# pronunciation: Wanted it: Flap T in -d?



## Xavier da Silva

Hello everyone,

I've been watching Rachel's English videos where she teaches how to sound more natural in American English. Today I saw a video in which she teaches that the verb "wante*d*" can have (in American English) its "t" dropped", forming something like "waned". My question: Does the final "d" in "wante*d*" sound like a Flap T in the example I made below?

I wante*d* _i_t. >> _I waned (flap T) it._

* I think this *d *is a flap T because of the "i" in the pronoun "it".

Thank you in advance!


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## entangledbank

I'll leave it for AmE speakers to comment more fully, but it should be, because it's a /d/ between unstressed vowels, as in Kennedy. It only comes _between_ vowels if the verb ends in /t/ or /d/, but it should work for any such, not just one that has itself been flapped or deleted: what about bolted it, bolded it, corded it, pasted it?


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## Xavier da Silva

Thank you very much. Really helpful.

Let's wait and see what an AmE speaker thinks of it.


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## AntiScam

I'm interested in the answer too. Thanks for asking the question.


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## Loob

To be honest, I'm not sure I understand the question.

The final consonant in  _wanted _is a /d/: where does flap-t come into it?


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## Xavier da Silva

The 'd' in 'wanted' is a flap 't' in AE because of the pronoun 'it' in my O.P.

I really would like an AE poster to confirm this.


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## dojibear

Xavier da Silva said:


> Does the final "d" in "wante*d*" sound like a Flap T in the example I made below?



You are asking whether the D in "wanted it" is pronounced as a "flap T". How do you define "flap T"? How is it different from D, mid-word between vowels? Between two vowels T is voiced, and D is also. 

I just looked at a video at Rachel's English, about how to pronounce WANTED in American English. I stopped the video after 15 seconds. By that time she had said "wanted" twice. She said it without the "t", and it did not sound like American English to me. 

In AE it is common to say "want to" as "wun-uh". You often see this written "wanna". But "wanted" is different. I don't think I am able to say "wanted it" while pronouncing the "nt" as "n".


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## Xavier da Silva

Thank you very much.

Probably it varies from region to region, as Rachel teaches things some people use and others don't.


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## entangledbank

In many (most?) AmE accents, both /t/ and /d/ are flapped in the same positions, in normal speech, so 'atom' and 'Adam' are homophones, as are 'bleating' and 'bleeding', 'waiting' and 'wading'. The rule of vowel shortening before a voiceless consonant does not apply before the flapping occurs. (In other accents the shortening occurs first, so the vowels get different lengths, then the consonants are converted to a flap. In these accents, 'bleeding' is longer than 'bleating' though both have flaps.)

My question about 'bolded it' and so on was to find out if word-final /d/ was flapped in this position. The preceding /d/ or /t/ was simply to provide a vowel on both sides. I believe it is irrelevant that some such words also flap or elide this preceding /t/, as in 'wanted it'.


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## Loob

Just curious - what's the difference between "flapping" and "voicing"?


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## baggobingo

Xavier da Silva said:


> Hello everyone,
> 
> I've been watching Rachel's English videos where she teaches how to sound more natural in American English. Today I saw a video in which she teaches that the verb "wante*d*" can have (in American English) its "t" dropped", forming something like "waned". My question: Does the final "d" in "wante*d*" sound like a Flap T in the example I made below?
> 
> I wante*d* _i_t. >> _I waned (flap T) it._
> 
> * I think this *d *is a flap T because of the "i" in the pronoun "it".
> 
> Thank you in advance!


I think we're on the same page : I wante*d* _i_t. >> _I waned (flap T) it.This sounds quite American tone._


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## GreenWhiteBlue

Foreign speakers are going to have a very noticeable accent no matter how hard they try to sound "American."  By trying to mimic one woman's questionable personal interpretation of what a so-called "American" accent sounds like, it is highly likely that foreign learners will miss the mark entirely, and will cause their accents to be even harder to understand.  My own advice is to disregard any website that teaches you how to slur your speech and to try to sound like sloppy or uneducated native speakers, and instead to try to pronounce words as clearly and intelligibly as possible -- even if that is not how lazy or careless native speakers say the words when speaking quickly and colloquially.


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## dojibear

GreenWhiteBlue said:


> By trying to mimic one woman's questionable personal interpretation of what a so-called "American" accent sounds like, it is highly likely that foreign learners will miss the mark entirely, and will cause their accents to be even harder to understand.



I agree. Anyone who says "wan-ned" instead of "wan-ted" is harder for AE speakers to understand.


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## dojibear

Loob said:


> Just curious - what's the difference between "flapping" and "voicing"?



A "flap T" is an "alveolar tap". That is a single tongue-to-alveolar-ridge tap. It is the same as Spanish R (single R as in "pero", not trilled RR as in "ferrocarril").

For more details see the wikipedia.com article titled "flapping".


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## JulianStuart

on the mechanical details - I'll try and figire out what it actually means.
In BE, the main difference between ladder and latter is that the latter is not voiced. Can you make the American flap T without also voicing?


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## Juhasz

Xavier da Silva said:


> Probably it varies from region to region



This is probably true.  I've noticed that people in the Northeast, where I now live, seem to drop these kinds of consonants more commonly than people in the Northwest, where I grew up.  That said, I probably only rarely pronounce the "t" in _wanted_.  I don't think that I pronounce _wanted_ with exactly the same sound as in _won_ (that is, I don't say: won-ed) and I don't pronounce _internet _the same as _innernet_, but the difference is very slight and I can't think of how to describe it.



GreenWhiteBlue said:


> Foreign speakers are going to have a very noticeable accent no matter how hard they try to sound "American."



Depends on what you mean by "foreign speakers," but this is probably not true.  I know a number of people who learned English as adolescents, moved to the United States as adults and have almost no detectable non-American accent.  I'm not suggesting this is the norm, but it is not true that all non-native speakers have noticeable accents.  However, I agree that these sorts of lessons are probably not useful for most English learners.  I put this sort of lesson into the same category as slang: unless the speaker is very proficient, it will sound more unnatural than the non-native accent/vocabulary.


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## dojibear

Juhasz said:


> I don't think that I pronounce _wanted_ with exactly the same sound as in _won_ (that is, I don't say: won-ed) and I don't pronounce _internet _the same as _innernet_, but the difference is very slight and I can't think of how to describe it.



