Like the Pilates Method for physiological wellbeing, the ClearSpeak Method is based on an innovative, holistic model from which a training approach and techniques have been derived. Although based on Standard Neutral English, the many techniques can be readily adapted to train any variety of English or, indeed, pronunciation change in any other language.

Learning to make individual sounds for accent change is an essential first step but it is definitely not the last. Conscious positioning of your tongue and lips is performed by the intellectual left brain. Your right brain must then draw on these sounds and combine these into a ‘whole’ accent pattern. Without this, you may well be able to say short sentences with your ‘new’ sounds but you will not be able to use these consistently in conversation.

The entire ‘feel’ of your mouth must change as you move from one accent to another. If you can’t feel this difference then you haven’t done it! Every accent requires a different ‘feel’ and the Method refers to this as its Overall Holding Posture. Once in the posture, you are able to speak fluently at length with that accent. In a sense, the new ‘cave’ shape you maintain with your mouth results in the exact acoustic resonance for the accented vowels you require.

Try this out for yourself.

• Say the word ‘bad’ while spreading your lips strongly sideways.

• Now say it again but drop your jaw and create a strong up-down oval shape with your lips.

Observe that your brain considers you to be making the exact same vowel both times. But notice how entirely different the two sounds appear to your ears? You have made two accented versions of the same vowel by simply changing the holding posture of your mouth.

Note that the consonants remain unchanged regardless of posture. In essence, a speaker’s ‘accent’ is conveyed by their vowel placement.

Intonation and rhythm combine to give an accent its characteristic speech melody. Fluent speakers ‘absorb’ this overall melody and follow it much like a singer might hum a waltz rather than a tango. This holistic use of melody goes way beyond sentence melody as taught in grammar classes. You learn it by repeated ‘tuning in’ to the English speech flow.

ClearSpeak was the first to pioneer the need to include conscious work on the posture in all accent change training and sub-conscious work on overall speech melody. This was first published in the book Perfect Pronunciation in 2000.

Another important innovation of the Method is the use of ‘interrupted text repetition’ to focus students on imitating sound sequences rather than anticipating familiar grammatical word sequences. See How to create a fluent accent.