How To Pronounce GENRE - Hadar Shemesh

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Accent's Way Magazine

#53

How to pronounce GENRE

• November 1, 2016
• 6 Comments

The word genre comes from French along with its lovely and confusing spelling. Of course, it has only American sounds. Now, people that are familiar with this word (hi, French speakers) or speakers of languages that borrow ‘genre’ from French may also have difficulties with saying this word. Why?

Because one of the hardest things, I think, is to get used to the English pronunciation of a word that you ALREADY HAVE in your language. But hey, that’s what I’m here for. How to pronounce ‘genre’.

How to pronounce GENRE

Word Count: 329 Open Transcript in New Tab

Hi guys, it’s Hadar and this is The Accents Way – your way to finding clarity, confidence and freedom in English.

Judy asked me to explain how to pronounce the word ‘genre’. Genre. Now, this word is derived from French. Now, in French you pronounce this word as one syllable.

Something like this – “genre”, “genre” [with a French accent]. Sorry, French speakers, I’m not a French speaker. So I guess it’s somewhat close, but it’s not like how you pronounce it in American English, although it’s the same spelling. All right.

So, a lot of non-native speakers still try to make it like the French pronunciation - “genre”, okay, and no. You have to remember that it’s two syllables. So the first syllable is “jaan”. It’s a ‘zh’ sound, then the ‘ah’ as in “father”, and then an ‘N’ sound – “jaan”.

The second syllable is an ‘R’ sound and a schwa – “ruh”, “ruh”. So basically it’s just like you’re making an ‘R’ sound and you forget to stop speaking – “ruh”, “ruh”.

Okay, so it’s “jaan-ruh” – “genre”, “genre”. What’s your favorite genre? Genre. Alright? Good!

I know it’s not the most common word but I know that a lot of speakers get stuck when they say this word because they just don’t know how to use it. So they don’t use it, and then they don’t talk about sophisticated things like different literary genres. Alright?

So, there you go! I hope this solves your problems.

Okay, so practice this word and try to use this word this week somehow, somewhere. Let us know how it goes right in the comments below.

That’s it. Thank you for watching. Come on over to my website. Check it out. Sign up to my newsletter and get more great content every single week.

Have a wonderful week and I will see you next week in the next video.

Bye.

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Have a great week. xoxo Hadar

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6 Responses

1. I pronounce it as jahnray . Is this correct ?

   Reply

2. 6

   Reply

3. It makes more effective pronunciation, when ‘wink’ is added.

   Reply

4. The video is unintentionally hilarious, as she explains the correct pronunciation gzhan-ruh and repeats it several time before using the american version in a sentence “What is your favourite jon- raa?

   Reply

5. Dear :Hadar it’s a pleasure to hear you ,in the background there’s a picture like a pene I would like that you check it that,maybe is my imagination Thank you

   Reply

6. Thank you Hadar, I used to pronounce it as jenre. Can you please do a pronunciation video on “comfortable”, I’m used to pronouncing it as comfor-table.

   Thank you very much

   Reply

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