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Category: Understand English

  • Master tongue control for natural, faster speech

    You’ve got the fast speech rules in American English—contractions, assimilation, elision, etc. Your pronunciation is clear, and expression isn’t an issue. Yet, you still notice a difference: you speak slowly and less smoothly compared to a native speaker. Have you ever wondered why? The answer lies in the tongue. It needs to be both flexible and stable, which helps you control your speed, while also ensuring your speech sounds natural and smooth. Think of your tongue as the accelerator, determining how fast or slow your speech flows. With the right placement and movement, it can achieve both flexibility and stability. Let’s look at why this matters and how to practice it.

    The tongue has three main parts: the tip, the body, which includes the blade, and back, and the root.

    When you’re about to speak, your tongue should be in a “tall” position. Specifically, the body should be slightly raised from the floor of the mouth, the tip should rest comfortably behind the bottom teeth, and the back should form a gentle arch near the roof of your mouth. From here, the blade moves subtly in various directions for different sounds. In this position, the tongue is closer to the front of the mouth, near the lips, teeth, and roof, which makes enunciation easier and faster.

    The key is to keep the tongue stable but flexible when moving. Without stability, it loses control; without flexibility, it gets rigid. You need to balance both by understanding the roles of the root and the blade and how they work together. The root, which attaches partly to the floor of the mouth and partly to the throat, provides stability. Think of it as an anchor that keeps your tongue’s movements under control, steady but not tense. If the root is rigidly tied down to the floor of the mouth or the back is raised too high, it restricts the rest of the tongue and makes your voice sound unnatural. If you feel tension, that’s a sign to relax.

    Once you have that stability, the blade needs flexibility. This is the most active part, doing most of the work in forming sounds. Its movements should be smooth and effortless to allow easy transitions between sounds. It doesn’t need to be aggressive or forceful, which would only slow you down and make your speech sound choppy or heavy. Keeping movements small and consistent helps you sound more natural and prevents your speech from feeling forced. When this part moves smoothly within a gentle range, you’ll notice faster, easier transitions between syllables, making your speech flow comfortably.

    As you speak, focus on the tongue and let the other articulators take a passive, supportive role. Picture the tongue as standing tall and comfortable as you speak—this will help your speech become faster and sound more natural. Avoid dropping your lower jaw too much, as this can make the root unstable. Don’t overuse your articulatory muscles, or your tongue will become tense and stiff. And most importantly, use your breath to raise the tongue forward. When you inhale, the tongue muscle (genioglossus) naturally moves forward, making the tongue “taller”.

    To ensure that the body and root of the tongue are relaxed, check the lingual frenulum (the strip under the tongue). If it’s tight, it indicates tension in the tongue. The frenulum should feel comfortably extended as you speak.

    In conclusion, balancing your tongue’s flexibility and stability is key to achieving native-like fluency. While there are lots of details to keep in mind as you practice, it really comes down to visualizing your tongue standing tall and relaxed. If it slips out of this position, use your breath to help you regain control.

  • Employ Power of breath to sail the voice

    Many E​nglish learners focus heavily on the articulators—tongue, jaw, mouth, lips, and throat. Yet, they still struggle to speak English naturally in various settings. A significant reason is their lack of awareness of breath control. Breath is a silent yet powerful tool for voice control, essential for smoothness, clarity, and consistency in speech.

    Breath acts as a voice carrier; however, its role is usually overlooked by learners. Many mistakenly believe that sound is created by the articulatory muscles and therefore move them excessively in pursuit of clarity. This can result in a voice that sounds “too clear” but lacks smoothness. They also overuse the articulatory muscles in an attempt to project their voice louder, but this approach often produces an unnatural and strained voice. Such habit may lead to fatigue and potential long-term harm to the articulators. Some learners, in contrast, are ​”lazy​” to move the articulators, combined with short and shallow breath, causing a weak, inconsistent and unclear voice. Additionally, some individuals sound natural when speaking alone or in small groups; however they fail to maintain effortless and consistent speech in larger, louder environments due to improper breath control.

    Having enough breath before speaking and knowing how to release it properly is crucial for voice control. Focus on breath rather than muscles. Let the breath carry the sound, and send the voice out on exhalation. You should always remind yourself to “open your throat” before speaking and maintain this openness throughout the speech. Breathing in helps open the vocal tract, position the tongue, and create more space at the back of the mouth. Once the articulators and their positions are set, maintain their stability and use breath to send the voice out. 

