How to Say BEACH vs. BITCH and SHEET vs. SHIT American English
In this American English pronunciation video,
I’ve come all the way to the beach to teach
you how to say ‘beach’ vs. ‘bitch’ and ‘sheet’
vs. ‘shit’.
Hey Friends and Fans! We’re going to get to
that video in just a minute. But first, did
you know that right now, I’m on an Epic Road
Trip Across America? Summer of 2014! Look
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A lot of my fans ask me about these two word
pairs, because, of course, one word in each
of these pairs is a bad word. In both cases,
it’s the word with the IH as in SIT vowel.
Both of these pairs are minimal pairs, which
means there’s only one thing that’s different.
In these cases, it’s the vowel sound. The
‘good’ word has the EE as in SHE vowel. And
the ‘bad’ word has the IH as in SIT vowel.
I’ve already made a video comparing those
two sounds, so do take a look at it. But let’s
just talk about it one more time in the context
of these words.
Beach vs. bitch. The main issue here is the
tongue position. And, that’s influenced by
the jaw position. Most people have EE in their
native language, ee, ee. Tongue tip is down,
and the front part of the tongue is lifting,
very close to the roof of the mouth. Ee, ee.
So, the space between tongue and roof of mouth
is very small. The way to make the IH vowel
is just to make that space between tongue
and roof of mouth bigger. So, we may do that
by dropping our jaw more: ee, ih. Or, you
might notice that some native speakers don’t
need to drop their jaw, it looks the same
from the outside. But the difference is happening
with the tongue position inside the mouth.
So, the difference between EE and IH is IH
has more space between the tongue and the
roof of the mouth. So, for ‘beach’, ee, ee,
my tongue is really high. For ‘bitch’, ih,
ih, my tongue isn’t as high. It’s a little
more relaxed, and my jaw hangs a little bit
more. Same with ‘sheet’, ee, ee, very high.
Shit, ih, ih, lower, more relaxed, and the
jaw might be lower too.
Guys, I hope this helps. If there are two
words you want to hear compared, please put
it in the comments below.
That’s it, and thanks so much for using Rachel’s
English.