“ahhh”
The American /ɑ/ is a difficult vowel for many non-native speakers. People who studied British English may pronounce this vowel as o. However, in American English, the vowel sound is ahhh. The vowel is held longer in the American pronunciation. Of course, both British and American pronunciations are acceptable. However, if you work in the Untied States, you are more likely to be understood if you use American pronunciation.
How to Make it – The mouth is wide open — the widest of any phoneme in English. The tongue is pulled back and stays low in the mouth.
Practice reading the list of technical vocabulary and saying ahhh for the underlined vowel. Remember to lengthen the vowel.
| /ɑ/ | |||
| toxic | biologic | modeling | modify |
| confident | metabolic | concept | approximately |
| recombinant | processes | chronic | project |
| optimize | technology | topical | operations |
| obvious | molecule | volume | common |
| ophthalmology | product | ocular | opportunity |
We’re confident we can optimize the process, but the project has some obvious common problems we need to resolve.
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