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Date Published: 19/11/2024

Top English pronunciation struggles for Spanish speakers

Many everyday English words leave Spanish speakers tripping over their tongues

Although it is widely spoken from one corner of the world to the other, English has long been regarded as one of the more difficult languages to learn. Spaniards in particular have trouble pronouncing some of the most frequently-used words in day to day speaking, according to a study conducted by the British Council.

Learning and pronunciation in English can represent a "considerable" challenge for Spaniards due to the phonetic differences between both languages, explains the British Council, the United Kingdom's international organisation for cultural relations and educational opportunities.

Linguistically, individual challenges vary depending on regional accents and dialects, but certain patterns emerge. Notably, commonly encountered English terms prove unexpectedly tricky for Spanish learners. Among the top offenders are frequently used words like "hello", "house", "happy" and ironically enough, "Spanish".

Research reveals that the absence of initial sp-consonant combinations in Spanish impedes accurate pronunciation of such English vocabulary, causing many Spanish natives to insert artificial 'e' prefixes, so that 'Spanish' ends up sounding like 'Espanish'. Similarly, Spanish speakers struggle with English expressions commencing with the written 'h', typically substituting Spanish 'j' equivalents.

Other complications arise due to the difference between written and spoken English. While Spanish employs few silent letters, English abounds with them. Examples include "walk", "talk", "would" and "could", where the letter 'l' isn't heard.

Another sticky point are vowels. In Spanish there are five vowel sounds compared to approximately 20 in English. This leads Spanish speakers to opt for the Spanish vowel that most closely resembles that of English. It's not always a problem, but some words like ship, live, hit, whose 'i' is short, could be confused with other words that are pronounced with a long 'i', like sheep, leave and heat.

Asked, worked, loved: another characteristic of English is consonant groups or clusters. The absence of these words in Spanish creates the need to look for strategies to pronounce them. On some occasions, a vowel will be incorporated between the consonants and, on other occasions, one of the consonants will be omitted.

Although it's not an error that usually causes difficulties in communication, if -ed is not vocalised in past tense verbs, it can lead to clumsy sentences that sound like they're in the present tense.

Image: Freepik

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