The wikipedia article mentioned that some AE speakers replace "nt" (between vowels) with a "nasalized flap", while others replace "nt" (between vowels) with an "n" sound, as OP and Rachel discuss.

I think this "nasalized flap" is how Juhasz and I say the "nt" in "internet" and "wanted". To me it seemed like I was saying "wanded" but now I realize the the "d" and "n" are really a single nasalized flap "nd".


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## Loob

Erm... Wasn't this thread about the red <_*d*_> in _*wanted it* _, rather than the green <_*t*_>?


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## Loob

I'm probably being dense, but I still don't see the difference between the /*d*/ in _He wante*d* it_ and the /*d*/ in _He wante*d* me to do it...._


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## Yngwie Malmsteen

dojibear said:


> The wikipedia article mentioned that some AE speakers replace "nt" (between vowels) with a "nasalized flap", while others replace "nt" (between vowels) with an "n" sound, as OP and Rachel discuss.
> 
> I think this "nasalized flap" is how Juhasz and I say the "nt" in "internet" and "wanted". To me it seemed like I was saying "wanded" but now I realize the the "d" and "n" are really a single nasalized flap "nd".


Can you send me the link to that wikipedia page. I quite often completely ignore the "t" in the words like "wanted", "twenty", "presented", "momentum", "center", "accidentally", "bounty" etc. when I pronounce them. So I wonder if I do wrong. Many American English channels on Youtube and many Americans on different sites claim that we can completely drop the "t" in these kinds of words.


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## dojibear

Flapping - Wikipedia


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## Yngwie Malmsteen

dojibear said:


> Flapping - Wikipedia


Thanks. I have been watching the videos of Rachel for a quite long time. It seems like she is wrong about some stuff. For example she says that the /t/ can completely be dropped in "I want it", but the /t/ should be an unaspirated /t/ in that sentence since it is the last sound of the word. However that completely ignoring the /t/ in the words like "internet", "santa" "counter" etc. thing is something many Americans on the internet agree with. But also seems like many Americans demur at it. Some say that the "t" is never completely dropped in any American dialect. Don't you think that some Americans or many Americans can completely ignore the /t/ of /nt/ when they pronounce those kinds of words?


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## dojibear

I disagree with Rachel on some things too. Her video demo saying "wanted" with no "t" sound (wan-ned) sounded totally phony, and not at all like AE "wanted".



Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> Don't you think that some Americans or many Americans can completely ignore the /t/ of /nt/ when they pronounce those kinds of words?



When I try saying words with "nt" in them, the "nt" sounds different than "n" would sound. It sounds like "nd" with a faint "d". The "t" is a voiced "flap t", which is the same as a "flap d". Sometimes the "nt" sounds closer to "d" than to "n".

And sometimes I hear "nd" in the same audio clip, where a foreign student hears "n" in the same clip. So, while it is possible that some AE speakers drop the "t" completely some of the time, I have not heard it.



Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> I quite often completely ignore the "t" in the words like "wanted", "twenty", "presented", "momentum", "center", "accidentally", "bounty" etc. when I pronounce them.



Most of the time, you'll get away with that. Sometimes you will confuse listeners. It's always better to pronounce it than to omit it.

Here's a suggestion. Think of "twenty" as two syllables. The first ends in a consonant, and the second starts with a consonant. The "twen-" syllable ends with the tongue pressed against the mouth roof behind the teeth. The difference between "-nee" and "-dee" for the second syllable is only one thing: how the tongue releases from the mouth roof when starting the vowel. It doesn't change position to make the "d" sound (it makes it from the normal N position, even if that's not your normal T/D position), it just releases in a different way. And it's a way you already know how to say: I am sure you can say "Monday" without dropping the "d".

Maybe that means you make the "d" sound with the tongue touching the teeth (instead of touching the alvealor ridge like normal). That's what happens to me. But it's fine: it is how you release that makes it a "dee" instead of a "nee".

It's the same for all these "nt" words. But you can practice with a simple pair like twen-nee/twen-dee.


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## Yngwie Malmsteen

@dojibear Thanks. I am just asking for being sure. You are saying that I can get away if I pronounce /nt/ as just /n/ without making the flap sound or without making the standard /t/ sound or anything? For example If say  /ˈɪn·ərˌvju/ instead of /ˈɪn·tərˌvju/ or /ˈwɑn·ɪd/ instead of /ˈwɑn·tɪd/ etc,  I will mostly be understood by Americans? Actually I need to buy a proper webcam and a microphone and test it on Omegle. Since I have no chance to go to USA, this can be a good tactic right?


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## Truffula

When I'm speaking quickly and the word is clear from context, I often omit sounds (these "t" sounds after "n" are common victims).  But when I'm speaking more slowly or enunciating or trying to be clear because the word isn't evident from context, I pronounce the sound (pretty much as explained very clearly above by dojibear with the different release of tongue from roof of mouth).  So that means, to me, that that sound _is_ part of the pronunciation of the word, just a less important part that can be omitted by carelessness without great loss most of the time.  

Until you get an instinctive sense like a native speaker usually would have of when it's needed and when it's not, you shouldn't just omit it entirely.


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## Oddmania

dojibear said:


> When I try saying words with "nt" in them, the "nt" sounds different than "n" would sound. It sounds like "nd" with a faint "d".


This is a very good description of what I usually hear too  I used to think that the "t" was completely dropped altogether in most American speakers' speech until I heard a Japanese singer being interviewed on French television. He very clearly pronounced the word "twenty" as "twenny", and I remember I was instantly reminded of threads like this one and I thought: "It most definitely does _not _sound American." It clearly sounded foreign.

I can't think of a relevant video clip to prove this point, because I wouldn't even know where to start looking (you could watch any American film and wait for the words "twenty" or "wanted" to pop up). However, it's a little easier with songs: in "_Drive_", the American rapper ☆LiL PEEP☆ utters "twenty-five" about a dozen times, and I think his pronunciation (however slurred it might be) does match Dojibear's explanation. There's clearly something between the "n" and the "ee" sound. Whatever it is (a faint "d", or something different), it _is _there. It doesn't sound like "twenny" (even from someone whose speech is as clipped and careless as LiL PEEP's).


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## GreenWhiteBlue

Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> For example If say  /ˈɪn·ərˌvju/ instead of /ˈɪn·tərˌvju/ or /ˈwɑn·ɪd/ instead of /ˈwɑn·tɪd/ etc,  I will mostly be understood by Americans?


Perhaps, although most would find that pronunciation odd and incorrect.  On the other hand, everyone would understand you if you just pronounced the standard /t/ sound where it belongs.


