speakers isn't ideal, it's definitely way
better than nothing. You'll be less
nervous speaking it in front of them and
you can learn from each others'
strengths.

• Even just learning a song a day can
widen your vocabulary extensively.
And it's fun and energizing, too. You
can grow your musical repertoire,
learn new words, and expand your
knowledge without even realizing it.
And then you can go hit the karaoke
bar!Stick to songs that are slow and
clear. The Beatles and Elvis are two
great places to start, though modern
music is good, too -- just aim for the
ballads; they're usually the easiest to
understand. Rap can wait till later.

• It's as simple as that. To get good at something,
you have to do it. You have to do it over and over
and over. So write. Every day. It can be a diary
entry, it could be your next bestseller; it doesn't
really matter. Just put that pen to paper and get
going.Keep it all in one place. Having a notebook
or binder dedicated to your English work will
keep you organized and motivated. The better
you get, the easier it will be to see your progress.
You can look back and marvel at how bad
you used to be and how awesome you are now.

Get it checked.
• However, it's kinda pointless if you don't
ever get it checked or corrected. You
want to get better at the entire
language, not just the language you're
capable of right now. You have two
options here:The Internet. It's amazing;
it really is. Sites like italki.com and lang-
8 can correct your work for free! Don't
get off wikiHow just yet, but do keep
those sites in mind.
• A friend. Obviously. But the great thing
about writing is that you can email your
friend and wherever they are, they can
get it, correct it, and get it back to you.
So whether they're a mile away or in the
middle of Canada, progress can be had.

• If you write like a six-year-old, regardless of
how correct your writing is, it still is going to
sound like a six-year-old. The only difference
between a six-year-old with good grammar
and a 20-year-old with good grammar is their
vocabulary. So whenever you run into a phrase
you want to start incorporating into your
writing (or speech), write it down. And then
make a point to use it.A good idea is to start
learning collocations. That's a fancy term for
words that go together. "Get married" is
useful, but "get married to someone" is even
better -- that way you know not to say "get
married with." If you said you "received a cold,"
you'd receive some funny looks -- but not if
you said you "caught a cold." See how that
works?

• While knowing a lot of words is all
well and good, ifu type like this,your
writing isnt going 2 look very good
u know? Painful. Make sure you
have your spaces right, your
punctuation right, and use capital
letters when appropriate. That stuff
matters too.Unless you are a 15-
year-old girl texting her friends, text
speak is not okay. "You" is "you,"
not "u." "For" is not "4." "2" means
something very different than "to"
or "too." You won't be winning any
medals for writing like that.

• It has practically everything you've ever wanted.
Practically. There are websites that have English games,
easy-to-read English articles, and exercises to improve
your skills in every domain. Here's just a few neat ones to
whet your appetite:[1]Anki is flashcard software. Similar
things can be found on websites like Memrise, too. You
can basically quiz yourself.
• OneLook is a type of dictionary that can find words for
you, define them, andtranslate. You only need the, cough
cough, one look. It also has a reverse dictionary where you
can type in the concept instead!
• Visualwords creates word map visualizations, connecting
the word you search with similar, associated words or
words that collocate with it. Great way to expand your
vocabulary!
• Similar to Visuwords, Merriam Webster has a "visual
dictionary." If you type in "tire," it will show you a tire,
with words pointing to every little detail of it from "tread"
to "bead wire."
• Englishforums is a great place to pose questions and talk
to speakers. It's basically message board after message
board of English-related questions.

• Always correct your writing. And by that, we don't mean "get it
checked," like stated above. We mean get it checked and then rewrite it.
You want a beautiful, finished draft of perfect English created by you. If
you just write it and get it corrected, you won't truly ingest what mistakes
you made and how to fix them. And this way your notebook is a whole
heck of a lot prettier.Once you've corrected a piece, try to write something
the next day that builds upon the mistakes you've corrected. This way you
can prove to yourself that you've improved and actually notice the
mistakes you're not making anymore. You'll get better and build your
confidence. Bonus.

