Rural Juror?! (Your Questions Answered)┃Learn American English Pronunciation On the Go

Rachel: You’re listening to  the Rachel’s English podcast,  

made especially for non-native speakers,  where we study the way Americans really speak. 

My goal is for you to listen to this podcast  every week and sound more natural when speaking  

English and improve your listening  comprehension. In today’s episode,  

we’re answering questions from you that have  come in on my YouTube videos in the comments. 

I’m here with my husband, David, who’s going  to help me answer these questions. If you’d  

like a free download of the transcript  of this podcast, please visit my website,  

rachelsenglish.com/podcast  and search for this episode. 

It’s absolutely free to download.  Alright, let’s get started with the  

first question, David. Can you read it for me? David: Alright, this is from Martin. It says,  

“Hey, Rachel, I’d love to ask you a quick  question. Is there an S-H as in ‘she’ or a C-H  

as in ‘cheese’ in the word ‘actually’ or ‘actual’? Rachel: Okay, this is a great question. First of  

all, as I’m looking here at the comment that came  in, I see that Martin has asked it and someone  

named Michael has answered it and he says, “I’m  not Rachel but I’m a native speaker.” And then,  

he gives a great explanation about what he  hears people say. So, I just want to give  

a shout-out to Michael and let anyone, everyone  know that, everyone is free to answer questions  

in the comments on my channel always.  And I think that’s great. I love seeing  

other people chime in with their ideas. Okay, but let’s get to the question. The  

question is the word, “Actually”. So, I looked it  up in several dictionaries and a couple of them  

had just one pronunciation: “Act-chu-ah-lee”,  four syllables and yes, with the C-H sound  

like in “cheese”, “actually, actually”. The  Merriam-Webster Dictionary had this pronunciation  

but then it also included the pronunciation  with S-H, “Ac-shwah-lee”, “Ac-shu-wah-lee”. So,  

I think either of them are fine, they both sound  okay, but I think the S-H is more common and it’s  

certainly what I use. What about you, David? David: Yeah, I’m in stunned disbelief that  

you bothered to consult Mr. Webster. I think  it’s really clear if you’re going by sound,  

it’s S-H. There’s no, if you’re, yeah. Rachel: Yeah, so, David’s saying, why even  

look it up in a dictionary when you hear native  speakers do it this way all the time? And I just… 

David: I don’t think it’s regional, “Ac-shwah-lee,  ac-shwah-lee”. If I’m going fast, you know what,  

actually, that’s fine for me. It’s definitely S-H. Rachel: But it doesn’t sound weird if it’s a C-H,  

right? Let me try it. “Act-chu-wah-lee”. Does  that sound weird to you? “Act-chu-wah-lee” 

David: That’s when you want to slow down and  emphasize a turn in what you’re saying. So,  

“Act-chu-wah-lee.” But if it’s just part of a  sentence where it’s almost a connector word,  

it’s not that important of a word  unless it’s signifying a change. 

Rachel: Well, I mean, I would argue that it is  often signifying a change but that doesn’t always  

have to mean that you’ve slowed down your pace. David: I guess, well, yeah, I mean, I was saying  

to differentiate between clarifying what  you’re already talking about versus changing  

the direction of what you’re saying. Rachel: But the moral of the story is:  

either one is okay. S-H is more common. I also  want to say that the dictionary has listed it  

as four syllables and it’s much more common  to do this than just three. So, let’s just,  

let me just slow down, break it down the  way that most Americans would say this word  

most of the time. So, it’s “actually”,  “ac-shwa-lee, ac-shwa-lee.” “actually,  

actually”, there we go. Okay, David, do  you have another question for me? So,  

we’re having problems with the name here because  it looks like Russian characters and I have no  

idea how those correspond to sounds. David: Great, and you’re the expert. 

Rachel: And I’m the expert. David: So, I’m going to say  

it’s from Napa and the comment is, “Wow,  thanks, Rachel. Could you please shoot a  

video with ‘sneak peek’ and tell me its meaning?” Rachel: Sure, okay. “Sneak peek” is sort of like  

a preview. It’s when something is coming soon  and a little bit of it is released early so  

people can get an idea for it. For example,  this would happen a lot with movies, shows,  

“Here’s a sneak peek of next week’s episode.” David: You could say a “teaser” also. 

