Improve your British Accent | 5 times American TV Got the British Accent WRONG!

What's up everyone! I'm Andrea, your Real-life English Fluency Coach.

And today we're learning more about British pronunciation and accents.

So, in case you didn't know, I'm from London. I was born and raised there, and so you might notice

that i have more of a general London accent. I don't necessarily speak with Received Pronunciation,

which another name for it is "RP" and is what the Queen speaks.

So, if you've heard the Queen speak English, that's what RP sounds like.

You might also hear a "Cockney" accent

which is more of an east side of London accent that can be quite strong as well.

So, the reason we're bringing you this lesson today is because in media in TV and movies you will normally

only see these two British accents represented,

which isn't true about the demographic because in the whole of Britain there are many different accents.

Now, we're going to take a look at some very exaggerated and not so accurate examples

of British pronunciation by American actors in some of our favorite TV series and movies.

Now, this will be very funny because they're so exaggerated

but they're not a great representation of the British accent.

Oh bloody hell.

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So first of all, we're going to take a look at this hilarious scene from Friends where Ross is so nervous about

teaching his first lecture that he suddenly invents a British accent.

Now this is a really really exaggerated Cockney accent.

Let's take a look at how it sounds.

Okay so the first word we're going to take a look at is "laboratory."

Now in English we would say "labora-tree" but he has pronounced every single syllable of the word

which natives do not actually do.

So this is really really funny and exaggerated and we'll see a lot in this clip.

Now the way he says "discovery" is pretty funny too

because he pronounces every syllable really clearly again, but there's also an intonation

on the way that he says it, which again is not very natural for native speakers.

So, when he says it, he says "discovery" because again it's very exaggerated and again it makes

for really good humor.

In fact, when we say the word "discovery" we don't always pronounce all of the syllables,

so he pronounces it as "dis-co-ve-ry" but we often will shorten it to "disco-vree"

Usually when you have the "ery" or the "ary" sounds at the end of words,

they kind of merge into one sound, to make "vree": "disco-vree".

And the same with "laboratory," it's not "laboratory" so that "ory" merges to make "laboratory,"

You can also hear this in the way that he says "sedimentary," so "sedimentary" is a type of rock

and he says "sedimentary," but again this is not how native speak.

We will shorten that last sound to say "sedimen-tree",

so the last part of this clip that we're going to look at is at the end where Monica and Rachel walk in to find Ross

doing his fake British accent, and so he comes out with...

which is actually really really funny but it's quite accurate of a Cockney accent.

So remember a Cockney accent is one you'll hear in east London and one that you'll see a lot in TV and movies,

especially like Mary Poppins or even some gangster movies like "Clock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels"

and "The Gentleman" which is Guy Richie's new one,

so what is quite typical of the Cockney accent but also in many other places around Britain is that people do not

pronounce that first H sound at the start of the word,

so instead of saying "Oh bloody hell", he says "Oh bloody el"

and you'll find this in many other words that start with H such as "have":

If you're Cockney you'd say "ave", so "I wanna ave a cup of tea" rather than...

"I want to have a cup of tea."

and even things like "hello."

Instead of saying "hello" people in east London might say "ello."

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Now this clip of James Franco's British accent is actually really really funny

because it's hard to even realize he's doing it.

It's so, so subtle that it doesn't even seem like he's really trying, and I think that's what makes it so funny.

So if you listen very carefully the subtle difference is the way that he pronounces the "Rs"

in some words such as "tear", "heart" and "burn".

Now in British English we tend to soften this R sound so you don't really hear it

whereas in American English you do hear that R sound

so this is kind of where he does have a little bit of a British accent but that's really all it is in this clip.

So just to explain that a little bit further in American English you'd hear "tear" so you hear that R sound,

but in British English we would say "tear" so it's very very soft.

The same with "heart" you don't really hear that R sound but in American English you do when they say "heart".

Now we've chosen a scene from the film "Parent Trap" where a very young Lindsay Lohan actually

plays identical twin sisters.

One is American and one is British, so she was actually 11 years old when she filmed this movie

and I think that for such a young girl she does a really good job of the British accent,

especially when you take into consideration that she had to film both parts at the same time.

So the scene we're going to take a look at is deep into the movie when they have already switched places

and one of them says there is an emergency because the father is in love with another woman

and they need to do something about it.

So let's take a look and see how Lindsay Lohan does the British accent.

So the British accent that Lindsay is having a go at here as her character Elizabeth which is the Queen's name

so it's quite interesting, is a Received Pronunciation accent.

so her family is quite wealthy and she's having a go at doing more of a Posh accent.

So the first word we're going to take a

look at is darling now as you can hear i'm not pronouncing

the r it's very very soft and it has more of a long a sound

so when we say darling you really hear a long r sound whereas

in American English you would hear that R more: darling.

so this long r sound is very typical of a British accent

you'll hear it in words such as darling card

car park and so so many more you can also hear it in the

way she says "How are you".

So, again we soften that r sound as opposed to how you hear it in American English

where they would say "how are you", so you hear that r a lot more.

In British English we would say how are you or certainly

in an rp accent now another little stereotype that's

quite funny in this scene is that elizabeth actually

brings up the weather.

now I don't know if you know but Brits are often associated with being

obsessed with the weather and somehow in conversation

the weather always comes up so she actually talks about

the chance that it might rain today which is usually pretty often

around Britain.

So the last word we're going to look at from this scene

is emergency.

So if you can hear the way i'm saying that emergency so again we have the soft r sound and it's

slightly elongated as opposed to American English where it

would sound like this emergency

let's take a look at the six best tv series to learn

british english

so the first one is the office when you laugh

your brain releases endorphins yeah your stress hormones

are reduced and the oxygen supply to your blood

is increased so you feel i try and laugh several times a day just because it

makes you feel good so let's let's try that