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## Yngwie Malmsteen

Oddmania said:


> This is a very good description of what I usually hear too  I used to think that the "t" was completely dropped altogether in most American speakers' speech until I heard a Japanese singer being interviewed on French television. He very clearly pronounced the word "twenty" as "twenny", and I remember I was instantly reminded of threads like this one and I thought: "It most definitely does _not _sound American." It clearly sounded foreign.
> 
> I can't think of a relevant video clip to prove this point, because I wouldn't even know where to start looking (you could watch any American film and wait for the words "twenty" or "wanted" to pop up). However, it's a little easier with songs: in "_Drive_", the American rapper ☆LiL PEEP☆ utters "twenty-five" about a dozen times, and I think his pronunciation (however slurred it might be) does match Dojibear's explanation. There's clearly something between the "n" and the "ee" sound. Whatever it is (a faint "d", or something different), it _is _there. It doesn't sound like "twenny" (even from someone whose speech is as clipped and careless as LiL PEEP's).


Maybe that singer sounded wrong because she is or he is not good at syllable stressing. In the word "twenty", the first vowel should be stressed. Also by the way for finding examples, you can use the site named youglish.com It is a beneficial site.


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## Yngwie Malmsteen

Oddmania said:


> This is a very good description of what I usually hear too  I used to think that the "t" was completely dropped altogether in most American speakers' speech until I heard a Japanese singer being interviewed on French television. He very clearly pronounced the word "twenty" as "twenny", and I remember I was instantly reminded of threads like this one and I thought: "It most definitely does _not _sound American." It clearly sounded foreign.
> 
> I can't think of a relevant video clip to prove this point, because I wouldn't even know where to start looking (you could watch any American film and wait for the words "twenty" or "wanted" to pop up). However, it's a little easier with songs: in "_Drive_", the American rapper ☆LiL PEEP☆ utters "twenty-five" about a dozen times, and I think his pronunciation (however slurred it might be) does match Dojibear's explanation. There's clearly something between the "n" and the "ee" sound. Whatever it is (a faint "d", or something different), it _is _there. It doesn't sound like "twenny" (even from someone whose speech is as clipped and careless as LiL PEEP's).


Also many Americans claim that the /d/ or /t/ sound can completely be ignored when pronouncing those words(Including the comment #25). This is like one of the most interesting and difficult parts of American pronunciation along with voiceless stops. It seems like there are not enough phonetic studies on this. That's quite frustrating.


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## dojibear

Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> Also many Americans claim that the /d/ or /t/ sound *can *completely be ignored when pronouncing those words



It depends on what you mean by *can*. Are the words understandable? Yes. Do you sound like an AE native speaker? No.

Research into speech recognition by computer taught us something about speech: everyone speaks imperfectly, most of the time. It is worldwide. It is true in every language. Normal speakers make small mistakes. When you analyze speech on a computer, there are sometimes missing sounds (like the d/t in "twenty") and often sounds that are impossible to tell apart (is that a B or a D?) from the sound stream alone.

Listeners who are fluent in that language recognize words by context (especially when used in common phrases), and mentally "correct" all of these small errors. Humans do this 100% without even noticing. Modern (successful) speech recognition programs do that too -- they compare the sounds to a huge database of words and phrases, and find a match.

So a *few* mistakes will be ignored *unconsciously*. Native speakers make them. If you make more mistakes, or always the same ones, what you say will be understood, but you will "sound like a foreigner". Even more mistakes, and people will misunderstand or not understand.


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## Yngwie Malmsteen

dojibear said:


> But pronouncing /nt/ as if it was /n/ is always a mistake.


But you have no proof that it is a mistake.


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## JulianStuart

Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> But you have no proof that it is a mistake.


I wonder what you would accept as "proof" in a discussion like this.  If I heard a non-native speaker (usually identifiable by myriad details of pronunciation) deliberately dropping t's and d's like you suggest, I would wonder who taught them English and feel they had done a bad job.  I'd go along with the others and say it's a bad idea to _actively learn_ to do that.  If you 1) learn the "correct" (i.e. clear enunciation) way, and 2) learn to speak fluently and 3) eventually, quickly, you may find yourself "dropping" (parts of) t's and d's like a native speaker who learnt the same way. _ Then_ you will make those sounds more like a native speaker


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## cointi

dojibear said:


> But pronouncing /nt/ as if it was /n/ is always a mistake.



I'm sorry to say that you are wrong and there is a whole lot of misinformation in this thread.

What the world-famous phonetician has to say about it.

Also

Do these people really sound uneducated?


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## Yngwie Malmsteen

JulianStuart said:


> I wonder what you would accept as "proof" in a discussion like this.  If I heard a non-native speaker (usually identifiable by myriad details of pronunciation) deliberately dropping t's and d's like you suggest, I would wonder who taught them English and feel they had done a bad job.  I'd go along with the others and say it's a bad idea to _actively learn_ to do that.  If you 1) learn the "correct" (i.e. clear enunciation) way, and 2) learn to speak fluently and 3) eventually, quickly, you may find yourself "dropping" (parts of) t's and d's like a native speaker who learnt the same way. _ Then_ you will make those sounds more like a native speaker


I already know the "correct'' way. Whatever the correct way is. That American "nt" pronunciation is not "wrong" also. There are two correct pronunciations of that cluster in American English when it's between two vowels. It's hard to take your post seriously.


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## cointi

Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> I already know the "correct'' way. Whatever the correct way is. That American "nt" pronunciation is not "wrong" also. There are two correct pronunciations of that cluster in American English when it's between two vowels. It's hard to take your post seriously.



Well, it's hard to disagree with the second part of Julian's post. When you learn English long enough (I'm not saying you haven't) and have an ear for it, you will sooner or later find yourself dropping the 't' naturally. It probably shouldn't be forced.


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## Yngwie Malmsteen

Giesiek said:


> Well, it's hard to disagree with the second part of Julian's post. When you learn English long enough (I'm not saying you haven't) and have an ear for it, you will sooner or later find yourself dropping the 't' naturally. It probably shouldn't be forced.


I don't force it.


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## cointi

Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> I don't force it.



I never said you did. I was trying to say that I see Julian's point.


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## dojibear

Thank you, Glesiek, for the link to a phonetician's blog post on this topic. It is an interesting, well-thought-out article.

