25- Assimilation of /s/
Hi. I'm Tim and this is my Pronunciation workshop.
Here I'm going to show you how English is really spoken. Come on, let's go inside.
You know how they say that British people are obsessed with the weather? Well I'm feeling
under it today. Under the weather - that's an expression which means 'I'm not feeling
very well'. Excuse me! What do you say in your language when someone sneezes? Do you
know what we say in British English? Let's ask the people of London.
Bless you. Bless you.
Thank you! Bless you! Now the word 'bless' ends
in /s/ and 'you' begins with /j/. But what happens to the /s/ sound when we put
the two words together? Watch and listen again.
In fluent speech, when a /s/ sound is followed by a /j then the /j/ changes to a /ʃ/ sound,
and this change also happens when the next word begins with the /ʃ/ sound itself. So 'bless
you' becomes 'bleshyou' and 'this shirt' becomes 'thishirt'. This is an example of assimilation.
And don't forget this can also happen if the /s/ is followed by a /t/, because as you
might remember from a previous video, the /t/ sound disappears between two consonants.
Here are some more examples.
Don't worry, that's usual. He always makes you feel good.
Tim Right, so you've heard the examples, and
now it's your turn. Listen and repeat.
Well done. Now remember, if you want to learn
more about pronunciation, then please visit our website, bbclearningenglish.com. And that
is about it from the pronunciation workshop for this week. I'll see you soon. Bye bye! Now,
my mum always said that this stuff is great when you're feeling under the weather. What
is it? It's just yoghurt. Ewww. Umm better not. Toasty.
