Cyprus-Forum.com

[Sotos]

Instead of hug I say huug for example, both cut and cat come out the same from my mouth and milk and ship become meelk and sheep.

I think it is the opposite with me. I apparently pronounce "beach" as "bitch". And is there really a difference between cut and cat?

[Sotos]

Instead of hug I say huug for example, both cut and cat come out the same from my mouth and milk and ship become meelk and sheep.

I think it is the opposite with me. I apparently pronounce "beach" as "bitch". And is there really a difference between cut and cat?

Tried it on Google Translate and apparently there is a difference between cut and cat. One is "kət" and the other one is "kat" phonetically. Cat should be spelled "caat"!

[GreekIslandGirl]

Instead of hug I say huug for example, both cut and cat come out the same from my mouth and milk and ship become meelk and sheep.

I think it is the opposite with me. I apparently pronounce "beach" as "bitch". And is there really a difference between cut and cat?

Tried it on Google Translate and apparently there is a difference between cut and cat. One is "kət" and the other one is "kat" phonetically. Cat should be spelled "caat"!

Try practicing pronunciations with this:

http://www.shiporsheep.com/

Click over the words.

[GreekIslandGirl]

Tried it on Google Translate and apparently there is a difference between cut and cat. One is "kət" and the other one is "kat" phonetically. Cat should be spelled "caat"!

This makes cut and cat clear:

http://www.shiporsheep.com/page6.html

[miltiades]

Instead of hug I say huug for example, both cut and cat come out the same from my mouth and milk and ship become meelk and sheep.

I think it is the opposite with me. I apparently pronounce "beach" as "bitch". And is there really a difference between cut and cat?

Cut is much shorter phonetically, a bit like KAT, while a cat is slightly prolonged and sounds a bit like kiat.

I recall many moons ago when I came to London I had great difficulty with words such as you mentioned as well as ship, sheep, ganger, bungers, murder and many more. I begun by copying the cockney slang and became quite good at it !! Now what I mean maiiiit !

On meeting my wife to be she soon put a stop to my cockney accent. a Bo'ol of beer became a bottle, waer became water, two and a kick became a half a crown !!!

Expressive, rich language, variety of accents and dialects, I love it !

By the way, the majority of English people learn their ...English from Holyoakes, Eastenders, Coronation Street and such other crap!! And of course from the nations favourite media news, The Sun

[Sotos]

Instead of hug I say huug for example, both cut and cat come out the same from my mouth and milk and ship become meelk and sheep.

I think it is the opposite with me. I apparently pronounce "beach" as "bitch". And is there really a difference between cut and cat?

Tried it on Google Translate and apparently there is a difference between cut and cat. One is "kət" and the other one is "kat" phonetically. Cat should be spelled "caat"!

Try practicing pronunciations with this:

http://www.shiporsheep.com/

Click over the words.

nah... I can communicate just fine with my current English pronunciation. There is such a huge difference in the way different native speakers of English pronounce words that I don't see why I should care to pronounce words in the officially correct way. As long as I am understood I am fine. Even if I say "I am lying on the beach" most people will understand what I mean And I can't even think of a situation where somebody will believe that I mean "cut" and not "cat" because context should make it clear!

[tsukoui]

We had a Cy P.E. teacher at school. Whenever he wanted hush he used to say "can I have some hash please", at which point several of the kids in the class would try to sell him some

[Stephanie77]

I really liked what Sotos said--as long as you communicate, you've won. GIG, love the link Ship/sheep you gave with the minimal pairs of words. GIG, have you ever worked with the rhythm and stress of Greek vs English?

[GreekIslandGirl]

Instead of hug I say huug for example, both cut and cat come out the same from my mouth and milk and ship become meelk and sheep.

I think it is the opposite with me. I apparently pronounce "beach" as "bitch". And is there really a difference between cut and cat?

Tried it on Google Translate and apparently there is a difference between cut and cat. One is "kət" and the other one is "kat" phonetically. Cat should be spelled "caat"!

Try practicing pronunciations with this:

http://www.shiporsheep.com/

Click over the words.

nah... I can communicate just fine with my current English pronunciation. There is such a huge difference in the way different native speakers of English pronounce words that I don't see why I should care to pronounce words in the officially correct way. As long as I am understood I am fine. Even if I say "I am lying on the beach" most people will understand what I mean And I can't even think of a situation where somebody will believe that I mean "cut" and not "cat" because context should make it clear!

Correct. Context is everything. Fluency over accuracy. The Brits aren't dialect ignorant, anyway, as there are so many strong English dialects, plus the added multicultural ones. It's Spanish speakers that have the greatest difficulty in pronouncing/recognising cut/cat or ship/sheep and they (the ones I know) seem to be keener on accuracy than Greeks who are just happy to have a laugh about it.

[GreekIslandGirl]

I really liked what Sotos said--as long as you communicate, you've won. GIG, love the link Ship/sheep you gave with the minimal pairs of words. GIG, have you ever worked with the rhythm and stress of Greek vs English?

Hiya - yes agree with Sotos too.

No, I haven't thought much about Greek vs English as they both come naturally to me (therefore a little boring). But I have a really good book (which you might know) and it has a chapter on precisely this comparison.

The chapter is by Sophia C. Papaefthymiou-Lytra - 'Greek Speakers' - and she covers the distribution of phonology of Greece Cyprus, and UK (British English).

She's probably written more on this subject but I have yet to check ....

P.S. just checked and there's lots of material out there.