• Southern English engages in r-dropping, that is, r's are not pronounced after vowels, unless followed by
another vowel. Instead, vowels are lengthened or have an /'/ off-glide, so fire becomes /fai'/, far becomes
/fa:/, and so on.
regular use of "broad a" (/a:/), where GA (General American) would use /æ/.
• "long o" is pronounced /'u/, where GA uses /ou/.
• final unstressed i is pronounced /i/, where GA uses /i:).
• t between vowels retained as /t/ (or a glottal stop, in its variants), where GA changes it to /d/.
• The English of well-bred Londoners, especially graduates of the public schools (e.g. Eton and Harrow) and
"Oxbridge" universities, was the origin of "the Queen's English," also known as Received
Pronunciation (RP), BBC, or "posh."

Cockney
Originally the dialect of the working class of East End London.
initial h is dropped, so house becomes /aus/ (or even /a:s/).
• /th/ and /dh/ become /f/ and /v/ respectively: think > /fingk/, brother > /broev'/.
• t between vowels becomes a glottal stop: water > /wo?'/.
• diphthongs change, sometimes dramatically: time > /toim/, brave > /braiv/,
etc.

•Estuary English
From London down the Thames and into
Essex, Sussex, and even Kent, a new working
and middle class dialect has evolved and is
rapidly become "the" southern dialect. It
combines some of the characteristics of
Cockney with RP, but makes much less use of
Cockney slang.

East Anglian
This dialect is similar to the Southern, but keeps
its h's:
t between vowels usually becomes a glottal stop.
• /ai/ becomes /oi/: time > /toim/.
• RP yu becomes u: after n, t, d... as in American
English.
• the -s in the third person singular is usually
dropped [e.g. he goes > he go, he didn't do it >
he don't do it]

The dialect of the East Midlands, once filled with interesting variations from
county to county, is now predominantly RP. R's are dropped, but h's are
pronounced. The only signs that differentiate it from RP:
ou > u: (so go becomes /gu:/).
• RP yu; becomes u: after n, t, d... as in American English.

The West Country
•
r's are not dropped.
• initial s often becomes z (singer > zinger).
• initial f often becomes v (finger > vinger).
• vowels are lengthened.

West Midlands
This is the dialect of Ozzie Osbourne! While
pronunciation is not that different from RP, some of
the vocabulary is:
are > am
• am, are (with a continuous sense) > bin
• is not > ay
• are not > bay

This dialect, spoken north and east of Liverpool, has
the southern habit of dropping r's. Other features:
•/oe/ > /u/, as in luck (/luk/).
•/ou/ > /oi/, as in hole (/hoil/)
Scouse is the very distinctive Liverpool accent, a
version of the Lancashire dialect, that the
Beatles made famous.
•the tongue is drawn back.
•/th/ and /dh/ > /t/ and /d/ respectively.
•final k sounds like the Arabic q.
•for is pronounced to rhyme with fur.

Yorkshire
The Yorkshire dialect is known for its sing-song quality, a little like Swedish.
/oe/ > /u/, as in luck (/luk/).
• the is reduced to t'.
• initial h is dropped.
• was > were.
• still use thou (pronounced /tha/) and thee.
• aught and naught (pronounced /aut/ or /out/ and /naut/ or /nout/) are used for anything and
nothing.

Northern
The Northern dialect closely resembles the southern-most Scottish dialects. It retains many old
Scandinavian words, such as bairn for child, and not only keeps its r's, but often rolls them. The most
outstanding version is Geordie, the dialect of the Newcastle area.
-er > /æ/, so father > /fædhæ/.
• /ou/ > /o:'/, so that boat sounds like each letter is pronounced.
• talk > /ta:k/
• work > /work/
• book > /bu:k/
• my > me
• me > us
• our > wor
• you plural > youse

• Welsh English is characterized by a sing-song quality and lightly rolled r's. It
has been strongly influenced by the Welsh language, although it is
increasingly influenced today by standard English, due to the large number
of English people vacationing and retiring there.

Scotland
Scotland actually has more variation in dialects than England!
"pure" vowels (/e:/ rather than /ei/, /o:/ rather than /ou/)
• /u:/ is often fronted to /ö/ or /ü/, e.g. boot, good, muin (moon), poor...
• . First, the phonetics:
/oi/, /ai/, and final /ei/ > /'i/, e.g. oil, wife, tide...
• final /ai/ > /i/, e.g. ee (eye), dee (die), lee (lie)...
• /ou/ > /ei/, e.g. ake (oak), bate (boat), hame (home), stane (stone), gae
(go)...
• /au/ > /u:/, e.g. about, house, cow, now... (often spelled oo or u)
• /o/ > /a:/, e.g. saut (salt), law, aw (all)...
• /ou/ > /a:/, e.g. auld (old), cauld (cold), snaw (snow)...
• /æ/ > /a/, e.g. man, lad, sat...
• also: pronounce the ch's and gh's that are silent in standard English as
/kh/: nicht, licht, loch...

