Eric Armstrong

Efficacy in phonetics training for the actor

Abstract This paper explores the impact of early introduction of keywords for sound/symbol memorization, teaching the complete repertoire of IPA symbols, IPA transcription of recorded audio, and the efficacy of several experimental teaching techniques in speech training for the actor. The paper is the result of a research study that tested the eight recommendations for phonetics instruction for actors outlined by Phil Thompson. The study gathered data from two focus groups of second-year graduate-level acting students after a year of introductory phonetics, taught within a voice class in a conservatory setting, to explore effective outcomes as well as student self-perception of the effectiveness of Thompson’s recommendations. The paper suggests that existing curricula can be bolstered by implementing aspects of Thompson’s new, rigorous approach, while interrogating both its effectiveness and appropriateness.

IPA keyboards for iOS

ples are available, they would be offered the default, mainstream version of an accent. The app does promise new kits will be added each month, so it is hoped that, while the creators continue to make kits with multicultural accents available, mainstream versions of such accents become available soon. The app even includes a prompt to request an accent, which sends an email to the creators. If you see a gap in their collection, you can help them out with a recommendation.

The accent kit

The Accent Kit is an app developed by The Big Gob Squad, a team of UK-based accent coaches: Edda Sharpe, Jan Haydn Rowles, and Richard Ryder. Edda Sharpe and Jan Hadyn Rowles are well known as the authors of How to do Accents, and their more recent publication, How to do Standard English Accents, in which they tackle variations on what has been known as Received Pronunciation. The app applies the approach outlined in How to do Accents to materials for many specific accents; it combines audio and text resources with a handy store module so app users can access affordable accent recordings quickly and easily.

African accents: a workbook for actors

Joanna Battles is a professional actor and director, as well as a voice, speech, and dialect coach for theatre and film. Currently, Joanna serves as Assistant Professor of Voice & Speech at The Conservatory of Theatre Arts at Webster University, and is the professional Vocal Coach on staff at the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis. Prior to her position at Webster, Joanna served as Co-Head of the Undergraduate program of Theatre at Louisiana State University. Joanna is Associate Teacher of Fitzmaurice VoiceworkTM, and received an MFA in Acting from Brown University/Trinity Rep.

Speech stereotypes: good vs. evil

At 8:30 on the morning of Tuesday, August 7 2012, five dialect coaches found themselves facing (via Skype, in one case) an audience of voice and speech teachers. We were there to discuss speech stereotypes in performance work. To be honest, until the conference started, I wasn’t sure that anyone other than the panelists would show up. Maybe it was too early in the day. Maybe people would fear that they’d be in for an hour of heated argument on a divisive subject—hardly the happiest way to start one’s day. Were we nuts? It occurred to me that perhaps I, as the architect of this panel, was certifiable. Surely speech stereotyping was the most contentious thing I could have selected as a presentation topic. Here I was, plunging in where angels fear to tread, and I’d dragged four innocent colleagues in with me. What had I done? How had we landed here? The genesis of the panel was a simple question that has occupied me almost as long as I’ve been coaching accents and dialects: Can speech stereotypes be used for good rather than evil—and if so, how? I knew what I thought about this, but not what others in my field might think. Occasionally aspects of the subject would come up on VASTAVox in regard to a specific production, or as a tangent on another thread; but as a topic on its own, I didn’t think it had been all that well explored. So, I proposed the panel because I wanted to go to this panel—and nobody else was doing it. The VASTA 2012 Conference theme was “A Voice for Good,” which seemed to present the perfect opportunity. Somebody must have agreed—we were on the schedule. My brave panelists came aboard in different ways. Two of them were friends of long standing (thanks to VASTA), whose work I was pretty familiar with, and I had invited them directly. Eric Armstrong regularly provides extremely well argued, thoughtful, and sensitive arguments in response to my often less-measured statements on the Vox. I’ve benefited from that encouragement to think things through again. Doug Honorof is, if anything, even more of a pragmatist than I am, and given his work as an improv comedian, I thought his views might provide an interesting counterpoint to Eric’s. Like Eric, he has shared his expertise with me whenever I’ve sent out a call for help.

Peer Reviewed Article Embodying Meter

I have long believed that the meter is one of the most exciting aspects of working on heightened text, and yet for many people it is one of the most frustrating. The iambic rhythm, as has been clearly defined by so many authors, is the heartbeat of Shakespeare’s language. I am indebted to George T. Wright’s works on this subject for clarifying my own understanding not only of how the iambic works, but how variations on the iambic provide a counterpoint to the monotony that strict adherence to the rhythm creates. Understanding the options available makes using the meter an effective acting choice rather than an academic exercise. That understanding should not only be understood on an intellectual level, but also on a physical level, for the rhythm of the language must be felt. In order to facilitate this, meter can be explored physically so that the actor can embody it fully, and then she can bring that embodied knowledge to her performance.

R and its Articulation

cialists and teachers of English as a second language () in recommending preferred/desirable/possible locutions to their clients, and in fully notating observed practices in . As voice and speech trainers, it seemed to the authors of this paper that this problematic phonetic class deserved closer scrutiny, with a view to more comprehensively and meticulously advising our clients in the varieties of r-type challenges in English. We and many of our colleagues, while not necessarily credentialed phoneticians, have a deep interest in and affinity for phonetics and linguistics. In our work we teach English language dialects and foreign language accents to actors; we train them in stage speech (dealing with the sometimes vexed question of a “standard” pronunciation); and our -and English-speaking clients with foreign, regional, or ethnic accents charge us with the task of “improving” their speech, or “reducing” their accent. Deepening our understanding of the complexities of rhotics, and improving our ability to talk to our theatre voice colleagues about them, is what we hope to achieve in this paper.