Transcript of AE 997 – Fast English Contractions | Contract HAS and HAVE

G'day, you mob. How's it going? Pete here, and this is another episode of Aussie English, the number one place for anyone and everyone wanting to learn Australian English. So, today I am going to be teaching you fast spoken English, how to do it, as well as how to understand it, okay. We're going to be training both your listening and your pronunciation when it comes to fast spoken English.

So, today we're going to be focussing on the contraction of the auxiliary verbs "have and has" onto their respective pronouns when in questions. Have you ever noticed this happening? Have you had trouble understanding fast English with these contractions? As you'll see, it's crucial. It's important to understand how and when these changes are happening, so training your listening.

And then also, if you want to sound natural when speaking English, it's important to learn to make these changes when speaking quickly. So, in this lesson, I'm going to break down the pronunciation of the auxiliary verbs "have and has" onto different pronouns. Right.

Like "have I, has he, have you" and then after that, I'm going to give you several example sentences and I'm going to leave enough space after each of these sentences so you can repeat after me and practise your pronunciation at the same time. Okay. There's no point in teaching you this stuff if you can't put it into practise, if you can't use it then and there.

And guys, don't forget to stay right to the end of the video because I've got something very important for you that's really going to help you level up your English pronunciation. All right. Are you ready? Let's get into it. Have I offended you in some way? Have I told you about Salman Yankeedom. Yeah. This one, a long time have I watched? Number one, "have I".

So, we can contract this several steps, "have I" that's just saying it, I guess, uncontracted the two words. "Have I". We can link that /v/ sound, the v sound to the "I", "hæv‿ɑe, hæv‿ɑe". We can then do what is called H deletion, where the H off the front of a word is no longer said and you'll hear, "æv‿ɑe, æv‿ɑe".

And then lastly, we can not stress the word "have", so we stress the pronoun "I" and the vowel sound in "æv" becomes a schwa sound, "əv", right. That unstressed schwa sound. So, you're gonna hear, "əv‿ɑe, əv‿ɑe, əv‿ɑe". Remember say these with me. So, here are three sentences. Say them after me. "Have I been here before? Have I tried it? Have I seen that movie?"

Good job, you'll also notice, because these are questions that the intonation quite often is going to be rising at the end there. "Have I seen that movie?" Of course not. What have you done with it? Have you ever been pregnant before? I have kept my side of the bargain, but have you kept yours? All right. Number two, "have you, have you". Remember repeat after me.

So, the V at the end of "have" conjoin to the /jʉː/ sound in the word "you", "hæv‿jʉː". It sounds like the word "view", right. Like, oh, that's a nice view. "hæv‿jʉː". We can remove that H through H deletion " æv‿jʉː, æv‿jʉː" and then we can destress the /æ/ vowel sound in "have" and turn it into a schwa. So, you're gonna hear "əv‿jʉː, əv‿jʉː, əv‿jʉː" "Have you eaten anything? Have you been watching? Have you ever travelled overseas?"

Getting that intonation. "Have you ever travelled overseas?" Has he said anything yet? Has he tried anything with you? All right. Number three, "has he, has he". Let's break this down, there's two H deletions that can happen here, right, these two words both start with a H. We'll start with removing the H from the pronoun "he", so we can say, "hæz‿iː, hæz‿iː" Then we can remove the H from "have" and you'll hear "æz‿iː, æz‿iː, æz‿iː".

And then what can we do? We can destress that vowel. I don't know if destress is a word, but destress that vowel /æ/, turn it into a schwa. And so, you're going to hear "əz‿iː, əz‿iː, əz‿iː" And we can even take this further. I've heard people, and I probably do it as well, just saying "z‿iː", or just leave it as "əz‿iː" for now, for this one. But you may even hear people from time to time saying "z‿iː".

They've just literally taken the /z/ off the end of the word "has" and put it at the front of the word "he" after removing that H. Okay. So, let's go through some examples. "Has he been surfing for long? Has he got any spare time? Has he just left?" So, yeah, you could probably say "z‿iː just left, "z‿iː just left", and it's not someone's name, "z‿iː". It's just that all of that's been contracted down to just "z‿iː".

