LAS LENGUAS INGLESA Y ESPAÑOLA de Delfín Carbonell

Do not trust your ear when learning a foreign language. All we hear is not decoded properly all the time. The ear sends the sound to the brain and the brain decodes it... with the information it has in stock about sounds, which belong to its mother tongue! So, do not think that what you hear is the right sound. Ask your teacher. Of all the skills in language-learning, sound is the most important and difficult to acquire. Language is sound! Never forget. My PHONÉTICA INGLESA PARA TORPES , compares the sounds of English and Spanish and can help you improve both languages. Do yourself a favor and study it: it is simple and easy to understand.

Many complain that English speakers do not try hard enough to understand foreigners. No es cuestión de querer, sino de poder. El monolingüe no puede entender un inglés mal pronunciado, por mucho que se esfuerce. Y es que el idioma es sonido, sonido emitido correctamente. For a Spanish-language speaker Leak and Lick suenan igual, pero son dos palabras diferentes. Feet son pies y Fit es caber. Si decimos We don't feet in the car , el nativo no puede comprender la frase, que debiera ser we don't fit in the car . Lousy English teachers say that the sound of feet is long, and the sound of fit is short. Nope. Ni corto ni largo, sino todo lo demás. Feet is abierto y Fit es cerrado y ambos sonidos se pronuncian en diferentes partes de la boca. Vayan a un diccionario online y escuchen los dos sonidos, varias veces. Y repitan. (Pueden emplear howjsay o Merriam-Webster, pero cualquier otro sirve.) Y ya de paso escuchen la diferencia entre: it / eat hip / heap nit / neat ...