For most people around the world, the term ‘British pronunciation’ implies what linguists call the ‘Standard Southern English Accent’ or ‘Standard Southern British English’ (SSBE), also known as ‘modern R.P.’ This accent, along with the standard Australian accent, is non-rhotic, meaning that we never make an /r/ sound at the end of a syllable, only at the beginning (i.e. before the vowel, not after).
For example, an English or Australian person pronounces the word ‘car’ /kɑː/. By contrast, in American pronunciation, which is rhotic, this word is pronounced /kɑːr/. There are exceptions: Scottish and Irish accents are rhotic, meaning they do make /r/ sounds at the ends of syllables, but most native Brits, as well as Australians and South Africans, speak in a non-rhotic accent.
If you are an ESL student living in America, or you have a strong preference for American English, then of course you should learn ‘American’ (i.e. rhotic) pronunciation. Otherwise, here are four reasons you should learn non-rhotic British pronunciation.
The study of pronunciation by ESL students is often referred to as ‘accent reduction’ and, indeed, your primary goal should be to remove from your spoken English those habits that sound distinctly foreign.
The exact nature of those habits will depend on your first language but one that is virtually universal among ESL students is the habit of making /r/ sounds at the ends of syllables.
There are various reasons for this but the most important reason is that it is what you do in your first language, be it Italian, Chinese, Russian or whatever.
So, when you make an /r/ sound at the end of a syllable, it does not sound American; it just sounds Italian, Chinese, Russian etc.
To truly sound like a native North American you have to adjust the way you make your syllable-ending /r/ sound. This is a process that takes a lot of time and practice.
A simpler way to sound less foreign is to just stop making any kind of /r/ sound at the ends of syllables and use non-rhotic British pronunciation. This one change will immediately elevate your pronunciation, removing one of the main elements of your native accent.
To be sure, although this strategy is simple it is not easy – it will still take practice – but, ultimately, it comes down to willpower. Removing the habit of rhoticity from your speech is like breaking the habit of biting your nails. You have to recognise when you do it and correct yourself.
Removing rhoticity from your speech by using British pronunciation will, in turn, help you to address another major signifier of your foreign accent: insufficient differentiation between long vowels and short vowels.
Malays and Singaporeans are especially prone to this problem but it affects all ESL learners to some extent. When you remove syllable-ending /r/ sounds from your English, the distinction between long and short vowels becomes much easier to appreciate and produce.
Compare the words ‘cart’ and ‘cut’ for example. Which one has a long vowel and which has a short vowel? Or do they both have short vowels? If you listen to how an English person says them then it is absolutely clear that ‘cart’ has a long vowel (/kɑːt/) while ‘cut’ has a short vowel (/kʌt/). In American pronunciation this is not so obvious as the /r/ sound in ‘cart’ blends with the end of the vowel.
If you study modern R.P. (particularly with the SpeakBritishEnglish method) you will get much better at producing long vowels, which will greatly reduce the foreign (e.g. Malay, Chinese) sound of your accent.
All beginner pronunciation students make the same mistake: they focus on spelling, not sound. Sadly, it can take a long time for a student to let go of this attitude.
Students tend to think (perhaps unconsciously) that clear pronunciation involves, as it were, ‘spelling out’ the word: enunciating each letter so that the listener can identify the word from its spelling. A particularly heinous example of this is when students pronounce ‘answer’ with a /w/ sound.
This approach may make you clearer to other learners, especially beginners, but it certainly does not make you clear to natives. To be clear to natives, which must be your goal, you need to pronounce words as natives pronounce them.
Of course, many natives speak rhotic (i.e. ‘American’) English and, as I said, if you want to learn rhotic pronunciation then you should; my point is that making syllable-ending /r/ sounds so as to ‘spell-out’ the word is misguided and counterproductive.
Removing rhoticity from your speech will help you, psychologically, to overcome this broader tendency of thinking visually about English so that you can start to think more like a native: with your ears not your eyes.
This will improve your aural comprehension and allow you to develop an accent that is easier for native English speakers, including those with rhotic pronunciation, to understand. It is much easier for an American to understand a British accent than to understand an Italian or Spanish accent!
Though it may be politically incorrect to point this out, ‘Received Pronunciation’, as people sometimes like to call it, continues to hold a certain aesthetic appeal among native English speakers around the world, including in North America.
There’s more to an ‘R.P.’ accent than non-rhoticity but, if you aspire to develop an R.P. accent, adopting non-rhoticity is the first and most important step.
Even if other aspects of your pronunciation still need a lot of improvement, once you break the habit of using syllable-ending /r/ sounds, English speakers around the world will immediately start to perceive your speech as distinctly English – not Polish, not Chinese and not ‘international’ but English – and, as such, more refined.
If you are going to the considerable trouble of trying to improve your accent, why aim for anything less than R.P., the most prestigious accent? Most pronunciation students never achieve a perfect R.P. accent but any adjustment in that direction will make your accent sound better in the ears of native speakers around the world. You can’t go wrong with ‘the King’s English’.
Rhoticity does not make you sound like an American. Unless your overall accent is very good, native English speakers will interpret your rhoticity as a feature of your foreign accent. By contrast, if you speak in non-rhotic pronunciation, natives globally will interpret this as distinctly English-sounding.
Enunciating every letter does not make you clearer. The only way to sound clear to natives is to speak like a native. I assure you, Americans and other rhotic English speakers have no difficulty understanding non-rhotic R.P speakers.
Letting go of rhoticity will help you to think more like a native and improve your aural comprehension. In particular, it will make it easier for you to appreciate the difference between long and short vowels.
So-called 'Received Pronunciation' continues to be a prestige accent, associated with the most refined, elegant English speakers. Even Americans love this accent!
To learn British pronunciation, find an accent coach, make use of free materials and join a course. My British pronunciation course gives you a complete, structured education in modern R.P. This course is unique in that you get to submit videos of yourself doing pronunciation exercises and receive individual video responses from me. You can also get private, one-to-one lessons in received pronunciation. Start for free!
John C.
