English How to Pronounce SH and ZH consonants American Accent
The SH and DJ consonant sounds. These two
sounds are paired together because they take
the same mouth position. Sh is unvoiced, meaning
only air passes through the mouth. And dj
is voiced, meaning you make sound with your
vocal cords. To make this sound, the teeth
come together, the corners of the lips come
in, and the rest of the lips flare. Sh, dj.
The tongue raises a bit in the middle. It
doesn’t touch the roof of the mouth, but it
does press against the inside corner of the
top teeth. Sh, dj. The front part of the tongue
comes down, but it’s far enough back that
it’s not touching anything in the mouth. Sh,
dj. Here we see the sh/dj sound on the right
compared with the mouth at rest on the left.
The corners of the lips do come in, but rather
than rounding, the lips come away from the
face, so more of the teeth are exposed. Here,
parts of the mouth are drawn in. The soft
palate is raised for these sounds. The tongue
reaches up towards the roof of the mouth without
touching. The tip of the tongue comes back
down behind the teeth, which are closed, but
it’s a little too far back to be touching.
Sample words: ship/measure, dish/decision,
wash/mirage. Sample sentence: She made the
decision to get a beige bed spread with chic
striped sheets. Now you will see this sentence
up close and in slow motion, both straight
on and from an angle, so you can really see
how the mouth when making this sound. She, lips
take the SH position, corners somewhat in
but lips away from the face. Teeth closed.
Made, lips together for the M. Tongue through
the teeth for the TH, the decision. Tongue
up and teeth closed for the D sound. Decision,
here’s the dj mouth position. To get, T pronounced
as a D here. Tongue up to make that D. A beige,
lips together for the B, and it ends in the
voiced dj sound. Teeth together, and note
the lip position. Lips together for the B,
bedspread. Tongue for the D, teeth together
for the S, lips together for the P. Spread.
Tongue up again for the D. With, lips form
the W sound, tongue through the teeth for
the TH. Chic, SH sound. Teeth together and
the SH lip position. Striped, teeth together
for the S, lips take the R position. Lips
together for the P. And sheets, with the SH
sound, teeth together, lips away from the
face. And now from an angle. She, teeth together
and lips out away from the face, sh. Made, lips
together for the M. The, tongue through the
teeth for the TH and to the roof of the mouth
for the D sound. Teeth together for the S,
decision. Here is the voiced dj mouth position.
To get a, all unstressed and quick words.
Beige, lips together for the B, and here again
the voiced dj mouth position. Lips together
for the B in bedspread, ‘eh’ as in ‘bed’ vowel,
tongue up for the D. Teeth together for the
S and lips together for the P. Spread, tongue
up for the D. With, lips form the tight W.
Chic, the sh, SH mouth position. Striped,
teeth together and tongue forward to make
the S. There’s the R position in the lips.
Lips together for the P. Sheets, the SH mouth
position, ‘ee’ as in ‘she’ vowel, corners
of the lips pull back, and the teeth together
for the TS sound. That’s it, and thanks so
much for using Rachel’s English.