    First, inhale gently and slowly through the nose, avoiding aggressiveness or abruptness. Speak on exha​lation. Inhale again before starting each new phrase or sentence. Speak on exhalation. This process repeats consistently and rhythmically: inhale, then speak (on exhalation).

    Alternatively, breathe in through the mouth as if starting a small yawn. Speak at the beginning of the yawn. Do not wait until the yawn is complete as this will cause strain on the tongue root and narrow the throat and the back of the mouth.

    In addition to proper inhalation, be aware of how to breathe out effectively because sounds glide on exhalation. Sound production is closely tied to the vibration of the vocal folds. If breath is ample but the vocal folds vibrate loosely, the voice will sound breathy or hollow. Conversely, insufficient breath and tense vocal folds stress the voice, making it sound small, dull, and rigid. Remember the vocal folds regulate airflows. It’s essential to maintain their flexibility and stability to achieve a smooth, clear, and natural voice. To understand more about how the vocal folds work, check it here.

    This information may seem overwhelming at first, and practicing it can be challenging. You may have been so familiar with overusing the articulators instead of using breath to produce sound. Take time to practice, be patient, and resilient. Be attentive to the articulators, muscles, and breath. Overtime, you will become more sensitive to how these elements react and be able to gauge whether your voice sounds okay or require adjustments. Take notes on issues while practicing for review and subsequent addressing.

    In summary, effective breath control is crucial as it serves as a voice carrier​. Mastering it significantly improves vocal quality, promoting a smooth, consistent, and natural sound without straining the articulators. From my personal experience, being well-prepared with breath also greatly enhances a speaker’s demeanor—conveying relaxation, control, and full engagement in conversations.

  • Stable vocal tract for consistent voice

    In the previous post, I stated that having a proper American English oral posture will change your voice immediately, making it sound much more natural and reducing the influence of your native language accent when you speak English. Continuing the series “Unlock your American English Voice”, this post is going to focus on how to form a stable vocal tract by covering three critical components: the tongue position, throat openness and effective breath control. Understanding and mastering these elements can significantly enhance vocal stability and quality.

    First, the tongue should be neutral and stand tall inside the mouth without straining the root. The relaxation of the tongue’s root is extremely important. Maintaining a tall tongue position without straining the root helps stabilize the oral posture. This standard position should be maintained throughout speaking with necessary adjustments for various phonetic units. Always balance between the height of the tongue and the relaxation of its root. If the tongue is tall but the root is tense, it will hinder the tongue’s movement. Breathing in or slightly moving the lips forward will help naturally raise the tongue.

    The second main point is the throat openness. The throat should be open at all times while speaking. Think of the open throat as a gas tank, it contains breath needed for sound production. A “flat” or blocked throat means there’s no breath release, resulting in no sound. Achieving this openness shouldn’t involve excessive use of throat, neck, or surrounding muscles, as this will make the throat hard and rigid. Instead, the throat should be opened by inhaling. The practice should be smooth, gentle, natural, and effortless. The deeper the breath, the more open the throat becomes. However, please note that our goal is to open the throat, and inhaling is a way to achieve that goal. Therefore, do not force yourself to breathe in so deeply that causes the stiffness of your abdomen area and throat. The process of breathing in and out should be constant and flowy.

    The third one is breath control. Having enough air is crucial to make sure it’s always available while speaking. However, how to release it properly between sentences is key to maintain a flowy, consistent voice. This breath control is closely related to the vibration of the vocal folds. The vocal folds are two muscular bands, located in the larynx in the throat. When you inhale, the vocal folds open, and then come closer vibrating upon exhalation. The focal folds function like the gate to decide how much air can come through. When the vocal folds aren’t tight enough, too much air will be released, resulting in a hollow, weak and breathy voice. In contrast, when they are too tight, only a very tiny string of air comes through, which causes overuse of surrounding muscles to be able to produce sound clearly. As a result, this will make your voice harsh, rigid and unnatural. Generally, in normal speaking, effective breath control involves using a very small amount of breath to vibrate the vocal folds and slightly tightening them to produce a strong and consistent voice.

    Maintaining the standard tongue position, open throat, and breath control are essential to create a stable physical speaking environment in the vocal tract. Holding a drinking straw or a pencil between the teeth while speaking is a great exercise that helps stabilize the overall vocal tract.

    In conclusion, achieving a fluent and consistent speech requires maintaining a stable physical speaking environment. This involves positioning the tongue neutrally and upwards, keeping the throat open, and effectively controlling breath. Mastering these principles can be challenging initially, but it’s a common experience when starting something new. Keep patience, regular practice, and attentive awareness of how your articulators, breath, and voice function during speech to make necessary adjustments, you will achieve your goal in speaking English naturally.