Rachel: Right, it’s meant to  get people excited about it,  

yeah. So, that’s the meaning of “sneak peek”. 

David: Alright, next one is from  Saeed. And he says, “You’re my bae in  

teaching English simply and effectively.” Rachel: That was a comment on my slang,  

“Summer of Slang” video where I talked, “Bae”. David: That’s right. Saeed says, “I’m preparing  

for the IELTS exam and it’s based on  British English. Can I use American  

idioms or slang during the speaking test?” Rachel: That’s a good question. I think I  

would say idiom’s fine. I think a lot of idioms  are actually in both American and British English.  

As far as the slang, I think, I probably would say  not to use it in the speaking test in that kind of  

situation. David, what would you say? David: Wow, I guess I would agree  

with you. That’s a hard question. Rachel: In a way, it shows like a mastery  

of the language, right? David: Yeah. 

Rachel: If you’re using slang and  idioms. I think idioms are totally fine. 

David: Yeah, I guess it’s a good distinction. Rachel: Also, you do need to make sure you’re  

using them correctly. An idiom that’s, you know,  grammatically not matching up with the rest of  

the sentence or something might sound awkward  and it might be better to just leave that out  

than to try to throw it in for extra points. David: Yeah, I think that’s a good point. It’s  

actually, if you are positive that  you’ve got it mastered, go for it,  

but if not, you may end up making a pretty  glaring mistake and actually, you could  

sound the worse than you are by misusing an idiom. Rachel: David, you just used “actually” twice,  

“actually”, okay. David: Is it an S-H? 

Rachel: No, you did it perfectly. You did  it just the way we described it. Okay,  

so, Saeed, I think, go ahead and do use  idioms if you feel very comfortable with  

them and probably avoid slang in that test. David: Yep. Alright, the next question is  

from Gerbart, and Gerbart says: “Please,  how can I be your student permanently,  

so that I can be able to ask you some  questions? I need to learn American English.” 

Rachel: Okay. And then here, he signs,  “Gilbert” so, his username is Gerbart but  

his signed name is Gilbert. David: Okay, I see. 

Rachel: So, Gilbert, great question. Right now, I  have an online school called the Rachel’s English  

Academy and it is by subscription. So, once you  sign up, you are my student until you choose to  

cancel. And through that, I answer questions on  the forms, the discussion pages within the school  

for each course, and I also have a Facebook  group where I interact with my students. 

So, for anyone who’s curious, that might be  a great way to have, you know, a little bit  

of more a consistent loop, feedback loop with me.  And I will put a link to that in the show notes. 

David: Alright, next question from Thomasino:  “Hey, Rachel. Appreciate your job and all the  

time in here. I get two words confused and don’t  pronounce them fluently. The two words are:  

“Saturday” and “Yesterday”. It seems to be a  problem for me to change the tongue position  

from “tur-tur” to “day” at least not so smoothly. Rachel: Okay, so the word “Saturday” and the word  

“Yesterday” and the problem is switching  from the “R” sound to the “D” sound. 

Well, let’s talk about the tongue position.  So, for the “R” in “Satu-rrr” or “Yes-terrr” is  

tongue tip pulled back a bit so it’s not touching  anything. I also lift the tongue tip a little bit  

so it’s like lifted and pulled back. And this is  a sound that you should be able to hold out. If  

you’re unable to hold it out, then that’s a sign  that you’re definitely not doing it right. And I  

always tell people with the “R”, it’s very good  practice to hold out the sound within your word.  

“Sa-turrr”. It just sort of helps you home in  on the right position, make subtle changes. Let  

your ear give your body some feedback there. So, if your tongue is pulled back like that,  

back in up, tongue tip, back in up. Then for the  “D”, it comes forward and flaps against the roof  

of the mouth once. “Urrr-dah”. So, that’s one  movement. It’s from being slightly pulled back  

in up, not touching anything to bouncing  once against the roof of the mouth for the  

“D”. It’s a flap here. So, just practice that and  definitely hold out the “R” sound first. It can  

help you concentrate on the flap that comes next  and sort of clean up that transition. “Saturday”,  

“Yesterday”, hold out the “R”. “Sa-turrr-day”,  “Yes-terrr-day”. Try that as you’re practicing.  

