About the Booklet and CD:

Dialects and Accents for Actors, Storytellers and more....

Mastering different accents and dialects can provide a huge advantage to your career. Dialects can instantly transform you into another person by affecting the very essence of who you are in the world – your speech. Dialects, for many actors, are enjoyable, useful tools. American Southern is a self-instructional program in the Acting With An Accent series prepared by a speech teacher and dialect coach to the stars, Dr. David Alan Stern. He doesn't use "tricks." Instead he teaches the basics of convincing dialects – resonance, lilt, sound substitutions and pace. He explains pronunciations, word choice and touches on idioms.

American Southern is not just samples for imitation, but contains step-by-step, systematic lessons to learn three general accent variations: General Deep South (the non-mountain areas of the Southeastern U.S.), Mountain Southern (characteristic of Tennessee, Kentucky, Arkansas and other mountain regions), and Plantation-style Southern (the heavily-resonated dialect of many regions of Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, etc., often associated with highly-educated landowners, lawyers, and politicians). Each packet contains a manual (as PDF file) and an hour-long instructional compact disc that teaches you Lilt, Stress, Resonance and Pronunciation.

Dr. David Stern is a master dialectician and teacher of film and TV actors. He has taught at several universities and at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. His Acting With An Accent compact discs are used in over 1000 university theatre programs and by professional actors around the world.

About the Author:

David Alan Stern, "The Dialect Doctor," founded Dialect Accent Specialists in Hollywood in 1980. He has coached business executives, broadcast media personalities, government officials, actors, and members of the clergy to modify accents and speak more expressively for over thirty years. Among his celebrity trainees have been: Mike Farrell, Jack Klugman, Liam Neeson, Edward James Olmos, Bronson Pinchot, Lynn Redgrave, and Michael York, as well as Oscar winners Forest Whitaker, Geena Davis, Olympia Dukakis, Julia Roberts, and Sally Field. He has served on the faculties of both Wichita State and Penn State Universities, and is now Professor of Dramatic Arts at his Alma Mater, the University of Connecticut.