Even Native Speakers Can’t Understand this Fast English

Native English speakers struggle to understand me. How is that possible? I’ll explain it all in this video and assist you in speaking more like a native English speaker.

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Video Transcript: 

Since I’ve been teaching American English pronunciation, I have developed a theory that if you take certain words in a sentence and a native speaker hears just those words, they’ll have no idea what they’re hearing. Even though it was spoken by a native speaker so I tested it and I was right. Even native speakers can’t understand this I mean can you understand this? Or this? We’ll figure out what’s going on in this video.  

In every sentence we speak in English, we have words that are more clear and words that are less clear. Even they are more clear, less clear these words were clearer but and words that are wasn’t so clear. I said it like this: and words that are, and words that are, and words that are. In every sentence we speak in English, we have words that are more clear and words that are less clear. That’s natural English. and words that are, and words that are. And when I’m teaching this to my students sometimes, they think no, no way, that’s to unclear that can’t be right. But in fact, it’s so unclear that even native speakers can’t understand it and it is right! What? How is this possible? One word, context. In a whole sentence we understand every word, the clear words and the unclear words. But if I chop up a sentence and play just the unclear words, even native speakers don’t always know what they’re hearing. Isn’t that incredible? With the context of a sentence, no problem, hear it once they get it. But the words alone, no idea. We’re going to test some native speakers in a second and all you native speakers out there watching, I want to know if you pass or fail. Do you understand or not? But first, I just want to point out from my non-native viewers, people who are trying to learn to speak natural English, this is a lesson in simplifying and speeding through certain words to get that contrast of long and short which is important in natural, easy to understand English. So, here we are at my parent’s house out on the back deck. I’m playing part of a sentence. A couple of unclear, unstressed words in a row. Let’s see if my friends and family can guess what I’m playing. This is the clip they’re going to hear: Do you know what’s being said?  

Put your guess in the comments right now what is being said.  

Let’s see if my parents and my friends could figure it out.  

This first one I think is a little bit easier but I’m not sure.  

Okay.  

Okay, here it is.  

Hear it again?  

No.  

Okay, hey this is what I was hoping would happen  

It sounds like  

Can you guys tell what it is? Should I turn it up?  

Yeah.  

Okay, I’m going to turn the volume all the way.  

Jonathan.  

You think it’s Jonathan? What do you think?  

Hit me.  

Don’t know. Something, don’t know.  

You think don’t know, you think anything, you think Jonathan.  

Come again.  

Okay, here’s the last time.  

Jonathan!  

Their guess is  

Anything 

Jonathan 

Not a thing 

Don’t know 

None of those are right. Really they have no idea what this native speaker is saying. And I played it for then several times. Now I’m going to play them the whole sentence.  

You don’t have to face the horrible pressures of this holiday.  

You don’t have to.  

Do you totally understand it without hesitation when you hear it in a sentence? 

Right, yeah.  

‘Cause it puts it in context. 

And they get it right away. No problem. I’ll play the whole sentence for you. This is a clip form Friends.  

You don’t have to face the horrible pressures of this holiday.  

So let’s think about this. Natural spoken English involves some words being so unclear that native speakers can’t understand them alone, out of context. You’re going to have to really simplify your mouth movements to make your unstressed words fast enough. When we have more than one unstressed or reduced word in a row, I like to call this a reduction string. A reduction is when we change a sound or drop a sound. For example the word “to”. We usually pronounce that [tə] with the schwa said quickly that’s a reduction. Example sentence: I’m about to leave. To, to.  

Let’s look at the sentence from Friends.  

You don’t have to face the horrible pressures of this holiday. Chandler said the first four words like this:  

You don’t have to— 

Let’s slow that down. 

You don’t have to— 

You.  Very unclear. Don’t have. I don’t hear a T in don’t and I don’t hear an H in have. Both dropped. These are both known reductions, I’ve done videos on both of these. The V sound changes to an F because it’s followed by a T. I also have a video on that. Have to becomes hafto, hafto.  You don’t have to becomes you don’t have to, you don’t have to. Listen again in slow motion then we’ll repeat it. We’ll do this twice.  

You’ve got to say it out loud to get used to this way of speaking.  

Now, speed it up. I’ll play it 8 times in a row with a pause each time. You hear it, you say it eight times over. As you do this, you’ll make minor adjustments and be able to simplify your mouth movements more. Just go with the flow. It’s not clear and it’s not supposed to be.  

How did you do? I know my students often can’t believe just how quickly and unclearly they should be making some words. Here’s another one. Can you understand what’s being said?  

Pretty tough right? Let’s see what my family thought.  

It was gonna.  

I was gonna.   

You think I wasn’t gonna?  

I wasn’t gonna. is what I thought.      

We want to hear it again.  

No idea.  

I don’t know.  

Ginny had a good guess. She guessed “Iwas going to” or “I was gonna”.  I was gonna. I played them the full clip.  

Okay, let’s listen to the sentence and see if it becomes clear.  

I knew it wasn’t gonna work out the moment that I — 

Wasn’t gonna  

I knew it wasn’t gonna  

Yeah 

It wasn’t gonna  

I knew it wasn’t gonna. That’s funny.  

Because it doesn’t really ch like that.  It can go either way in that sentence.  

But when you hear the whole sentence you totally get it. 

You slow them 

Right away. They don’t even need to hear the full sentence. They understood that “It wasn’t going to”.  

One other thing I notice when doing this with my family is they keep asking me to turn it up. It’s too quiet. That’s another quality of unstressed syllables. They’re not just faster, they’re quieter. Just another way they contrast with stressted syllables which are louder. Let’s listen to that reduction string in slow motion.  

I wasn’t gonna– 

Now that you know it, do you hear it better? I don’t hear either T. Iwasn’t gonna. And gonna is so unclear I don’t hear a very good n. Gonna, gonna, it wasn’t gonna, it wasn’t gonna. Listen in slow motion and repeat it twice, make sure your lips are moving as little as possible.  

And now, play it say it at regular pace eight times. Focus on relaxation.  

Now try to put that in the whole sentence. Listen repeat five times.  

Now, jump to my niece and sister-in-law. I played them this.  

Can you tell what you’re hearing?  

This is just a. (laughing)  

Yeah.  

This is just a, your guess?  

This is just a.  

Okay.  

Now let’s play the whole sentence.  

Maybe it’s just a kidney stone.  

Maybe it’s just a kidney stone. 

Right. It’s so clear in a sentence, isn’t it? Like you would never hear that like what is she saying? 

Right.  

When you hear just the fast words.  

It is hard to tell. Listen in slow motion.  

Maybe it’s just a kidney stone. 

Maybe. Not so clear. It’s just a. I hardly hear any vowel in it’s or just. It’s just, it’s just. In the whole sentence though, we get it. I want you to try simplifying this too with the play, it say it. Here it is. Unclear speech eight times. Repeat each time, mouth movement is minimal, simplify.  

And not let’s try the whole sentence five times.  

The next time you’re working with my analysis videos like this, I’ll link to some playlist with this kind of video in the video description. Think about this. When you’re working with unstressed or reduced words, they’re simplified. In fact, they maybe simplified so much that a native speaker can’t even understand the words out of context. But in a whole sentence, that contrast magically it all comes together and everything becomes clear.  

I love thinking about spoken English this way and teaching you what I learn. Keep your learning going now with video. Thanks for watching and be sure to subscribe with notifications, I make new videos every Tuesday. That’s it and thanks so much for using Rachel’s English.  

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