标准美语发音的13个秘诀 CD 2 Track 24（在线收听）

Reduced Sounds                                                    CD 2 Track 24 

The Down Side of Intonation 

Reduced sounds are all those extra sounds created by an absence  of lip, tongue, jaw, and throat movement. They are a principal  function of intonation  and are truly indicative of the American sound.  

Reduced Sounds Are "Valleys" 

American intonation is made up of peaks and valleys—tops of staircases and bottoms of staircases. To have strong peaks,  you will have to develop deep  valleys. These deep valleys should be filled with all kinds of reduced vowels, one  in particular—the completely neutral  schwa. Ignore spelling. Since you probably first became acquainted with English through the printed word, this is going to be quite a challenge. The position of  a syllable is more important th an spelling as an indication of correct pronunciation. For  example, the words photograph and photography each have two O's and an A. The first word is stressed on the  first syllable so photograph sounds like [fo d'græf]. The second word is stressed on the second syllable , photography, so the word comes out [f' tah gr'fee]. You can see here that their spelling doesn't tell you how they sound. Word stress or intonation will determine the pronunciation. Work on listeni ng to words. Concentrate on hearing the pure sounds, not in trying to make the word fit a fami liar spelling. Otherwise, you will  be taking the long way around and givin g yourself both a lot of extra work and an accent! 

Syllables that are perched atop a peak or a staircase are strong sounds; that is, they maintain their original pronunciation. On the other  hand, syllables that fall in the valleys or on a lower stairstep are weak sounds; thus they are reduced. Some vowels are reduced completely to schwas, a very relaxed sound, while others are only toned  down. In the following exercises,  we will be dealing with these "toned down" sounds.  

In the Introduction ("Read This First," page iv) I talked about overpronouncing.  This section will handle that overpronunciation. You're going to skim over words; you're going to dash through certain sounds. Your peaks are going to be quite strong, but your valleys, blurry—a very intuitive aspect of intonation that this practice will help you develop.  

Articles (such as the, a )  are usually very reduced sounds. Before a consonant,  the  and  a  are both schwa sounds, which are reduced. Before a vowel , however, you'll notice  a change—the schwa of the  turns into a long [e] plus a connecting (y) —Th ' book  changes to  thee (y) only book; A hat  becomes a nugly hat. The article  a  becomes  an.  Think of [ə●nornj] rather than  an orange;  [ə ●nopening], [ ə●neye], [ə ●nimaginary animal].