Present tense: often, all forms follow the third
person singular (they wis, instead of they were).
Past tense (weak verbs): -it after plosives (big >
biggit); -t after n, l, r, and all other unvoiced
consonants (ken > kent); -ed after vowels and all
other voiced consonants (luv > luved).
Past tense (strong verbs): come > cam, gang >
gaed and many more.
On the other hand, many verbs that are strong in
standard English are weak in Scottish English: sell
> sellt, tell > tellt, mak > makkit, see > seed, etc.
Past participle is usually the same as the past
(except for many strong verbs, as in standard
English)
Present participle: -in (ken > kennin)
The negative of many auxiliary verbs is formed
with -na: am > amna, hae (have) > hinna, dae (do) >
dinna, can > canna, etc.
Irregular plurals: ee > een (eyes), shae > shuin
(shoes), coo > kye (cows).
Common diminutives in -ie: lass > lassie, hoose >
hoosie...
Common adjective ending: -lik (= -ish)
Demonstratives come in four pairs
(singular/plural): this/thir, that/thae, thon/thon,
yon/yon
Relative pronouns: tha or at.
Interrogative pronouns: hoo, wha, whan, whase,
whaur, whatna, whit.
Numbers: ane, twa, three, fower, five, sax, seeven,
aucht, nine, ten, aleeven, twal..

• lass, bairn (child),
• kirk (church)
• big (build),
• greet (weep),
• ingle (household fire),
• aye (yes),
• hame (home)...

Ireland
• English was imposed upon the Irish, but
they have made it their own and have
contributed some of our finest
literature. Irish English is strongly
influenced by Irish Gaelic:
r after vowels is retained
• "pure" vowels (/e:/ rather than /ei/, /o:/
rather than /ou/)
• /th/ and /dh/ > /t/ and /d/ respectively.

Use of be or do in place of usually:
I do write... (I usually write)
Use of after for the progressive perfect and
pluperfect:
I was after getting married (I had just
gotten married)
Use of progressive beyond what is possible in
standard English:
I was thinking it was in the drawer
Use of the present or past for perfect and
pluperfect:
She’s dead these ten years (she has been
dead...)
Use of let you be and don’t be as the imperative:
Don’t be troubling yourself
Use of it is and it was at the beginning of a
sentence:
it was John has the good looks in the family
Is it marrying her you want?
Substitute and for when or as:
It only struck me and you going out of the
door
Substitute the infinitive verb for that or if:
Imagine such a thing to be seen here!
Drop if, that, or whether:
Tell me did you see them
Statements phrased as rhetorical questions:
Isn’t he the fine-looking fellow?
Extra uses of the definite article:
He was sick with the jaundice
Unusual use of prepositions:
Sure there’s no daylight in it at all now

Australian English
• Australian English is predominantly British English, and especially from the
London area. R’s are dropped after vowels, but are often inserted between
two words ending and beginning with vowels.
The vowels reflect a strong “Cockney” influence:
• The long a (/ei/) tends towards a long i (/ai/), so pay sounds like pie to an
American ear.
• The long i (/ai/), in turn, tends towards oi, so cry sounds like croy. Ow
sounds like it starts with a short a (/æ/). Other vowels are less dramatically
shifted.
Even some rhyming slang has survived into Australlian English: Butcher’s
means look (butcher’s hook); hit and miss means piss; loaf means head
(loaf of bread); Noah’s ark means shark; Richard the third means turd, and
so on.