Almost nothing in the article disagrees with what I wrote. He talks about "nt-reduction" (pronouncing /nt/ as /n/) is something "we think of" as American and Australian English, rather than a fact about AE speech. He starts by saying he does not know how common it is. He points out that the "t" may become a glottal stop or the "nt" a nasalized flap -- both of which are different from nt-reduction (different from just saying "n"). He uses "seem to be" and "perhaps" throughout the article, except in statements about situations where nt-reduction does *not* happen.

But he also says he "has the impression" that nt-reduction is more common in the south and west (parts of the U.S.) and less common in the northeast. Most of my experience in AE is from living in the northeast. So perhaps *my* opinions are based on my regional dialect, and are not correct about other dialects of AE.


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## cointi

dojibear said:


> Almost nothing in the article disagrees with what I wrote.


You did make some authoritative comments:


dojibear said:


> _It depends on what you mean by _*can*_. Are the words understandable? Yes. Do you sound like an AE native speaker? No._


And, in no uncertain terms, you said that /nt/ reduction to /n/ is laways a mistake:


dojibear said:


> _So a _*few*_ mistakes will be ignored _*unconsciously*_. Native speakers make them. If you make more mistakes, or always the same ones, what you say will be understood, but you will "sound like a foreigner". Even more _mistakes,_ and people will misunderstand or not understand._
> 
> _In summary a few mistakes do not make you misunderstand. But pronouncing /nt/ as if it was /n/ is always a mistake._


You must admit it is just not true.



dojibear said:


> He talks about "nt-reduction" (pronouncing /nt/ as /n/) is something "we think of" as American and Australian English, rather than a fact about AE speech. He starts by saying he does not know how common it is. He points out that the "t" may become a glottal stop or the "nt" a nasalized flap -- both of which are different from nt-reduction (different from just saying "n"). He uses "seem to be" and "perhaps" throughout the article, except in statements about situations where nt-reduction does *not* happen.



Well, he said "many Americans". But, by all means, it is not a universal phenomenon.



dojibear said:


> But he also says he "has the impression" that nt-reduction is more common in the south and west (parts of the U.S.) and less common in the northeast. Most of my experience in AE is from living in the northeast. So perhaps *my* opinions are based on my regional dialect, and are not correct about other dialects of AE.



But isn't it very dojibear-centric to say that if dojibear doesn't use it, it must be wrong?


And then I believe the /nt/ -> /n/ is actually *very* common and most accent reduction couches will teach it.

I may well be wrong, but I think Barack Obama drops his t's like crazy.

Did you have a chance to see the second link?

To be fair, native speakers are often hardly aware of the phonetic mechanisms in their own language.


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## JulianStuart

Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> I already know the "correct'' way. Whatever the correct way is. That American "nt" pronunciation is not "wrong" also. There are two correct pronunciations of that cluster in American English when it's between two vowels. It's hard to take your post seriously.


You did notice the quotes around the word "correct" in my post, too?  I did not use the word "wrong" 


Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> I don't force it.





Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> I quite often completely ignore the "t" in the words like "wanted", "twenty", "presented", "momentum", "center", "accidentally", "bounty" etc. when I pronounce them. So I wonder if I do wrong. Many American English channels on Youtube and many Americans on different sites claim that we can completely drop the "t" in these kinds of words.


  Are you saying this "ignoring" is not deliberate?  Not sure which post to take "seriously"  Would you deliberately say "wanna", for example?


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## dojibear

dojibear said:


> But pronouncing /nt/ as if it was /n/ is always a mistake.





Giesiek said:


> it is just not true



I agree with your arguments, Giesiek. I should not say it is always a mistake in AE. I have deleted that sentence in post #30.

That doesn't change my view that it is bad advice to tell AE students to just say /n/ for /nt/.

But, thinking more about that, I realize it depends on the student. Some students can easily say AE's "nt" and for those students, it is worth saying it that way. No matter who the listener is, or what their local dialect is, the words are more easily understood spoken that way. Saying it this way also also eliminates a large set of "different words that you pronounce the same" (winter/winner, internet/inner net, etc.).

But for students cannot pronounce this consonant group easily, it is better just use N so they can say the words easily and naturally. There are more important things to work on -- your "accent coaches" would agree.



Giesiek said:


> And then I believe the /nt/ -> /n/ is actually *very* common and most accent reduction couches will teach it.



I think it is very common for AE speaker to pronounce /nt/ in a way that *sounds* like /n/ to some foreigners. I think it is much less common to pronounce "nt" exactly the same as "nn". We will have to disagree about that.


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## Truffula

dojibear said:


> I think it is very common for AE speaker to pronounce /nt/ in a way that *sounds* like /n/ to some foreigners. I think it is much less common to pronounce "nt" exactly the same as "nn".



I think this is essentially right.  And not just to "some foreigners" - to some locals also.  But there is often an audible difference, and native speakers exaggerate this difference when confusion is possible.  Therefore it's only safe to, as a non-native speaker, pronounce them the same when you are fluent enough to be sure there's no alternative interpretation that might be misunderstood but would be cleared up if you'd pronounced the 'nt' combination more distinctly from a 'nn' sound.  

So, I might say something that sounds just like "spend the winner in Florida" knowing that any listener would be sure I'd said "winter" by the context.  But I wouldn't say "It's only for the winner" meaning "it's only for the winter" because that sentence could make sense either way - especially if I'd been talking about something that might cue my listener to be ready for winners and losers to come up in the discussion.


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## Yngwie Malmsteen

Truffula said:


> I think this is essentially right.  And not just to "some foreigners" - to some locals also.  But there is often an audible difference, and native speakers exaggerate this difference when confusion is possible.  Therefore it's only safe to, as a non-native speaker, pronounce them the same when you are fluent enough to be sure there's no alternative interpretation that might be misunderstood but would be cleared up if you'd pronounced the 'nt' combination more distinctly from a 'nn' sound.
> 
> So, I might say something that sounds just like "spend the winner in Florida" knowing that any listener would be sure I'd said "winter" by the context.  But I wouldn't say "It's only for the winner" meaning "it's only for the winter" because that sentence could make sense either way - especially if I'd been talking about something that might cue my listener to be ready for winners and losers to come up in the discussion.


