EW as in FEW diphthong.

Diphthongs are a combination of two sounds.

They have a starting position and an ending position.

The first sound is the Y consonant.

Diphthongs are normally made up of two vowel sounds.

But in this case, the Y consonant is acting as a vowel.

For example, in the word 'music'.

The Y sound goes with the OO vowel to make a diphthong rather than with M consonant

to make a consonant cluster.

Music.

To make the Y sound, the jaw drops a little bit.

The lips may be relaxed or they may begin rounding for the ending position.

The tongue tip is down, lightly touching the back of the bottom front teeth.

The mid-front part of the tongue lifts and touches the roof of the mouth about here.

It pushes forward against the roof of the mouth before pulling away.

As we move the tongue on the roof of the mouth, we close the vocal chords to get this sound...

which we add to the sound...

We release it the same time we release the tongue.

To transition into the next sound, we release right into the position of the OO as in BOO vowel.

The tongue tip doesn't need to move.

It remains touching the back of the bottom front teeth.

The back part of the tongue lifts towards the soft palette.

The lips round.

Let's study a word with this sound: USE.

Jaw drops just a little bit as the tongue lifts and presses forward against the roof of the mouth.

The lips flare in preparation for the rounding at the end of the diphthong.

Tongue releases, lifts in the back, and the lips round.

In a stressed syllable, the EW diphthong curves up then down.

Use.

Ew.

In an unstressed syllable, it's lower and flatter in pitch as well as quieter and quicker.

Ew.

Ew.

The diphthong is unstressed in the word 'interview'.

Ew.

Let's take a look at the word 'interview'.

A little bit of lip rounding in the first position of the diphthong but in the ending

position, the lip rounding is subtle.

Not like in a stressed EW diphthong.

Let's compare the ending position of the stressed EW diphthong above

with the unstressed diphthong below.

In the stressed version, the lips round much more.

Generally, the unstressed version of a vowel or diphthong is more relaxed

and doesn't take the full mouth position.

In this case, less lip rounding.

This is because we don't take this much time for unstressed syllables.

They're shorter so we simplify the mouth movements.

EW stressed.

Use.

EW.

Unstressed.

Interview.

Ew.

EW.

Ew.

EW.

Ew.

Example words.

Repeat with me.

Music.

EW.

Music.

Continue.

Ew.

Continue.

Review.

EW.

Review.

Unite.

Ew.

Unite.

Union.

EW.

Union.

Future.

EW.

Future.

This video is one of 36 in a new series, The Sounds of American English.

Videos in this set will be released here on YouTube twice a month, first and third Thursdays,

in 2016 and 2017.

But the whole set can be all yours right now.

The real value of these videos is watching them as a set, as a whole,

to give your mind the time to take it all in and get the bigger picture.

Most of the materials you'll find elsewhere just teach the sounds on their own in isolation.

It's a mistake to learn them this way.

We learn the sounds to speak words and sentences, not just sounds.

Move closer to fluency in spoken English.

But the video set today!

Visit rachelsenglish.com/sounds

Available as a DVD or digital download