# Is there a certain "trick" for learning pronunciation?



## romelako

I don't mean the pronunciation of the vowels and consonants.  I mean the actual pronunciation of the actual words.  I'll be with a native speaker trying to read the material I'm studying and I'll find that 90% of the time, I mess up the pronunciation.  Why?  Because in English, *most of the time*, the stress of the word is usually on the second to last syllable of the word.  For example:

advertísement
specífic
unreláted

Of course, this rule doesn't always apply in English, because you've got words like:

cápital
tránslated

What I've found in reading Tagalog, most of the words have the accent stressed on the *last* syllable.  I'll have my tutor correct me almost 90% of the time with my pronunciation because I default to an English pronunciation of the word.  So, my question is, *is there any "trick" when it comes to pronouncing Tagalog words?*  or is it just like English with many exceptions?  I remember my tutor thinking about it and he really wasn't able to come up with a rule.  It's his native tongue, so I didn't really expect him to come up with a solid rule for every word.  However he did come up with this:

_"If the word is a verb and it starts with "i-," the stress is always on the 2nd to last syllable."_

ilúto
isábit
itágo

I thought it was quite clever.  So, any suggestions?


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## 082486

hi... 

I can't tell you any rule when it comes to pronunciation, it's been a long time that we studied about that,  but I suggest that you listen to Tagalog songs or movies.


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## peaceflores

The intonation seems different in Tagalog compared to English. For example:

Hin-DI KO A-lam.
Li-NISAN mo ang KWARTO mo.
Bu-KAS pa ako bibili.

Link to voice sample of above sentences:   http://www.2shared.com/audio/umUJOG7j/record1.html


>> From the examples, you cannot distinguish the intonation just by capitalizing some syllables because the dialect Tagalog has three ascending tones that work as a pattern and the last syllable tone descends , using the first example: "Hin-DI (first tone-low) KO (second tone - higher pitch) A-(third tone-highest pitch)lam(descending tone). But I noticed while speaking aloud these sentences including the ones below, that Tagalog dialect has a somewhat lyrical intonation. It seems to me that in most cases, this pattern is used.

>>Another illustration from the second example, it is a longer sentence, so as there are ascending tones, there's also the descending tones usually a pitch lower than the third tone (highest). Li(first tone-low)-NI(second tone-higher)SAN(third tone-highest) mo(one pitch lower than highest) ang(low) KWAR(highest tone)-TO(lower) mo(low).

The pattern seems to be:


First example: low>higher>highest>higher>low
or
Second example: low>higher>highest>higher>low>highest>higher>low


In the American English dialect, I noticed a similarity in intonation in most sentences that you speak. That is, if you speak in a calm way, because if emotion is added into it, the intonation changes. There are only two tones and you can easily distinguish them. American English does not seem to put emphasis in every single syllable. It's different inTagalog, you have to abide by the lyrical pattern that we use in our way of speaking.

My BIRTH-day's to-MO-rrow.
I'm PRAC-ticing pi-A-no.

Link to two voice samples of above sentences:   http://www.2shared.com/audio/Hjd23jGD/Record-second.html

Does this make some sense?


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## Outsider

A common recommendation is to start with a fake (or different) word whose stress is like in English, and whose first syllables and stress coincide with the Tagalog word you want, and then clip the syllables that don't matter at the end, as though you interrupted your speech. Practice a couple of times.


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## mataripis

You can pronounce Tagalog words in a clear manner when you separate the part of the word ' for example; 1.) The word "Tawilis" is hard for english speakers to pronounce , they will say " Tey Wilis" to make it clear  read first the "Ta" as "Ta" in English and there is no problem for Wilis because there is Willy in English name. Ta- Wilys.Same in Tagalog= Ta/Ga/Log.


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