Also, he points out I can make it in British  English which goes without the “R” sound. So,  

like, “Yes-tah-day”, “Yes-tah-ah-ah”, I can  see how that’s a lot easier. The transition  

from “R” to a flap can be hard for sure but  there, we’ve broken it down. And if you break  

it down as you practice, practice it slowly  that way, I think it will improve and it will  

become more smooth and natural for you. David: Great. So, the next thing that  

we want to talk about and actually, we won’t say  the user’s name on this one but somebody wrote,  

“Sir, how I respect your family. You are really  an example for our society.” And I think you  

wanted to talk a little bit about that comment. Rachel: Yeah, I did. So, it’s very common for  

people to comment on my videos and to address  me as “sir”. And of course, in my videos,  

I believe it’s very obvious that I am a woman.  And “sir” is used for men and “ma’am” is sort of  

the female equivalent there. I don’t particularly  love “ma’am” but that’s for different reasons. I  

just wanted to point out here that “sir” is not  something that you would use with women. This is  

not a way to address women. You can use “ma’am”  or “miss” or “missus”. I think that they’re all,  

I don’t even know what I want to say about it.  “Ma’am” feels kind of formal and a little stuffy  

like if I’m checking out at a store and someone  says, “Here’s your change, ma’am.” I’m like,  

“Whoa”, I don’t know, it just sounds weird. David: Yeah, they’re more formal. “Sir” in  

particular, or maybe “Ma’am”, too, they’re a  little bit antiquated also. I feel like they  

would have been a lot more popular… Rachel: Yeah, definitely. 

David: …in a different era. Rachel: Yeah, you know I agree. So,  

I guess one thing I would say is, it can always  be left out. Like, if you’re wondering, “Well,  

how should I use ma’am? Should I use a different  word?” You can actually just leave it out. Like,  

if I was checking out, and so it said, “Ma’am,  here’s your change,” or “Here’s your change,  

ma’am.” It’s not necessary to even use it. I mean,  I guess it’s being used to show politeness but I  

don’t know, it’s a little formal. But the  main point is, don’t use “Sir” with women.  

I don’t know why it happens so frequently  but it does show up on my channel a lot. 

David: Alright, so the next question  is from Gavin, and Gavin says,  

“I’d appreciate it if you can help me compare  ‘go’ versus ‘goal’ and ‘so’ versus ‘soul’.  

I’ve spent quite a bit of time practicing  but I still find it hard to pronounce them  

correctly. I’m a teacher of English in China.” Rachel: Cool, I love hearing from other teachers.  

Okay, so, “go” g-o versus “goal” g-o-a-l. So  the thing that’s interesting to note here is  

the word “goal” is supposedly that has the same  exact sounds just with an ‘L’ at the end. So,  

we have the “g” consonant and the “o” diphthong,  “Go” but I have found that the dark “L” does  

change this diphthong. So, it’s not “go, go-whal”.  That’s not how we say that word. We say it,  

“Goal”. Really, it’s just the “g” and the  dark sound, “Go-o-o-o-o-, goal, goal”.  

There’s not much of an “o” diphthong  really before the “L”. So, for “go, go”,  

your jaw drops a little bit, your lips round  for the diphthong, jaw-drop then lip-rounding,  

“go, go”. But for “goal”, you make the “g” you  do drop your jaw a little bit but then you’re  

making a movement with the back of your tongue,  “Goal-l-l-l”. The back part of your tongue moves  

back a little bit, presses down a little bit  and mistakes a dark sound, “go-al-l-l, goal”. 

So, you will round your lips a little bit first  but then the relax towards the end for the “L”,  

towards the end for the “L”, “go, goal”. I  also think I have had students who have done  

an amazing job changing difficult pairs like this,  changing how they pronounce them by listening over  

and over and over. I had a student from China  once who didn’t have a good “e” vowel like in  

“sit”. She always said “ee” like in “seat”. So,  I made an audio file for her where I said minimal  

pairs like this “sit, seat”. And she listens to  them for about a week, and then she said, “Okay,  

I got it.” And then she practiced it for a week,  repeating out loud, and she came back to me the  

next week with a perfect “e” sound. I was actually  blown away. So, one thing you could do here is  

just practice a bunch of minimal pairs listening,  “go, goal”. And guys, if you’re wondering, “Well,  

that’s great, Rachel, where can I get the audio  files for this?” There’s a site called forvo.com  

where a bunch of native speakers have uploaded  themselves saying tons of different words. So,  

you can download a bunch of those and  put them together in your own audio file. 

