What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

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EthanH
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What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby EthanH » Sat Nov 10, 2018 10:32 pm

Hello!
The title says it all, I want to make sure I am pronouncing my words right because at the moment I am having a hard time with the vowels and consonants etc. What videos and websites did you use for practice? should I focus only on pronunciation before moving forward in my book, or do both at the same time?

On a side note, how much will a Russian speaker understand me if I don't have mediocre pronunciation?

Thanks!

Ethan
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Re: What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby EthanH » Sat Nov 10, 2018 10:33 pm

if I don't have mediocre pronunciation?
I meant "if I have mediocre pronunciation."
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Re: What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby Xmmm » Sun Nov 11, 2018 12:14 am

I did about 75 hours of Glossika. Probably shadowing any dialogue where you have the audio would work just as well, but Glossika was a big fad three years ago. I guesstimate it brought my accent up from a "F" to a "B". I've worked with four tutors, none have had any trouble understanding me, and I've received compliments that my "accent is much better than most American learners". Maybe this amounts to being damned with faint praise, but it didn't seem like they were being sardonic about it.
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Re: What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby Arnaud » Sun Nov 11, 2018 6:26 am

I repeated Assimil and several other courses. I also repeated "phonetique du russe" a french book about russian phonetic with a lot of minimal pair exercises, it was helpful for the hard/soft consonants. I write "repeat" because it's not "shadow", it's rather a "press the pause button and repeat after the native speaker" technique that I prefer.
From time to time, I record myself reading aloud a few pages of a novel and compare with the audiobook, to check if I put the stress correctly.
I still have a french accent, but russian people don't have problems to understand me.
Still, if I can speak french with a decent british or american accent, I can't speak french with a russian accent: I've not yet "mapped" completly the russian accent to play this little game.
Edit: Here's a site about the russian phonetic with audio exercises
On YT, I watched several times this and that playlists, to understand the reading rules.
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Re: What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby ilmari » Mon Nov 12, 2018 7:11 am

I find this old book and cassette set quite good: How to Pronounce Russian Correctly (Passport Books)
https://www.amazon.com/Pronounce-Russian-Correctly-Cassette-English/dp/084424287X
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Re: What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby Ogrim » Mon Nov 12, 2018 2:48 pm

EthanH wrote:Hello!
The title says it all, I want to make sure I am pronouncing my words right because at the moment I am having a hard time with the vowels and consonants etc. What videos and websites did you use for practice? should I focus only on pronunciation before moving forward in my book, or do both at the same time?

On a side note, how much will a Russian speaker understand me if I have mediocre pronunciation?

Thanks!

Ethan


I would say the two most important things to work on are stress and vowel reduction. They are strongly interlinked, as most unstressed vowels undergo phonetical reduction when in an unstressed syllable, e.g. /o/ = /a/, /e/ = /i/ etc. If you get these wrong, a native Russian speaker may have difficulties understanding you. That is also the case with stress, as the same word with stress on different syllables may have different meanings.

I have no particular resource to recommend. What I did was to use Assimil (but not the first 20-30 chapters where the audio is far too slow) and pay a lot of attention to the pronunciation while following the text. Once I got over the absolute beginner stage I started listening to authentic stuff I found on Youtube, and also to Russian pop songs and ballads. I found music quite helpful in improving my pronunciation.

I would not recommend you to focus only on pronunciation at a beginner stage though, because the more input you get, the better your pronunciation should get over. Just pay particular attention to stress, vowel reducation and, to add a third important element, the difference between palatalised/non-palatalised consonants. And a final piece of advice: if you can, find a native Russian speaker to help you out and practise.
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Re: What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby Kess » Wed Nov 14, 2018 10:13 am

I would like help your pronuciation. I am Russian. But I very badly speak English. We would be to speak Russian approximately 15-30 minutes in day, and you would help me with my English pronunciation. And we will read books. How are my idea?
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Re: What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby SGP » Thu Jan 03, 2019 7:00 am

EthanH wrote:Hello!
The title says it all, I want to make sure I am pronouncing my words right because at the moment I am having a hard time with the vowels and consonants etc.
What I have been doing is to listen to Russian for a while (even if it mostly was about single words only), then I started to speak. Some easy phrases only. Because of that previous and still ongoing Listening Exposure, one can be closer , relatively speaking, to a near-to-native pronunciation than one who "didn't even" have that exposure.

Yes, listening to single words only isn't the Very Best Solution. And yes, I am a pre-A1 beginner of Russian, and my pronunciation isn't native-like nor near-to-native.

On a side note, how much will a Russian speaker understand me if I don't have mediocre pronunciation?
If you speak slowly and clearly (i.e. without "mumbling" ;) ), there could be a rather high probability of being understood. This is what happened to me, even if I used to micro-learn Russian only in the past (the "more than just micro-learning" switch only has been made a few days ago). I'd say that it is easier to understood in basic Russian than in, e.g., basic French when someone doesn't have the near-to-native accent yet.
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Re: What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby David1917 » Thu Jan 03, 2019 3:09 pm

Ogrim wrote:
EthanH wrote:On a side note, how much will a Russian speaker understand me if I have mediocre pronunciation?


I would say the two most important things to work on are stress and vowel reduction. They are strongly interlinked, as most unstressed vowels undergo phonetical reduction when in an unstressed syllable, e.g. /o/ = /a/, /e/ = /i/ etc. If you get these wrong, a native Russian speaker may have difficulties understanding you. That is also the case with stress, as the same word with stress on different syllables may have different meanings.


This is my experience as well. I've said words with wrong stress before, and it takes the person a second to realize what you're trying to say. Shadowing or simply listening & reading are helpful. If you don't have audio, many beginner's texts include accent marks so you know where to stress the word.

As for your question on "only" focusing on pronunciation before moving on, I would say no. Just be mindful as you go on, and unless you're especially gifted with impersonations/accents, it might take awhile anyway.
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Re: What did you do to practice your Russian pronunciation?

Postby Speakeasy » Fri Jan 04, 2019 4:34 pm

I agree with all of the recommendations above concerning the attentive listening to and reproduction of the materials from standard sources such as Assimil, Glossika, How to Pronounce Russian, and the like. Nonetheless, having struggled with the Russian pronunciation myself, I find myself wondering whether or not the OP might benefit from a brief return to the basics of the language’s sound system. My specific recommendation in this sense would be that the OP review and practice the “Supplementary Pronunciation Drills” in Appendix A to “Instructor’s Manual: Modern Russian” by Clayton L. Dawson et al.

Cover and Sample Page
1 Modern Russian Instructor's Manual.JPG

2 Modern Russian Instructor's Manual.JPG


The corresponding audio recordings are freely-available from the University of Indiana CeLT website.
http://www.iu.edu/~celtie/catalog1.html
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