Did you know there is no KNOW in acknowledge?
TRANSCRIPT
Hey, it’s Hadar. Today we’re going to talk about the word ‘acknowledge’, ‘acknowledge’. I love this word because this is yet another example of a word that… the root of the word, the word ‘know’, is pronounced completely different than the way it’s pronounced in the word ‘acknowledge’. Listen: no(w). So obviously, there is the K that is not pronounced. It starts with an N sound, then the ‘ow’ as in go. All right? ‘kno(w)’.
In the word ‘acknowledge’, all right, notice that I’m not going through the long diphthong – it’s not ‘acknoWledge’, doesn’t sound the same. Here we change to the ‘aa’ as in father – NAA. So let’s break it down. We start with a schwa sound – uh, and then you shift to a K sound – ‘uhk’. So for the schwa, you basically do nothing. Drop your jaw, relax your lips, relax your tongue: ‘uhk’.
Then you move to the N sound, so lift the tongue up to touch the upper palate, and then drop your tongue down. Open your mouth, relax your lips for the ‘aa’ as in father. Listen: NAA. See how open my mouth is? You have to open your mouth for this one. ‘uhk-NAA’.
Then you move on to the last syllable, which is an L sound, another schwa, and a ‘dj’ consonant – l’dj. So although there is an E here, it’s not ‘leidj’ (acknowlEIdge), it’s ‘uhk-NAA-l’dj’. Really quick and really short. Listen to the music of this word: ta-TA-da. ‘uhk-NAA-l’dj’. Because the NAA is the primary stress, so I raise my pitch a little bit and I stretch the vowel – the middle vowel, the vowel that is stressed. ‘uhk-NAA-l’dj’. I acknowledge your efforts to speak better English. Acknowledge.
All right. I also acknowledge that it may not be as simple as I just said it is. So, if something is still not clear, let me know in the comments below. Or if it is clear, let me know if you have any other questions, like how to pronounce other words or difficult sounds in American English. All right? I’m waiting to get your comments below.
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Have a great week. And I will see you in the next. Bye.