  • Proper oral posture is everything

    In American English, it’s important for your speech to be both smooth and clear. If you either overdo or underdo your enunciation, your voice will loose its smoothness or clarity. Even after balancing these aspects, maintaining a stable voice can be challenging. Having a proper oral posture plays a big role in acquiring characteristics of American English.

    Think about a saxophone; it is a wind instrument similar to a flute, a trumpet, or a clarinet. However, one of the things makes its sound distinguished is its unique shape. Similarly, your oral posture will determine how close your English sounds to American English. Please note that sounding American is not the purpose of this writing; rather, the ultimate goal is to speak English naturally and effortlessly. However, I strongly believe that once adopting a proper oral posture, your voice will immediately change, becoming much less influenced by your native language accent.

    The proper oral posture I’m mentioning here is not for each individual sound. It is the overall mouth shape that you should consistently maintain throughout speech. While it needs to adjust to accommodate different sounds, it should always return to its overall form between transition of sounds, even the smallest unit. A proper oral posture significantly helps your enunciation sound natural, smooth and clear in a stable way.

    Here are three steps to form an overall mouth shape for speaking American English.

    First, inhale deeply and slowly through your nose. Avoid being aggressive and straining the muscles of your throat, lips or mouth. This technique is called diaphragmatic breathing (or belly breathing, or abdominal breathing). When you breathe in, your diaphragm, a muscle in your belly, contracts and moves downward, causing an expansion to your stomach. Diaphragmatic breathing is the foundation of your voice. With more air in your lungs, it creates a well-supported, stable, consistent and energetic voice.

    Second, hold the breath, gently move your tongue forward and upward by slightly moving your lips forward. Position the upper body of the tongue between the upper molars, with the tip of the tongue behind the bottom teeth. This is a standard tongue position that you should maintain throughout speech after any adjustment. Since the tongue moves a lot, ensure it has plenty of freedom and flexibility. Stay away from any pressure or strain on your tongue, especially its root. If you feel discomfort or notice the tongue pulling back, lifting too much, or moving too far forward, adjust its position.

    Third, open your mouth by dropping your jaw slightly without changing the positions of the tongue and the lips. Americans typically don’t open their mouths wide or move them excessively when they speak. No matter how much the lower jaw drops, never slide the temporomandibular joints (TMJ), or the hinge joints beyond the normal range of motion for speaking. To find the right amount of jaw movement, place your fingers on the hinge joints, located in front of the ears, and gently move your jaw as if chewing without opening your mouth. The space between the upper and lower molars created by this movement is the standard degree of mouth openness.

    Although these 3 steps are described separately, in practice, they occur rapidly and almost simultaneously.

    In summary, achieving natural American English speech hinges on adopting a proper oral posture. This involves inhaling deeply, positioning your tongue forward and upward, and gently lowering your jaw. Believe me, once the overall mouth shape is formed, your voice will experience an immediate transformation, sounding more natural with an instant reduction in the influence of your native language accent.

  • Unlock American English Voice

    Greetings, English learners!

    Today, I’m going to share with you the ways to enhance your English voice, making it sound natural, effortless, yet powerful. This subject has lingered in my mind for months, but the right moment never seemed to come. Today, however, I’m feeling enough energy and motivation to delve into it, one that I’m deeply passionate about and have dedicated a countless amount of time, energy, and effort to master.

    This post doesn’t detail the specifics of the IPA chart, sound reduction, sound connection, assimilation or elision as you are likely familiar with these topics, and there are ample free resources covering them. While these aspects significantly contribute to clear and correct pronunciation, instruction on producing individual sounds isn’t my aim. The ultimate goal of this sharing is to assist you in achieving a natural, effortless, yet powerful voice in American English. For this purpose, a more comprehensive approach is necessary, involving a thorough understanding of the physical aspects of speaking American English.  

    To avoid wasting your time, kindly disregard this post if you have no concerns with your voice or no desire to reduce your native language accent or adopt a general American English accent. However, if you are grappling with any of the following issues, this post is a perfect fit, I believe, a game changer, that drastically addresses those challenges, ultimately boosting your confidence in expressing yourself with your own voice.

    English learners, this post holds the solution to the following issues:

    Voice-Identity Mismatch: You don’t hold affection for your voice and sense it doesn’t truly represent your authentic self. 