I prefer doing that American "nt" pronunciations in the words which I am used to hearing from Americans that way and in the words which sound nice to me that way. For example I don't remember that I ever dropped the /t/ in the words like "interesting", "intellectual", "interesting", "hunter", "winter", "hunter" etc. But for example let's say, when I say "presented by", I drop the "t" because I am used to hearing it that way from American TV programs. If I drop the "t" in a sentence like "Presented by State Farm!", it sounds better, more natural to me. Also like you, when I think that it might not be understandable if I drop the /t/", I make the /t/ sound. For example in my experience "incentive" is not a word which is used a lot. So that if I say "incentive", I make the /t/ sound.

Also in the situations when I drop the "t", I say the last word before the word that includes the intervocalic more silently and I say that "nt" word more loud. Actually usually there is a stress in the syllables that include the "n" of "nt", paying attention to stressing the vowel is important for being understood better.


----------



## cointi

dojibear said:


> I agree with your arguments, Giesiek. I should not say it is always a mistake in AE. I have deleted that sentence in post #30.



Thank you for reconsidering your stance.



dojibear said:


> That doesn't change my view that it is bad advice to tell AE students to just say /n/ for /nt/.
> 
> But, thinking more about that, I realize it depends on the student. Some students can easily say AE's "nt" and for those students, it is worth saying it that way. No matter who the listener is, or what their local dialect is, the words are more easily understood spoken that way. Saying it this way also also eliminates a large set of "different words that you pronounce the same" (winter/winner, internet/inner net, etc.).
> 
> 
> But for students cannot pronounce this consonant group easily, it is better just use N so they can say the words easily and naturally. There are more important things to work on -- your "accent coaches" would agree.



I generally agree. As I wrote earlier, I would not encourage an elementary or intermediate student to try to actively mimic this pronunciation. As you rightly say, there are most important things to focus on, not to mention it would sound fake given their overall lack of fluency.

But then there are advanced students who are already fluent and their goal is to get as close to native pronunciation as possible. In many cases, they will have developed "t" dropping already, without even thinking about it. I think it's at least partly physiological; it's just easier to drop the t, there is a universal tendency in languages to drop or weaken the 't', it is not limited to 'nt' clusters. Some students notice it and try to find out more about it, which I consider a very healthy tendency. For some reason, in this forum, they sometimes meet with native speakers' hostility when they ask about (advanced) pronunciation. Natives are perfectly patient when it comes to grammar questions (which I really appreciate), but pronunciation questions seem to irk them somehow. Not to mention that sometimes the answers given are just plain wrong.

Also, language changes. What you may consider sloppy or uneducated, some other people consider perfectly normal speech. In Poland, advanced students of English are taught Received Pronunciation only to be laughed at when they use it around natives. It sounds stilted. Poles usually quickly learn then to e.g. drop the t's and replace them with glottal stops. It sounds far more natural.




dojibear said:


> I think it is very common for AE speaker to pronounce /nt/ in a way that *sounds* like /n/ to some foreigners. I think it is much less common to pronounce "nt" exactly the same as "nn". We will have to disagree about that.



I don't necessarily disagree. How can I be sure if even John Wells isn't? Impressionistically, anything goes. Appropriate speech samples would have to be measured, but even phonetic laboratories won't give us definite results. Human speech is a complicated phenomenon.

But then again, the best way would be to acquire 'nt' reduction naturally. This way whatever happens in the mouth will likely be correct, no matter what different people hear.


----------



## Truffula

Giesiek said:


> For some reason, in this forum, they sometimes meet with native speakers' hostility when they ask about (advanced) pronunciation. Natives are perfectly patient when it comes to grammar questions (which I really appreciate), but pronunciation questions seem to irk them somehow. Not to mention that sometimes the answers given are just plain wrong.



I think there's 2 main reasons that native speakers find pronunciation questions frustrating.

One, it's very difficult for many people to hear the differences within a phoneme; and typically they will use quite a few of the different options in the same phoneme to pronounce the phoneme in various contexts.  So when someone asks which of those options is "right" it's really difficult to figure out the answer and even once figured out to convey it in a way that makes any sense at all.  

And two, given the rules and limitations of a text based message board that doesn't allow linking to videos, it's hard to be sure you even understand the question properly.  Letters don't have a one to one correspondence with sounds; and while IPA mostly works ( Wiktionary:IPA pronunciation key - Wiktionary ) most of us haven't memorized it and the constant looking up of sound letters and not being sure quite which one we are saying when listening to ourselves say a word over and over until it becomes meaningless air vibrations is sometimes incredibly irritating. 

Take this thread as a great example.  What does it mean to "pronounce the t" even?  Are we sure we are all thinking of the same sounds?  IPA doesn't even have a bunch of helpful variations of "t" to compare, just  t and tʰ and d... it uses t for both the English t in "stop" and the Spanish t in "tocar" - and I know those sound different to me, and my tongue does something different in my mouth when pronouncing them.  So what is the "t" after "n" ? It is different yet again and we simply lack shared vocabulary to really pin it down.   If we could share clips of people saying words it would be a bit easier, but even then quite challenging.


----------



## dojibear

Giesiek said:


> Also, language changes. What you may consider sloppy or uneducated, some other people consider perfectly normal speech. In Poland, advanced students of English are taught Received Pronunciation only to be laughed at when they use it around natives. It sounds stilted.



That is a good point, but the opposite also happens, and students should know about it. 

To a linguist or a phonetician, slang and uneducated speech are "part of the language", as long as many people use them. 

But a lot of ordinary people think differently. They don't expect the AE equivalent of RP: some slang, imperfect pronunciation and simplified grammar is universal. But some slang and poor grammar is only common among *un*educated people. It's a class marker. Educated people notice it, and think you are uneducated if you use it. 

I think consistently pronouncing "nt" as */n/* instead of */nɾ/* in AE falls into this category: a low-class marker. The authors of novels have characters say "wanna" and "you innerested?" (they spell them that way in the novel) to show readers the character is low-class. 

But /n/ is a mild class marker. It is much milder than using "ain't" or sprinkling your sentences with the F-word (which millions of AE speakers do, but other millions avoid).


----------



## cointi

dojibear said:


> That is a good point, but the opposite also happens, and students should know about it.
> 
> To a linguist or a phonetician, slang and uneducated speech are "part of the language", as long as many people use them.
> 
> But a lot of ordinary people think differently. They don't expect the AE equivalent of RP: some slang, imperfect pronunciation and simplified grammar is universal. But some slang and poor grammar is only common among *un*educated people. It's a class marker. Educated people notice it, and think you are uneducated if you use it.
> 
> I think consistently pronouncing "nt" as */n/* instead of */nɾ/* in AE falls into this category: a low-class marker. The authors of novels have characters say "wanna" and "you innerested?" (they spell them that way in the novel) to show readers the character is low-class.
> 
> But /n/ is a mild class marker. It is much milder than using "ain't" or sprinkling your sentences with the F-word (which millions of AE speakers do, but other millions avoid).