"z‿iː just left? z‿iː got any spare time? z‿iː been surfing for long?" So, you don't have to speak like that, but just be aware that can happen in fast spoken English. Has she been to see Eren? Killed another one, has she? What has she got? Separation anxiety? All right. Number four, "has she, has she, has she" almost getting ahead of myself there and contracting it down.

So, "has she" saying those two words, now because there's a Z sound and S sound next to one another, "has she"- Actually it's not a S sound, it's a sh sound. Sorry. "Has she" that Z sound can disappear. So, you may hear "hæ‿ʃiː, hæ‿ʃiː", Z soundss gone. You could also potentially hear it merge together. "hæz‿ʃiː, hæz‿ʃiː, hæz‿ʃiː" But it's a little hard to say it like that.

So, I'd probably just say, "hæ‿ʃiː, hæ‿ʃiː" then we can get rid of that H and just say "æ‿ʃiː, æ‿ʃiː" and we can de-emphasize, destress that /æ/ vowel sound and just say /ə/ that schwa, "ə‿ʃiː, ə‿ʃiː, ə‿ʃiː". And the emphasis in all of these examples when that schwa is in front because it's destress, the emphasis is on the pronoun. "ə‿ʃiː, ə‿ʃiː".

So, let's go through some sentences. "Has she read this book? Has she married him yet? Has she ever ridden a horse?" Why have we come here? Go away? Then again, we haven't found them yet, have we? So, have we got it? Number five, "have we, have we". First step in contracting this we can connect that V sound to the W sound at the front of "we" "hæv‿wiː, hæv‿wiː".

After that, we can remove that H sound, so you're going to hear "æv‿wiː, æv‿wiː" H deletion. "æv‿wiː" And then lastly, we can insert that schwa there instead of the /æ/ vowel sound in "æv", "əv‿wiː, əv‿wiː" So, let's go through some examples. "Have we travelled much? Have we been to this restaurant before? Have we already met this guy?"

What have they got do with anything? What fruit have they brought? Haven't helped you get out of here, have they? Number six, "have they", we're getting close to the end now. "Have they, have they". We can kind of merge the V and the th sound here, it's a voice th sound, "hæv ðæɪ". Although it's a bit of a tongue twister, tongue tyer there, "hæv ðæɪ, hæv ðæɪ".

We can get rid of the H at the front there and say, "æv ðæɪ, æv ðæɪ" and then we can, as usual turn that /æ/ sound into a schwa sound, "əv ðæɪ, əv ðæɪ, əv ðæɪ". You could probably even get rid of that V sometimes where you may just hear, "ə ðæɪ, ə ðæɪ".

But here I'm going to say, "əv ðæɪ" because that sounds a bit more natural to me. Let's go through some examples. "Have they just arrived. Have they had their car repaired? Have they played this game before?" How long has it been? Rumour has it you did summer school. Has it helped your sex problems? All right. Number seven, the very last one, guys, "has it, has it".

So, the first step here we can connect the word "has" with "it", where that Z sound is connecting to /ɪ/. Right. "hæz‿ɪt, hæz‿ɪt". We can then get rid of the H, "æz‿ɪt, æz‿ɪt", and then we can reduce that /æ/ sound into a schwa sound, "əz‿ɪt, əz‿ɪt". And sometimes you may even hear the vowel sound in the word "it" gets reduced to a schwa, as well, where you may hear, "əz‿ət, əz‿ət".

Let's go through some examples. "Has it changed anything? Has it rained today? Has it already happened?" So, that's it, guys, that is how you can track "has and have" onto the different pronouns in English at the start of questions and speak quickly. This is going to make you sound much more natural when speaking English if you can nail these contractions, these sound changes.

So, to finish up, let's recap what we went through. Okay. Number one, "have I, æv‿ɑe. Have I been to Australia? Have you, æv‿jʉː. Have you been to Australia? Has he, æz‿iː. Has he been to Australia? Has she, æ‿ʃiː. Has she been to Australia? Have we, æv‿wiː. Have we been to Australia? Have they, æv ðæɪ. Have they been to Australia? Has it, æz‿ɪt or əz‿ət. Has it been to Australia?"

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