Also, just to make another pitch for my online  school, I have thousands of audio files on my  

online school that do with a lot of minimal pair  comparison. Coz my online school is really all  

about training, not just learning the concept but  training it. So, if you’re having a tough time  

with a minimal pair like, “go” and “goal” or “so”  and “soul”, that’s a great way to work on those. 

David: Alright, our next question is  from Joe, Joe says, “Hi, could you  

post a video of pronouncing ‘millionaire’ and  ‘billionaire’? I find it difficult, thanks.” 

Rachel: Okay, Joe, sure. Well, not a video,  but I’m going to put it on the podcast. So,  

these are three-syllable words with stress on the  first syllable. “MILL-io-naire”, “BILL-io-naire”,  

“millionaire”, “billionaire”. I always think it  helps with multi-syllable words like this to break  

it down and practice the stressed syllable and the  unstressed syllable separately, “MILL-ionaire”. So  

there, I’m separating the stressed from the  unstressed, so, try that. “MILL-ionaire”,  

“BILL-ionaire”. Do that for a while and then put  them together. “Millionaire”, “Billionaire”. Put  

them together in slow motion then do that for a  while and then just try the word at regular pace.  

“Millionaire”, “billionaire”. I think working with  it, working with these words that way will help. 

David: Alright, so the next comment, question  is, “Could you please teach how to pronounce  

words that contain ‘R’ and ‘L’ at the same time?  I can never pronounce the word, ‘rural’. For me,  

it’s just a sound like ‘royal’ or ‘loyal’. Rachel: Okay, David did a great job  

pronouncing the word “rural”. It’s a tough word.  Actually, it’s funny, a couple of years ago,  

I did a series on my YouTube channel called  “Interview a Broadcaster”. And I was interviewing  

a guy named Craig Melvin who’s a broadcaster  for NBC here in the United States. And he,  

I was asking him if there were any words that he  founded difficult to pronounce and “rural” was one  

of the words he mentioned. So, it’s not just you,  it’s Americans, too. So, this word is interesting  

because “Ru-r-r-r”, we have the “R” consonant and  then the dictionary would say it’s the “uh” vowel  

like in “book” or “push” but it’s not, really.  It’s just really the “r” vowels. We have “r”  

consonant, “r” vowel, “r” consonant altogether,  “rur-r-r-ral”. So, there’s sort of a re-emphasis  

of the sound that happens for the second syllable,  “ru-ral, rur-r-r-ral” and then we go right from  

that “r” into the dark sound. So, if you have a  hard time with “r” or a hard time with the “L”,  

this is going to be really difficult. But for  the “r”, lips flare a little bit, tongue-tip,  

pulls up and back a little bit, “ru-r-ral”.  Re-emphasize the sound and then “ru-r-r-ral”,  

engage the back of the tongue to make  that dark sound for the dark “L”. Now,  

this is also reminding me of an episode of  “30 Rock”. David, have you seen that show? 

David: I have, yeah. Rachel: Have you seen every episode, do you think? 

David: No. Rachel: So, there’s one where  

Jenna is cast in a movie and she’s really excited  about this side project. And the name of the movie  

is called the “The Rural Juror” and it’s making  fun of these words that have the “r-r-r-r” in it  

in them. And so, she is, people are asking her,  you know, they’re trying to be supportive and  

they’re like, “Oh, what’s the movie?” And she’s  saying, “The Rural Juror” and then the joke is  

no one knows what she’s saying. Okay, I’m going  to see if I can find a clip of that and I’m going  

to put it on the show notes. David: That’s great. 

Rachel: It’s so funny. Rural Juror. And of course,  she’s like pronouncing it even more silly in the  

show to make it even harder to understand.  Rural Juror, Rural Juror was the name of the  

movie. Anyway, I’ll try to find a link for that  but it’s hilarious. So, the moral of the story is  

“rural” is not just hard for non-native speakers. David: Alright, the next question is from Cho,  

“Hello, thank you for your good lectures.  I have a question about the pronunciation  

of ‘on our’. I can’t hear ‘on our’.  I would like to explain, I would like  

you to explain how to pronounce ‘on our’. Rachel: Okay, so, David is doing a great  

job in pronouncing this quickly. It’s “on, O-N,  our, O-U-R”. Well, here’s the thing is that we  

almost never pronounce “our” that way. We  so frequently reduce it to “ur, ur”. So,  

let’s make a phrase that would use this.  How about, “On our anniversary”? So,  

I would say that, “On-ur anniversary.” “On-ur,  on-ur, on-ur, on-ur, on-ur, on-ur anniversary.” 