Agreed. 

Is "wanna" a class marker still? In novels - sure, but in (everyday) speech? I'm rather surprised to hear it, though I know little about American social strata.

Out of curiosity: do you hear */n/ *or* /nɾ/ *in Barack Obama's _wanted_s?


----------



## dojibear

Giesiek said:


> Is "wanna" a class marker still? In novels - sure, but in (everyday) speech? I'm rather surprised to hear it, though I know little about American social strata.
> 
> Out of curiosity: do you hear */n/ *or* /nɾ/ *in Barack Obama's _wanted_s?



I'm not a good judge whether it is still a class marker. Obviously I thought it was, when I posted #46. But I don't speak often enough with enough different AE speakers to evaluate your idea that this has changed.

Obama is a good public speaker, and a graduate of Harvard Law School, so it is unlikely that he uses any "low class markers" when he is speaking on camera. Listening for "nt" pronounced /n/ in his speaking may be useful to you.

Donald Trump goes out of his way to use "working class AE" rather than "high class AE". I would not be surprised to hear /n/ from him.


----------



## cointi

dojibear said:


> I'm not a good judge whether it is still a class marker. Obviously I thought it was, when I posted #46. But I don't speak often enough with enough different AE speakers to evaluate your idea that this has changed.
> 
> Obama is a good public speaker, and a graduate of Harvard Law School, so it is unlikely that he uses any "low class markers" when he is speaking on camera. Listening for "nt" pronounced /n/ in his speaking may be useful to you.
> 
> Donald Trump goes out of his way to use "working class AE" rather than "high class AE". I would not be surprised to hear /n/ from him.



I didn't make myself clear: do you, dojibear, hear */n/ *or* /nɾ/ *in Barack Obama's _wanted_s? (You could use Youglish.com) I hear */n/ *there so I wonder if I am missing the flap, which is entirely possible since I am not that good at hearing phonemes.


----------



## dojibear

Giesiek said:


> I didn't make myself clear: do you, dojibear, hear */n/ *or* /nɾ/ *in Barack Obama's _wanted_s? (You could use Youglish.com)



I don't know any way to find videoclips or audioclips of Obama saying the word "wanted". It sounds like a big project.

I looked at "youglish.com" which lets me watch one person saying "wanted". But the person isn't Obama.


----------



## cointi

dojibear said:


> I don't know any way to find videoclips or audioclips of Obama saying the word "wanted". It sounds like a big project.
> 
> I looked at "youglish.com" which lets me watch one person saying "wanted". But the person isn't Obama.



If you type "wanted" into the bar and choose "US" it will show a few thousand clips and you can listen to wanteds in every one them, just click the green arrow below the video to go to the next one. Barack Obama appears at elast 3 times in the firts thirty hits. And I think most of the other speakers there should be considered educated as well. Yet I think I consistently hear */n/* rather than */nɾ/*.


----------



## cointi

After listening to those again, I think the whole */nt/* cluster just becomes */ɾ/ *in rapid speech or possibly */n/ *in slower speech but then it's hard (at least for me) to distinguish between those two. Acoustic analysis or a phonetician with a good ear could say more about it. Either way, it seems like the "t" is completely dropped for most speakers.


----------



## Keith Bradford

GreenWhiteBlue said:


> ... disregard any website that teaches you how to slur your speech and to try to sound like sloppy or uneducated native speakers, and instead to try to pronounce words as clearly and intelligibly as possible ...





GreenWhiteBlue said:


> ... everyone would understand you if you just pronounced the standard /t/ sound where it belongs.



Hear, hear!  I couldn't agree more!



Giesiek said:


> ... In Poland, advanced students of English are taught Received Pronunciation only to be laughed at when they use it around natives. It sounds stilted. Poles usually quickly learn then to e.g. drop the t's and replace them with glottal stops. It sounds far more natural...


This is nonsense.  Since RP is,* by definition*, the generally accepted speech of educated people in the south of England, some other factor must have been present.  For instance:

The Polish students had learnt badly.
The "RP" they had been taught was outdated; this is the most probable cause.  Even the Queen doesn't now have the same "may hasbend end ay" accent she spoke with 50 years ago.
The "natives" in question were uneducated or not from the south of England; this is improbable since RP is heard everywhere on radio and television.


----------



## daffron7

dojibear said:


> I agree. Anyone who says "wan-ned" instead of "wan-ted" is harder for AE speakers to understand.





Yngwie Malmsteen said:


> Thanks. I have been watching the videos of Rachel for a quite long time. It seems like she is wrong about some stuff. For example she says that the /t/ can completely be dropped in "I want it", but the /t/ should be an unaspirated /t/ in that sentence since it is the last sound of the word. However that completely ignoring the /t/ in the words like "internet", "santa" "counter" etc. thing is something many Americans on the internet agree with. But also seems like many Americans demur at it. Some say that the "t" is never completely dropped in any American dialect. Don't you think that some Americans or many Americans can completely ignore the /t/ of /nt/ when they pronounce those kinds of words?



The ‘T’ should never be dropped. To drop the ‘T’ would be more like speaking ‘slang’. Hope this helps.


----------



## cointi

daffron7 said:


> The ‘T’ should never be dropped. To drop the ‘T’ would be more like speaking ‘slang’. Hope this helps.



It obviously cannot be true unless you are ready to say that Barack Obama most speakers on TED conferences use slang during their speeches. Then sure.


----------



## cointi

Keith Bradford said:


> Hear, hear!  I couldn't agree more!
> 
> 
> This is nonsense.  Since RP is,* by definition*, the generally accepted speech of educated people in the south of England, some other factor must have been present.  For instance:
> 
> The Polish students had learnt badly.
> The "RP" they had been taught was outdated; this is the most probable cause.  Even the Queen doesn't now have the same "may hasbend end ay" accent she spoke with 50 years ago.
> The "natives" in question were uneducated or not from the south of England; this is improbable since RP is heard everywhere on radio and television.



Don't take my word for it, take Gimson's:

"RP itself can be a handicap nowadays, since it may be taken as a mark of affectation or a desire to emphasize superiority."

