Pronunciation diary 2.0

This is the second part of my pronunciation diary. Luckily the oral exam is over and I survived itJ. I would like to explain you my strategies for improving and practising my pronunciation skills.

Firstly, I took a closer look at Hendrik’s feedback from the pronunciation exercises we recorded in class and listened to the audio file again. I noticed that I often swallowed the last letter of a word – especially the “d” and “t” and that I mispronounced the words “that”, “this”, “there” – I said something like “det”, “dis”, “der”...
I found this BBC video (http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/pron/sounds/con_voiced_6.shtml) which really helped me to improve the sound ð – the sound you need for words like “that”, “there”...
The “BBC woman”, I do not know her name J, explains how to produce this specific sound and gives some examples. Surprisingly, I could hear a difference to my recording after I practised the sound a few times.

Another video I found on the website was about the differences between the voiced consonant “v” and the voiceless “f”. I was not aware that theses sounds are also tricky for me. Before I watched the BBC video I pronounced “v” and “f” the same in the middle of a word. For example the two words “believe” and “belief” sounded completely the same when I pronounced them because I did not think about it. “V” and “f” are still tricky for me and I need to work on them.

I also tried to look up the pronunciation of words I read in books. Normally, if I read a word and do not know how to pronounce it I just think “yeah, whatever” and continue reading. The last few weeks I typed most of the words into an online dictionary and listened to the pronunciation.

The moral of the story is that the exam is over, but the pronunciation practise is not J.

Porter book game

Hey guys!

Last Thursday we had so much fun in class because of an awesome but simple game :). The instructiosn: Everyone had to cut a piece of paper into eight pieces and write a number on it (from one to eight). Then we looked for an unfamiliar word in the porter book, wrote a sentence with this word on the first page and passed it to our neighbor. He/She had to draw our sentence and pass it on. The next one drew what his/her neighbor had written and so on... It was (of course) not allowed to cheat and have a look what the other person had written/drawn. 
After eight rounds we looked through the texts and read them out.

I proudly present the "bleak house story". Have fun!

By the seat of one's pants

Do you know what these two guys have in common? Apart from being handsome… J

Their names are Jeff Dunham (from America) Sascha Grammel (Germany) and they are both ventriloquists. You think you don't know what a ventriloquist is? I am sure you do. According to Wikipedia "Ventriloquism is an act in which a person changes his or her voice so that it appears that the voice is coming from elsewhere, usually a 'dummy'".

Dunham has various of these dummies such as Walter, the grumpy retiree; the furry and manic Peanut and José Jalapeño from South of the border; but he is best known for his character “Achmed the Dead Terrorist” who is an incompetent suicide bomber. Achmed became famous for his yelling “Silence! I kill you!” to Jeff Dunham. The video where Achmed is introduced has more than 160 million clicks on You Tube, but that’s not all. Dunham’s TV series on Comedy Central have the highest audience ratings; he has sold more than seven million DVDs and his videos have half a billion views on You Tube. Sounds impressive, doesn’t it? No wonder Forbes Magazine ranked him in its list “100 most powerful entertainers” and Time Magazine wrote that he is “the most popular comedian in the United States”. 

Jeff Dunham has earned much money but his success has also a negative side. His characters have been accused of being racist, sexist and homophobic. In 2008, a TV commercial featuring Achmed was banned by the South African Advertising Authority after people complained about the ad because it was offensive to Muslims and portrayed them as terrorists. Dunham defended himself against the complaints and pointed out that he is a stand-up comedian and that it is his job to make people laugh. From his point of view comedy is the last true form of free speech.

Sascha Grammel, on the other hand, is well known in Germany and Austria but not as popular as Jeff Dunham is in America. Grammel created his own unique ventriloquist-style which is called “Puppet-Comedy” and combines comedy, magic, puppet show and (of course) ventriloquism. Like Jeff Dunham, Sascha Grammel has plenty help-on-stage: “Josie”,

a turtle that works as a cash machine, “Frederic Freiherr vom Furchensumpf” a cheeky eagle-pheasant-mix who is extremely self-confident; and “Dr. Peter Hacke”, a burger and nutritionist. Grammel’s previous show was called “Hetz mich nicht” (Don’t rush) which he performed in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. I had the occasion to see him live on stage in Vienna - it was absolutely amazing! He performed “Don’t rush” for more than three years but now he has a new show – “No plan”. 

Grammel has got new characters (for example “Rüdiger”, an alien; or “Huhn, a blue chicken), new jokes AND is coming to Vienna in November 2014! I am really looking forward to seeing him again on stage.

Challenge 1

I am not sure if it is too late for Challenge 1 but I was so busy last week and therefore I decided to post my sign now because I am thinking about it all the time. I was not able to find a funny sign in Graz, I just found some correct ones but this was too boring. When I was in New Zealand I took this picture because I saw it every day and I am still wondering if it makes sense or not. It is an advertisement for “Liquor King”, a well-known company in New Zealand which sells alcohol. This is the sign:

If it is the best liquor store in the world, it is automatically the best one in New Zealand and it would be enough to write “World’s best liquor store”. If it is the best liquor store in NZ, it is not automatically the best one in the world. Maybe there is a better one somewhere else?
Perhaps it is possible to write it like this but from my point of view it sounds strange.
What do you think about it?