Of course there are many British accents and there are many American accents,

but I'm going to show you some of the major accent differences between them.

So let's start!

Linguists give vowels names to make it easier to talk about them.

The LOT vowel sound describes the vowel in words like "job," "politics," and "not."

When British speakers say this vowel, their lips might be slightly rounded.

But Americans use a different vowel sound and their lips will be more open.

The BATH vowel describes the vowel sound in words like "behalf," "passed," and "path."

British speakers – especially those in the south of England – will use a more back vowel sound here.

But Americans will tend to use a more front vowel sound.

The words "water," "authority," and "fighting" have a T in the middle.

Brits will tend to pronounce a T sound here.

But Americans will use a tap.

This may sound like a short D sound or even an R sound if you're a non-native speaker of English

The word "yod" describes a /j/ sound.

In the word "new", Brits will tend to pronounce a /j/ sound here.

But Americans don't – they've dropped the yod.

In Britain, this word can be pronounced with a /dj/ sound, but it's also commonly pronounced with a /dʒ/ sound.

This change from /dj/ to /dʒ/ is called yod-coalescence.

You can hear Theresa May use the /dʒ/ pronunciation.

But Donald Trump just uses a /d/ sound here.

In the words "shared," "hard" and "work," most Brits will not pronounce the R sound, but most Americans will.

Donald Trump grew up in New York.

In traditional New York accents, the letter R is only pronounced in certain positions.

But nowadays the situation is more complicated.

With New Yorkers sometimes pronouncing the R and sometimes not.

This is what Donald Trump does in his speech.

Sometimes he pronounces the R and sometimes not.

But for the purposes of this video, it's important to state that most Americans will always pronounce the letter R.

I'm going to finish with an interesting aspect of Donald Trump's accent that's particular to New York - rather than American accents in general.

For me, the words "human," "huge," and "humour" begin with a /hjuː/ sound, but in New York accents, the H is dropped, and we're left with /juː/.

Listen to Theresa May pronounce the H in "human."

And now listen to Donald Trump who doesn't pronounce the H.

These are just some of the differences between a British and an American accent.

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If you're a non-native English speaker and you want to improve your pronunciation, then take my online English pronunciation course.

Click the link underneath the video to find out more