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In this American English pronunciation video,
we’re going to go over how to pronounce
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and use the phrase ‘excuse me’.
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The phrase ‘excuse me’ can be used in
different situations to mean different things.
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But first, let’s talk about the pronunciation
of the word ‘excuse’. I’m going to say
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it two different ways. Can you hear the difference?
Excuse, excuse. Excuse, excuse. It’s a subtle
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difference, and it’s in the ending sound.
If the ending sound is voiced, in this case,
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a Z sound, excuse, then it’s a verb. If
it’s unvoiced, excuse, then it’s a noun.
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It’s a verb in the phrase ‘excuse me’.
So, for the most part, we will be using a
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Z sound.
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The different ways to use this phrase. First,
you can use it to get someone’s attention.
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>> Excuse me, where’s the bathroom?
>> Around the corner.
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>> Excuse me, do you have the time?
>> Ah, it’s about 9:15.
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>> Thank you sir.
>> You’re welcome.
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Because we’re using it to get someone’s
attention, excuse me, it has to be very clear
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and a little bit louder. So, we begin with
the IH as in SIT vowel. Ih, ih, ih, a little
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jaw drop. Ex-, ex-, ex-.
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To make the K, the back part of the tongue
reaches up and touches the soft palate. Ex-,
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kk, kk, ks, ks. Do you see how my jaw closes?
That’s because the teeth have to be together
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to make the S. The tongue tip is down, pressing
here, to put a little tension in the tongue,
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behind the bottom front teeth. Ex-, ex-.
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The back part of the tongue reaches up and
touches the soft palate, kk, kk, kk.
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da-DA-da, excuse me. It has the EW as in FEW
diphthong. So, the tongue tip is down, pressing
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behind the bottom front teeth. For the first
half of the diphthong, the front part of the
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tongue is reaching towards the roof of the
mouth, yy, yy, to make that Y sound. Excu-,
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yy, yy, yy. Then we have the OO vowel, excu-,
so the lips will round. Excuse me, -se me,
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-se me. Then we have the Z sound, the M consonant,
and the EE vowel. So, to make the Z sound,
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the tongue is here, touching the back of the
bottom front teeth, and the teeth are closed,
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zz, zz. It’s just like the S except I’m
vibrating the vocal cords with my voice, zz.
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ZZ-mm. Then we just close the lips to go into
the M sound. Excuse me, ee. And then the EE
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as in SHE vowel. Lips will part, jaw won’t
drop much because the tongue is lifting pretty
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high here to the roof of the mouth. The tongue
tip is down, but the front part lifts. Excuse
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me, excuse me.
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Let’s watch one more time.
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>> Excuse me, where’s the bathroom?
>> Around the corner.
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>> Excuse me, do you have the time?
>> Ah, it’s about 9:15.
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>> Thank you sir.
>> You’re welcome.
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We also use this phrase to get around somebody,
or if we accidentally bump into somebody in
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a crowd. Now here, we don’t really need
to get someone’s attention, so we might
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really mutter it, excuse me, ‘scuse me,
‘scuse me, dropping the first syllable altogether.
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I’ve noticed sometimes I even almost just
whisper it if I accidentally bump into somebody,
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or if I need to slide between two people,
‘scuse me [3x]. So this is very different
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from the first case where we needed to get
someone’s attention, and we had to say it
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really clearly. Excuse me, ‘scuse me, ‘scuse
me.
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>> ‘Scuse me, ‘scuse me.
>> ‘Scuse me, ‘scuse me, thank you. ‘Scuse me.
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We can also use this phrase if we don’t
understand, and we need somebody to repeat what
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they’ve said. Excuse me? Excuse me? Here
again I’m dropping the first syllable. You
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don’t have to. Excuse me? But it doesn’t
have to be so clearly pronounced because we’re
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not getting someone’s attention. We don’t
have to get the focus here, we already have
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the focus. Excuse me, excuse me? Notice also,
the voice is going up in pitch. That means
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it’s a question. That’s the signal to the
person that I didn’t understand. Excuse me?
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>> So I don’t know what I’m going to get.
>> Excuse me?
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>> I don’t know what I’m going to get.
>> Ah.
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>> How about three?
>> Excuse me?
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>> How about three?
>> Yeah, three works.
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>> Okay.
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>> Excuse me? [6x]
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It’s just like saying ‘What did you say?’,
only it’s a little faster. Excuse me, excuse
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me?
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This phrase can also be used sarcastically,
as a response to somebody overreacting to
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something. For example, ‘Rachel, you always
make a mess in the kitchen.’ ‘Excuse me.’
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Now, when we use it sarcastically like that,
we tend to really stretch out the stressed
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syllable, excuse, excuse. Well excuse me.
Of course, it’s a little bit rude, you would
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be using this, maybe, in an argument with
somebody.
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>> Dad, I can’t believe you ate the last
cookie!
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>> Well excuse me!
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So there you go, four different ways to use
and pronounce the phrase ‘excuse me’. So the
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pronunciation matters. Are we trying to get
somebody’s attention? Then we need to be
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really clear. Are we signaling that we don’t
understand? Then we need to phrase it as a
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question with the pitch going up. Excuse me?
Instead of, excuse me.
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>> [burp] Excuse me!
>> Hi.
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>> Hi.
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I hope this video has helped you figure out
how and when to use this phrase. Don’t forget
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to like and share this video!
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That’s it, and thanks so much for using
Rachel’s English.
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>> Did you touch your mic? You can’t touch it.
>> Well excuse me!!
