Hard Words in French #8 -Vowel "eu" Plus a"P" Pronounced-Mastering French Pronunciation w/ Geri Metz

Pneu - This word for "tire" has a comical sound. It was listed as hard to say by Expats. Learn to say the vowel "eu" plus a "p" pronounced.
Bonjour! I'm Geri Metz and this is my latest series of mini video lessons "Hard Words in French"
In this series I'll be taking up those particularly hard to pronounce words as chosen by expats living in France.
Please visit pronouncingfrench.com and sign up for a free French pronunciation lesson, phonetics chart and many other useful learning tools for teachers and students alike! Enjoy!
“Are you speaking French with an American mouth?” Mastering French pronunciation w/ Geri Metz will help you to "Finesse your French and speak more like a native." pronouncingfrench.com/courses
The purpose of PronouncingFrench.com is to improve the quality of spoken French among all who wish to sound more authentic. Whether you're a French Teacher, French Student, Expat living in France, Foreign Diplomat or business man working in France, an International Traveler, Actor or just lover of the French Language, Mastering French Pronunciation will give you the tools you need to develop a more authentic French accent and speak more like a French native.
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This new video series on Hard Words in French has been a lot of fun to teach. One of the interesting things I have noticed is that in most cases it is not that the word is particularly hard to pronounce but the spelling makes it look hard. I started the series around the time of Christmas, so the first of this series was “meilleurs voeux”. But from then on I have been focused on the “10 hardest words in French”, a list that appeared in an online news magazine called The Local. Fr. I am assuming that these were words expats in France submitted to the magazine and got the idea for the series. The word this week, “pneu” is not really all that hard but it has a couple of interesting features. One is the pronunciation of the eu spelling, which in this case we call the closed eu. Its phonetic symbol is /ø/ and it is one of the foundations of my course, Mastering French Pronunciation. What is so important about this vowel? It contains all the important characteristics of what I call “The French mouth”. Since I am an English speaker, I have had to learn how to sound French and that is the specialty of what I offer. These little video lessons give you a sample of the content of my teaching, but the course also gives the opportunity to practice what is taught by repeating exercises after me, and also by seeing a native French speaker say the words on video. If correcting your Anglo/American accent and sounding more authentically French interests you, I invite you to look into Mastering French Pronunciation.

[@RRMSWISS]

Un GRANd merci Geri !

[@drmichaelelinski6992]

Je suis tellement content que vous vous êtes mise à enregistrer vos vidéos de phonétique. Je trouve votre cours magnifique et j’ai hâte à voir ce que vous faites dans cette nouvelle série d’enregistrements. Vous êtes une prof formidable et je vous remercie de votre travail qui m’est très utile. Bonne journée.

[@PronouncingFrench]

Merci beaucoup de vos mots si gentils. Je suis contente que vous ayez trouvé le cours utile.

[@alexsimentaldegabaldon2858]

It would be awesome if you gave the feminine or masculine articles to the nouns you teach on these videos. I speak fluent Spanish and English and can learn these articles very quickly, I can't always rely on my Spanish to get the article right....

[@memo6032]

I'm a native Arabic speaker and this word is really hard for me because of the p sound which we don't have in Arabic- actually a lot of Arabic speaker don't have that problem (at least with aspirated p) if they were taught English since a very young age or were in an English school- and it's really hard to pronounce the p and I have to slow down to get it so when another constant comes after it not a vowel it becomes even harder

[@PronouncingFrench]

Thanks for your comment and I can sympathize with the difficulty you have. For this word, "le pneu", you bring the lips together and you feel a little pressure build up behind the lips and then the pressure releases into the "n" and ultimately into the vowel "eu". I hope this helps a little. You might think about having a private session with me. Find that information on the website, pronouncingfrench.com under "tutoring". My best wishes.

[@lewjames6688]

Le nom de , est-il masculine ou feminine? Merci beaucoups d’un étudiant de français!

[@PronouncingFrench]

c'est "le pneu"

[@drmichaelelinski6992]

PS Voici mon deuxième mail. Le premier est juste en bas. Je suis d’accord avec l’avis d’Alex qu’il a posté ci-dessous, en bas de mon premier message. Ça m’aiderait énormément aussi si vous montrions des nouveaux noms avec un article. Nous, vos étudiants apprendraient le genre d’un nom en même temps qu’on apprendrait la signification du nom. Lorsque j’étais jeune, cela était en grand problème car on ne savait jamais le bon genre d’un mot/nom. À l’école, les enseignants ont rarement mis le bon article, avec le nouveau mot que nous venions d’apprendre. Si on l’apprenait le bon genre au début, on saurait si un nom est masculin ou féminin dès le premier jour, après avoir appris la signification d’un nouveau mot. Je sais que ce que je dit n’est pas de la phonétique, mais cette petite étape nous aiderait apprendre beaucoup plus facilement le genre des mots, tout en apprenant comment bien prononcer des mots. Considérez ma suggestion, s’il vous plaît. À part ça, vos cours sont absolument excellents et j’apprends toujours quelque chose de nouveau. Bonne continuation. Et bonne journée.

[@PronouncingFrench]

Merci de vos suggestions. Je ferai un effort de mettre les articles avec les mots.