Gimson's Pronunciation of English, revised by Allan Cruttenden, 2008, p. 77



Keith Bradford said:


> The "RP" they had been taught was outdated; this is the most probable cause.  Even the Queen doesn't now have the same "may hasbend end ay" accent she spoke with 50 years ago.



That's conservative RP and no, as far as I know, no one teaches it here.


----------



## Keith Bradford

Giesiek said:


> Don't take my word for it, take Gimson's:
> 
> "RP itself can be a handicap nowadays, since it may be taken as a mark of affectation or a desire to emphasize superiority."
> .



That's not the same as saying that Polish students are laughed at.  Of course "RP ... may be taken as a mark of affectation", but that will usually be in dialect areas or in sub-cultures.  We need more evidence before we teach foreign students not to use standard English!


----------



## cointi

Keith Bradford said:


> That's not the same as saying that Polish students are laughed at.  Of course "RP ... may be taken as a mark of affectation", but that will usually be in dialect areas or in sub-cultures.  We need more evidence before we teach foreign students not to use standard English!



No one said a word about teaching students not to use standard English. The question is: should it really be RP, which *is* a minority accent?

_"In the end, I decided that 3% was approximately correct, but if anybody wishes to say that we should raise the figure to, say, 5%, I would have no objection. The point is that RP speakers have always represented a very small proportion of the population of native speakers of English in Britain."_

Peter Trudgil here

But it's actually a non-issue; students acquire a somewhat artificial form of English, but most adjust quickly when faced with actual English. Given how widespread the Internet is, they don't have to go to England anymore to realize that if they, say, keep their t's fully realized (as opposed to unreleased or glottalized in some contexts), they will sound more fake than if they don't. They can always go back to RP if they happen to be invited to Buckingham Palace.

Native speakers of any language are notoriously bad at knowing what is actually happening in their mouth and, by extension, language, which this thread is a great example of. We hear what we want to hear.


----------



## dojibear

Giesiek said:


> It obviously cannot be true unless you are ready to say that Barack Obama most speakers on TED conferences use slang during their speeches. Then sure.



Apparently you are just here to argue.

Have you lived in the US for decades? If not, then *your failure *to hear the difference between the consonants that Obama (and TED speakers) use and /n/ is totally different from "it is a *fact *that they say /n/". It is not a fact, because native speakers hear the difference.

But you claim it is a fact. You are wrong.


----------



## cointi

dojibear said:


> Apparently you are just here to argue.
> 
> Have you lived in the US for decades? If not, then *your failure *to hear the difference between the consonants that Obama (and TED speakers) use and /n/ is totally different from "it is a *fact *that they say /n/". It is not a fact, because native speakers hear the difference.
> 
> But you claim it is a fact. You are wrong.



I am here to discuss linguistic matters. When I think someone is wrong, I point it out.

I am also here to educate. Here.

I am correct when it comes to the only statement I made and am sure of, which is that t dropping in /nt/ clusters is common and "educated people" do it as well. I am not able to impressionistically say with certainty whether the cluster is replaced by */n/ *or */ɾ/* in each case, and I doubt that an average American is. Phonetics is tricky. The cluster can definitely be replaced by both */n/ *or */ɾ/*, though. If someone disagrees, then they disagree with Mr. Wells, a world-class phonetician. And basically anyone who has something to do with the field.


----------



## Keith Bradford

Giesiek said:


> _... RP speakers have always represented a very small proportion of the population of native speakers of English in Britain."_
> 
> Peter Trudgil here...


Peter Trudgil seems to be basing this on a sandom sample taken in Norwich.  You won't find large numbers of RP speakers there because Norwich is a provincial city in the east of England, and RP is a southern form.  Also, Trudgil seems repeatedly to equate RP with the royal family, for reasons I find hard to understand.

I'm not a royalist, I don't come from the south of England and I don't actually speak RP myself, but I recognise that the best form of English to teach is one that has the widest acceptability (even if not the widest geographical spread). The flapped and vocalised forms of intervocalic 't' are as much dialect forms as any other, and are even seen by several members of this forum as slang or erroneous.  They are also more liable to misunderstanding than the "pure" forms of 't', even sometimes by native speakers.


----------



## cointi

Keith Bradford said:


> Peter Trudgil seems to be basing this on a sandom sample taken in Norwich.  You won't find large numbers of RP speakers there because Norwich is a provincial city in the east of England, and RP is a southern form.  Also, Trudgil seems repeatedly to equate RP with the royal family, for reasons I find hard to understand.



Yes, but then he addresses those comments and goes on to explain that he still believes that 5% is an accurate estimate. The problem may lie in how one defines RP.



Keith Bradford said:


> I'm not a royalist, I don't come from the south of England and I don't actually speak RP myself, but I recognise that the best form of English to teach is one that has the widest acceptability (even if not the widest geographical spread).



But when you contrast RP with Estuary English (i.e., according to Wells, Standard English spoken with the accent of the south-east of England), I am inclined to say that the latter should be taught rather than RP. Estuary English seems to be meeting your criteria and is closer to what an overwhelming majority of people use.



Keith Bradford said:


> The flapped and vocalised forms of intervocalic 't' are as much dialect forms as any other, and are even seen by several members of this forum as slang or erroneous.  They are also more liable to misunderstanding than the "pure" forms of 't', even sometimes by native speakers.



Indeed, the flapped/vocalized t, while a norm in American English, in British English is non-standard. I would stay clear of it. Note, please, that I talked about a different phenomenon, which is perfectly natural in Estuary English and, I think, not unheard of among younger royals.


----------



## She'lock Holmes

Giesiek said:


> In Poland, advanced students of English are taught Received Pronunciation only to be laughed at when they use it around natives. It sounds stilted. Poles usually quickly learn then to e.g. *drop the t's and replace them with glottal stops.* It sounds far more natural.





Giesiek said:


> Gimson's Pronunciation of English, revised by Allan Cruttenden, 2008, p. 77



I know this might be highly controversial, but the same source p. 81 says after mentioning several _'well-established changes'_ to modern RP: (5) preconsonantal /t/ becoming *[ʔ]*.

It is also mentioned in p. 82 _'Innovations on the Verge of RP'_: (2) use of *[ʔ]* for /t/ before an accented vowel or before pause.


----------



## cointi

She'lock Holmes said:


> I know this might be highly controversial, but the same source p. 81 says after mentioning several _'well-established changes'_ to modern RP: (5) preconsonantal /t/ becoming *[ʔ]*.
> 
> It is also mentioned in p. 82 _'Innovations on the Verge of RP'_: (2) use of *[ʔ]* for /t/ before an accented vowel or before pause.