David: That sounds just like the letter “r”. Rachel: Yeah, it does. 

David: On our. Rachel: Yes, exactly. So, it reduces. So,  

“on-ur”, so, your tongue touches the roof of  the mouth for the “n” and then it pulls back  

right away for the “r” consonant sound. Don’t try  to make a vowel there between the “n” and “r”,  

“On-ur, on-ur, on-ur”, “On-ur anniversary. On-ur  trip.” David, what would be another phrase that  

would use “on our” on our last day of school? David: It’s actually, it sounds exactly like  

the word, “H-O-N-O-R”. Rachel: Yeah. 

David: Honor. Rachel: Right. It’s like a stressed syllable,  

unstressed syllable. The sounds are all the  same. Interesting. Okay, I hope that helps, Cho. 

David: Alright, the next question is from Rana.  Rana says, “Rachel please help me pronounce  

‘find that’ and ‘like that’. I find that they’re  difficult to pronounce fast. Thank you so much.” 

Rachel: Okay, well, let’s start with the phrase,  “Find that”, “David, can you help me find that  

piece of paper?” “Find that, find that.” What’s  happening to the “D”? It’s getting dropped because  

it comes between two other consonants. We do  that a lot with the “D” between two consonants.  

So, I’m just saying, “Find that” right from  the “n” consonant into the “T-H”. “Can you  

help me find that telephone number?” David: I want to find that article  

that my friend was talking about. Rachel: “Find that. Find that.” Okay,  

and then the other phrase was, “Like that”.  “I don’t like that.” And I think I do a very  

light “K” release like, so, light. “I don’t like  that. Like, k-k-k k-that, k-that, k-that, k-that,  

k-that, k-that.” Really light “k” before the  “t-h”. “I don’t like that. Oh, I like that,  

I like that.” But it’s really fast so  I can see how it would be hard to catch  

when someone’s saying it. But the good news  is, when you find that there is a shortcut,  

you can drop that “D”. Okay, David, I  think we have time for one more question. 

David: Alright, we have a question from  Raphael for our last one. Raphael says,  

“Could you do a video on the pronunciation  of the word, “Certain”? It sounds like  

it is a stopped “T” but I’m not quite sure. Rachel: Raphael, you are exactly right. There’s  

a stopped “T”, “Cer-ain, cer-ain”. I’m stopping  the air there. So, “certain, curtain, mountain,  

kitten, button”. There’s a whole bunch of words  that have the sequence, “T-schwa-N”. And I think,  

this way that I’ve just pronounced them is the  most common and is the most standard. Although,  

definitely, you will hear light true “T”,  “certain, certain, mountain, mountain, curtain,  

curtain”. And you’ll also hear pronunciation  where people do the stop, and then they make  

more of an open “e” vowel sound like, “moun-en,  ki-en, bu-en”. I think that’s maybe New England-y,  

I’m not sure. I know someone from Connecticut  who used to do that. I personally think that  

pronunciation sounds really weird. I would say,  stick with the stop, plus the “n” sound like,  

“curt-ain” or if you’re more comfortable,  you could do a really light true “T”. But  

if you make too much of it, “curtain”, then it  starts to sound a little bit strange. David,  

what do you think about the pronunciation?  Do you prefer a stop or a light true “T”? 

David: Stop. Rachel: Stop. More common, don’t you think? 

David: Yeah, I think so. Rachel: So, actually,  

I have a video on how to pronounce the word  “mountain” where I go over this and I will link  

to that video in the show notes. So that there  is more to learn there. And also, that video  

was shot outside in the mountains in Colorado.  So, there’s some good background to look at. 

David: It actually was. Rachel: It actually was,  

yep. Okay, guys, that’s it. Thanks so  much for listening to this podcast and  

to David for asking the questions that came in. David: Absolutely, it’s great to talk to you guys. 

Rachel: Once again, if you guys would like a  copy of the transcript, it is absolutely free to  

download on my website, rachelsenglish.com/podcast  and just look for this episode. On my website,  

you’ll also find the show notes which will  contain links to related topics and videos.  

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