Name: Speak English Like Jennifer Lawrence | The Southern Accent [Advanced Lesson]
Uploaded: 2021-01-22T18:10:07.000Z
Duration: 21 min 43 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

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What's up, guys? Welcome back  to learn English with TV series.  

Future simple

Now, today we have a very special lesson for you,  where we are going to analyze the speech of the  

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hilarious and charming actress Jennifer Lawrence. Now this is going to be very helpful for you  

in improving your comprehension and even improving  your American accent, if that's a goal of yours.

Now, Jennifer Lawrence is from Kentucky. This is  a state in an area of the usa called the South.  

Now the South is a very big area and as such,  it has a very big variety of different accents,  

but they're all pretty similar to each other. Now these accidents can be difficult even for  

Americans to understand sometimes. Now even  if you don't plan on traveling the South,  

this can be really useful for you because if you  travel you can really meet Southerners anywhere,  

and it's also highly represented  on a variety of television series. 

Now I'm from Colorado, which is in the West  of the United States and it has more of a  

standard American accent. So today you'll be  able to compare my standard American accent  

with that of Jennifer Lawrence and some  other Southerners with different examples. 

All right, but before we get into today's lesson,  I want to let you know that if you are new here  

every single week we make fun lessons, just like  this one so that you can understand fast speaking  

natives. Without getting lost, without missing the  jokes and without subtitles. Just like Mikhail,  

who says that our lessons have helped him  to understand a variety of different accents  

in English. And you can too, it's really simple:  just hit that Subscribe button and the Bell below,  

so you don't miss any of our new lessons. Now, let's jump into this lesson where  

we're going to break down the accent  of Jennifer Lawrence. Aww yeah!!

So as you will hear in some of  the different examples today,  

this accent can have more of a Southern influence  than some other American accents. Now, one  

characteristic of the Southern accent is called  the drawl. Now this refers to how Southerners can  

have kind of slower speech, but also how they  will draw out more the different vowel sounds  

and also how they sometimes soften their R's. So  let's take a look at this with Jennifer Lawrence.

Now if you are at all familiar with this  accent already you probably will notice  

Jennifer Lawrence does not actually  have a very strong Southern accent.  

She grew up in Kentucky, but actually when  she was a teenager she moved to Los Angeles,  

so she's really had it softened. Now  if we look at this interview with her  

family we'll see that they do actually still  maintain a very strong Kentucky accent. So  

we can see where she comes from. Now later we  will also see her imitating her mom by donning  

this thicker Kentucky accent. So first let's  take a look at this interview with her family.

And as I said, she still maintains certain  elements of her Southern accent which is what  

we're really going to focus on in this lesson. So as I was saying before in this interview we can  

get many great examples of that Southern drawl. Now one of the characteristics of this is the  

gliding vowels. Now that is how single vowels  will actually become diphthongs. Now diphthong  

is when you have two vowels together, that occupy  a single syllable. So for example you can hear  

it in words such as meal, which becomes meal.  And also yep which is another way to say yes,  

so instead of saying yep, they would say in  the South yep. So they wouldn't say pet like  

that in the South, they would say pet. And then here we'll see an example where  

Jennifer Lawrence is actually making fun  of her mom, as I told you about earlier.

So for example here with the word not we can  see that Southern draw where not becomes not. 

So she didn't say not, she said it more like not.  

Now let's take a look at some other examples  of Jennifer Lawrence with the drawl. 

So we can kind of hear an extension there  with the word ton, let's listen to that again.

And then again we have an example here of how not  becomes not. Let's listen to that one more time.

So did you notice how she said man here? She  didn't really say it like I would say it in  

my standard American accent, man. Let's  take a look again at how she said that.

Now have you seen the movie Inglorious Basterds?  Maybe you already caught the lesson that we made  

with this fantastic film. So in this movie  Brad Pitt's character has an accent from the  

Appalachian Mountains. Now this is an accent  that you could encounter in Eastern Kentucky.  

And we'll see in this clip how he pronounces  some things very differently than I would. So  

for example I would say the word well as just one  syllable, but let's take a look at how Brad Pitt's  

character in this movie would say this word well. So you might have seen he doesn't say well he  

says it like well. Let's listen to that again. Now this is similar to how Jennifer Lawrence  

would say this name. I would say it as  Gail but let's see how she would say it.

Another famous actor that comes from Kentucky  is Johnny Depp. Now let's take a look at this  

interview and pay special attention to the  drawl that he has on some of his vowels.

Then he also says this word differently than  I would. I would say diary but he says it as:

And now let's look at another  example from the movie Mean Girls.

So I would say day and rifle, but  this kid says it as day and rifle.

Now another characteristic of Southern  accents is called twang. Now this is the  

kind of increase in nasality which can make  consonants sound harder. So let's compare how  

I would say going anywhere to how  Jennifer says it in this interview.

Now let's look at another interview  where we can see this nasal sound.

So I would say it as regulations. Let's  take a look again at how Jennifer said this.

I would say children, let's listen  again to how Jennifer said that.

Now another Kentucky native that you  might have encountered is Melissa McBride,  

who is most famous for her role in The Walking  Dead. Now let's listen to how she says season one.

So we can hear more nasality in her ends  

and also how she really dragged out that uh  sound in one. So I would say season one...

I would say body but Melissa  drags out that ah sound.

Here we have an excellent  example of twang when Jennifer  

says supportive. I would say  supportive but Jennifer says...

Some other very common elements of sound morphing  in this accent are the following: so first off we  

have how get can become git, so it changes from an  e to an i sound. And how on changes from just an  

o sound on to own. And that kind of w sound  you'll also find much more common in the vowels  

in that Southern accent. And then we also have how  can't the word cannot can't can become caint. So  

let's look again at how Jennifer Lawrence would  say can't. I would say can't and she says...

So Jennifer actually says it like can't with  an a sound, and actually this is probably  

where the not so grammatically correct ain't comes  from. Maybe you've heard that before it can mean  

is not or have not and we're going to look at  that a little bit more later in the lesson.

Okay so finally I want to show you a clip with  George Clooney. Now believe it or not he is also  

from Kentucky. Now in this film Oh Brother Where  Art Thou? we can see him putting on a very strong  

Southern accent. Now he probably  picked this up from his childhood  

because in his normal speech he  doesn't really use this accent anymore.

So did you hear how he said this word boys?  

So I would just say boys but he drew  it out a lot more he said it like this. 

And then we also have another great  example with how he says can. So we  

had kant with Jennifer Lawrence that she says  it like can't let's look at how he says can.

So he draws out that a again he says  can. And then another really great  

thing in this movie is that we can hear  some very typical Southern folk music.

Now it can be extremely frustrating when natives  don't speak how you're expecting them to. How  

you probably learned that we speak in school.  Now we don't really speak anything like that  

and that's why in our 3-Part Masterclass we are  going to teach you the 3 Principles of being able  

to understand natives no matter how fast we  speak. So first off is vocabulary, second off  

is understanding pronunciation, like we're doing  in this lesson. And then third another element  

that we're looking at a little bit in today's  lesson is cultural context. So we'll teach you  

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Speak English Like Jennifer Lawrence | The Southern Accent [Advanced Lesson]

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