    Robotic And Rigid Voice: Despite your earnest efforts to improve your English, you find yourself unable to speak it naturally and effortlessly due to a lack of control over your articulators. There is an overuse of articulative muscles and surrounding muscles, causing restrictions and tension in the movement of the articulators. 

    Inflexible, Non-adaptive Voice: When you speak alone or in a small group, you sound fluent. However, you encounter difficulties in open spaces or crowds where louder speech is required. Your delivery becomes unclear and disjointed, primarily due to a lack of smooth and consistent transitions between pitches in your voice. The issue is rooted by the failure in maintaining stability in your articulators during speech.  

    Shallow, Flat And Weak Voice: Your voice lacks depth, energy, richness and fullness because there isn’t sufficient space inside your mouth, inadequate breath support, and a narrow or blocked vocal tract. 

    Native Language Influence: Despite your fluency with phonemes and dedicated practice of pronunciation rules such as sound reduction, connection or assimilation, your voice is still heavily influenced by your native language accent. While mastering phonemes greatly improves your English voice, understanding how the articulators function in American English speech is crucial for reducing your native accent.

    Speaking Anxiety: Though you excel in vocabulary, grammar and sentence formation, you lack confidence in your English voice. This stems from difficulties in coordinating your articulators effectively. You get stuck in identifying a right approach to speaking fluently.

    Native Speaker Listening Challenge: You have watched numerous movies, YouTube videos, or podcasts by English native speakers; however, comprehending what they say remains difficult. Apart from encountering new vocabulary, cultural aspects, or unfamiliar knowledge, the main hindrance to catching up is the lack of full understanding the physical features of American English speech, making it feel like they speak too fast.

    Slower Speech Rate: This is affected by your native languages, such as Vietnamese. Speaking American English without changing or adjusting the way the articulators work based on your native language prevents you from speaking American English at a native speaker’s speed naturally. 

    Moving forward, let’s explore the physical aspects of American English, specifically understanding how the articulators work because they are the key to address those issues. While there are numerous documents on the Internet explaining articulators, they aren’t geared towards English learners. Instead, they target individuals, both native speakers and those seeking to enhance or modify their vocal capabilities. This post, however, is designed with a focus on English learners, yet it can also provide valuable insights for native speakers facing similar challenges or for those in the transgender community.

    The articulatory system shown in the picture below encompasses 1) lips, 2) teeth, 3) alveolar ridge, 4) hard palate, 5) Soft palate, 6) tongue, 7) jaw, 8) nasal cavity. In this post, rather than analyzing the features or functions of each articulator, I will concentrate on the characteristics of American English based on how these articulators work. This approach, I believe, provides a practical and solid guide for improving your voice. 

    Image source: Internet

    When speaking English, keep in mind the following key points:

    1. Open the mouth vertically rather than horizontally. Doing this will elongate your vocal tract, automatically open the back of your mouth, making your voice deeper and fuller. Horizontal mouth opening narrows the oral space, hindering the tongue’s free movement due to limited space.  

    2.  Move the jaw back and forth, not up and down. During this motion, the lower jaw slides smoothly on the hinges (TMJ) located in front of the ears. Be aware that the movement should be gentle and within a small, controlled range rather than the full extent of its motion.

    3. Position the tongue towards the front of the mouth, in proximity to the lips, teeth and alveolar ridge. This positioning facilitates easy pronunciation of consonants and ensures a smooth transition between syllables.

    4. Slightly purse the lips when speaking. This way will help maintain a vertical mouth shape.

    5. Expand the back of the mouth. Elevating the soft palate, keeping the throat open, and relaxing the neck will aid in opening up the space at the back. 

    6. The articulatory muscles should relax during speech, especially those in the tongue, neck, throat, and around the cheek areas. 

    7. The deeper breath, the louder the voice becomes. When you need a louder voice, ensure inhalation reaches deep into the diaphragm.  

    8. The vocal tract comprising the laryngeal cavity, the pharynx, and the oral cavity should be clear. Avoid blocking the vocal tract while speaking unless it is necessary. 

    Ensure your voice remains consistent for a natural, effortless, yet powerful sound. To achieve this, maintaining stability and smooth cooperation between articulators is crucial for the desired result. Regardless of the sound produced, the articulators should return to their original positions that I mentioned above after adjusting for different sounds. This secures articulator stability throughout speech.

    I hope you now have a clear understanding of the physical aspects of speaking American English. Best of luck on your practice. I would be so delighted to receive positive feedback on your progress. Feel free to ask if you have any questions about this post or English voice.