• LikeAmerican English has absorbed numerousAmerican Indian words,
Australian English has absorbed many Aboriginal words:
billibong -- watering hole
• coolabah -- a type of tree
• corroboree -- a ceremony
• nulla-nulla -- a club
• wallaby -- small kangaroo
• wombat -- a small marsupial
• woomera -- a weapon
• wurley -- a simple shelter

Another characteristic of Australian English is
abbreviated words, often ending in -y, -ie, or -o:
aussie -- Australian chalky -- teacher
chockie -- chocoloate coldie -- a cold beer
footy -- football (Australian rules, of
course)
sammie -- sandwich
mossie -- mosquito sunnies -- sunglasses

New Zealand
• New Zealand English is heard by Americans as "Ozzie Light.“
• The characteristics of Australian English are there to some degree, but not as
intensely.
• The effect for Americans is uncertainty as to whether the person is from England
or Australia.
• One clue is that New Zealand English sounds "flatter" (less modulated) than either
Australian or British English and more like western American English.

• i - as in bit is pronounced 'uh'
• long /a:/ in words like 'past', 'dance'
• t in middle of words pronounced as d's ('pretty' becomes '/pridi:/')
• donga - ditch, from Xhosa
• dagga - marijuana, from Xhoixhoi (?)
• kak - bullshit, fromAfrikaans
• fundi - expert, from Xhosa and Zulu umfundi (student).

• Canadian English is generally similar to northern and western American English.
• The one outstanding characteristic is called Canadian rising:
/ai/ and /au/ become /oei/ and /oeu/, respectively.
• One unusual characteristic found in much Canadian casual speech is the use of sentence final "eh?" even in declarative
sentences.
• Most Canadians retain r's after vowels, but in the Maritimes, they drop their r's, just like their New England neighbors to
the south.
• Newfoundland has a very different dialect, called Newfie, that seems to be strongly influenced by Irish immigrants:
/th/ and /dh/ > /t/ and /d/ respectively.
• am, is, are > be's
• I like, we like, etc. > I likes, we likes, etc.

American English derives from 17th
century British English
There are three dialect areas --
northern, southern, and midland.

• Northern New England (Maine and New Hampshire)
• Boston area (eastern Massachussets, Rhode Island)
• Northeastern (Connecticut, western Massachusetts, Vermont, upstate New
York, lower Michigan, northern Illinois)
• New York City area (including most of Long Island and northern New Jersey)
• North central (upper Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, the Dakotas)

• Philadelphia area (inc. eastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey, Delaware, and the
Baltimore area)
• Pittsburgh area (western Pennsylvania)
• Ohio-Plains (Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, Kansas...)

• Appalachia (western Virginia, West Virginia, eastern Kentucky, easternTennessee)
• Arkansas-Oklahoma

• Virginia (eastern)
• North Carolina (eastern)
• South Carolina
• Georgia-Florida
• Mississippi-Gulf (including Alabama, Louisiana, easternTexas, western Tennessee, western Kentucky)
• West Texas
• (Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, California)

• "drawl" [lengthening, fronting, and raising vowels]
• /ai/ > /æ:/ in find, mind
• /oi/ > /o/ in boil, oil
• /u:/ > /yu:/ in due, tuesday
• au/ > /æu/ in out, doubt
• /e/ > /ei/ in bed, head
• /e/ > /i/ in pen, ten
• greasy > greazy
• carry > tote
• dragged > drug
• you > you all, y’all
• Southern:
• help, bulb, wolf > /hep/, /boeb/, /wuf/

drop r’s -- strong, sometimes retroflex, r’s
• wash: /wa:sh/ -- /wosh/, /worsh/
• think: /thingk/ -- /theingk/
• egg: /eg/ -- /eig/
• moon: /mu:n/ -- /mü:n/
• snake doctor -- snake feeder
• snap beans -- green beans
• goobers -- peanuts

• fog, hog: /fag/, /hag/ -- /fog/, /hog/
• roof: /ruf/, /huf/ -- /ru:f/, /hu:f/
• cow, house: /kau/, /haus/ -- /kæu/, /hæus/
• wash: /wa:sh/ -- /wosh/, /worsh/
• darning needle -- snake feeder
• pail -- bucket
• teeter-totter -- see-saw
• fire-fly -- lightning-bug

/æ/ frequently becomes /a/, e.g. in aunt, dance, glass
• Mary-marry-merry (/eir/-/ær/-/er/) distinctions preserved only in r-less areas,
rapidly disappearing from American speech.
• and spreading rapidly
loss of voiceless w: which > /wic/
• loss of voiceless y: human > /yum'n/

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