I often have clients who are super fluent in English, but who speak so quickly that they have problems being understood. What should they do? Slow down? S p e a k l i k e t h i s ????? WHO WANTS TO DO THAT? No one! Speaking rate is essentially hard wired into our speech profile. I think of myself as a fast speaker, as well.
Fortunately, the answer is…….drum roll, please…… INTONATION! Yes, my clients who most often speak English so quickly that they are hard to understand are from countries with languages in which one speaks faster if one is upset, angry, or very emotional. Spanish speakers frequently fall into this category. What is different in English from many other languages, Spanish included, is that we use INTONATION when speaking. The key is that every, yes EVERY, English word has a STRESSED SYLLABLE! And what we do to stress a syllable can be summarized in three words: LONGER—- LOUDER—-HIGHER!
We hold out the vowel in the stressed syllable LONGER than in any unstressed syllable, we speak the syllable LOUDER, and we use a HIGHER PITCH for that syllable. Doing these three things creates the MELODY of English, the up and the down of it, the music of the language.
AND, it also makes a fast speaker MORE INTELLIGIBLE. Not because they are trying to slow down their speech, but because the speech now has the intonation required. The speech is WAY more understandable!
So, NO, if you are a fast speaker, you do NOT need to slow down. You may need simply to INTONATE when speaking English!
