This textbook is meant for Spanish-speaking university students: undergraduates and graduates in English Philology, students in advanced courses at Official Language Schools and Teacher Training Colleges, and, in general, all those who have a fair knowledge of the inner workings of the English language and wish to delve further into the intricacies of English pronunciation.
It departs in many ways from other textbooks in the market in that it focuses on just one variety of British English –General RP– a controversial name by which British phoneticians and linguists, in general, refer to the most prestigious accent spoken mainly, but not exclusively, in the south of England. Aware of the omnipresent role played by the mother tongue in foreign language learning by adults, we approach the subject from a contrastive standpoint; thus, we have chosen to present English pronunciation against the backdrop of Castilian Spanish (referred to in the book simply as Spanish).
Another aspect in which this book differs from similar publications in the market is the incorporation of some of G. Lindsey”s views on current RP. The arrival of his English After RP. Standard British Pronunciation Today (2019) has meant, if not an earthquake, a rethinking of many of the postulates unquestionably repeated decade after decade in the textbooks in use.
The reader will also note that no mention is made of “phonetics” or “phonology” in the title of the book and that “pronunciation” is used instead. Naturally, the former underlies everything related to the latter. Although it is undoubtedly helpful to include some introductory chapters on the foundations of articulatory, acoustic, and even auditory phonetics, coupled with some brief notions on phonology as some textbooks do, we have decided to take from these disciplines just those aspects that can have a direct bearing on the knowledge and mastery of British English pronunciation.
While language is an undifferentiated whole, pedagogical reasons have led us to organise the subject into five main sections. Thus, after an introductory chapter on the type of accent discussed, we briefly describe the different systems of phonetic representation in English. It follows a Unit covering the English syllabic structure and phonological processes in context. Monophthongs, diphthongs and diphthong-like sequences are addressed in Units 4 and 5. In Units 6 and 7, we deal with approximants and nasals, respectively, while fricatives, affricates and plosives are covered separately in Units 8, 9 and 10. The following chapters deal with English lexical stress, rhythm, and intonation. As appendices, we include a list of words of French origin with their corresponding pronunciation, as well as London Tube stations whose pronunciations may be problematic to the foreign learner; a third section lists Anglo-American toponyms with an atypical pronunciation, and finally, there follows a list of Latin expressions used in academic language.