Yes, exactly what I wrote about. It is not controversial, it is obvious to anyone who deals with phonetics. One is left wondering though why there should be such strong opposition to well-established facts.

But I'm happy to say that teaching materials are finally being updated, albeit slowly.


----------



## dojibear

When I listened to 3 examples of Obama saying "wanted", the "nt" was clearly not /n/. But one of the other speakers at youglish.com said "wanted to" and the "nt" sounded like /n/ to me.

When I listened to the "dropped T words" audioclip at Ryan's webpage (link in post #60) I heard T in all the words. It was not the "start of word T sound", but it isn't supposed to be: AE has at least 4 distinct sounds represented in writing by T. 

Ryan's advice is good: it is better to use "nn" for "nt" than to use the wrong T sound (for example, start-word plosive T) in that position. But that is advice to foreign learners, not a description of how natives speak.



Giesiek said:


> I am not able to impressionistically say with certainty whether the cluster ("nt") is replaced by */n/ *or */ɾ/* in each case, and I doubt that an average American is. Phonetics is tricky. The cluster can definitely be replaced by both */n/ *or */ɾ/*, though.



I have been studying Mandarin Chinese, and know a few hundred words. To me, "xiao" and "shao" sound the same. To a native they are different. I think it is unreasonable to think you can distinguish all the sounds an average American can distinguish. I can hear things in Obama's 'nt" that you cannot. So can the average American, *when* they are paying attention. 

*But* we usually are not paying attention. As long as we understand the sentence, we do not notice whether "nt" is pronounced /n/ or /nɾ/ or /ɾ/ or /?/. It is just one of many small details we ignore. And that means it is unreasonable for me (a fluent AE speaker) to think that I know how often "nt" is pronounced /n/.


----------



## Truffula

Absolutely, everything dojibear just said in #65, I concur.

- Obama says "nt" in wanted, the "t" is elided a bit but not gone.  I cited two speeches in my (I don't know why, I did NOT link to videos) deleted post here.  One was in a line about a police officer who was killed in Dallas and the other in a line about a 6 year old who wrote to him.  I heard it in both and so did another native speaker listening over my shoulder.

- The "t" in "wanted" as pronounced in speech by a native speaker is not the exact same sound as the "t" in "tomorrow" or the "t" in "stop" or the "t" in "establish" and all three of those are slightly different "t" sounds too.  But, they are all the same phoneme so we don't consciously note the difference.  So we really don't have a clue, even though we hear it all day every day!  Shocking, I know.  I think you can guess how difficult it sometimes is to draw hard lines about sounds in everyday speech, since it is highlighted in recent days by news about people possibly mis-hearing the President and quoting him (the "I vs I'd" and the "shithouse vs shithole" incidents...)

And for classics, there's the "Mairzy Doats" song.  

So there's more than one thing here:  1, what do we hear as "wanted" when it's in the right context?  2, what do we naturally produce for "wanted" when we're not thinking too hard about it?  and 3, what range of sounds sound right vs sound subtly wrong vs sound completely wrong to a listener who is a native speaker of English?  (Also possibly 4, how do we talk in text about this range of sounds??)


----------



## cointi

dojibear said:


> When I listened to 3 examples of Obama saying "wanted", the "nt" was clearly not /n/. But one of the other speakers at youglish.com said "wanted to" and the "nt" sounded like /n/ to me.



Thank you for listening to Obama. The very reason I asked you to do so is that I don't trust my own judgments as I am neither a native speaker nor a phonetician. I think the sound he uses is */ɾ/ *but am happy to know what a native speaker hears.



dojibear said:


> When I listened to the "dropped T words" audioclip at Ryan's webpage (link in post #60) I heard T in all the words. It was not the "start of word T sound", but it isn't supposed to be: AE has at least 4 distinct sounds represented in writing by T.


Thanks. Ryan's are not the best recordings. I just copied random Google link about t-dropping. Would you be willing to listen to those and tell me if you hear any "t" there? And, if you have some more time to spare, would you please see the lady on Youtube under "Day 17 - Dropping the T - Understanding Fast Speech in English"? I think I hear /n/ in many of her examples, but it would be really great if I could hear your opinion. Again, I am not very good at this.



dojibear said:


> Ryan's advice is good: it is better to use "nn" for "nt" than to use the wrong T sound (for example, start-word plosive T) in that position. But that is advice to foreign learners, not a description of how natives speak.



Yes, good point.



dojibear said:


> I have been studying Mandarin Chinese, and know a few hundred words. To me, "xiao" and "shao" sound the same. To a native they are different. I think it is unreasonable to think you can distinguish all the sounds an average American can distinguish. I can hear things in Obama's 'nt" that you cannot.



If I didn't believe that there is a difference between what you (as a native speaker and a person who knows what a phoneme is) and I can hear, I wouldn't ask you to listen to those recordings. I would be happy to rely on my own judgment and knowledge. But I know that you may be more sensitive to certain details.



dojibear said:


> So can the average American, *when* they are paying attention.



I'll have to disagree here. I do stand by my belief that the average Joe, if you asked him, say, what sounds he produces in "water", there is a chance he would swear it's */d/* and if you told him it's actually */ɾ/*, he would tell you that he knows better what he says. It happens with native speakers of any language. There are many phenomena in language that you are not aware of if it's your mother tongue. To the point of vehemently denying the existence of the mentioned phenomena.



dojibear said:


> *But* we usually are not paying attention. As long as we understand the sentence, we do not notice whether "nt" is pronounced /n/ or /nɾ/ or /ɾ/ or /?/.



Bingo! I got involved in this thread because I saw native-speakers say "We don't drop the t", which was untrue. Later I heard "ok, only uneducated people drop the t", which is also untrue. A significant number of people will pronounce /nt/ cluster dropping the t and producing */ɾ/ *or */n/ *(hard to say which, but probably the former is more common)*, *some will pronounce the (word-medial) /t/. I think we both agree on that. And if we do, you must admit that there was a lot of misinformation in this thread.



dojibear said:


> It is just one of many small details we ignore. And that means it is unreasonable for me (a fluent AE speaker) to think that I know how often "nt" is pronounced /n/.



Which is perfectly fine, but then I would expect you not to make any definitive judgments.


----------



## cointi

Truffula said:


> Absolutely, everything dojibear just said in #65, I concur.
> 
> - Obama says "nt" in wanted, the "t" is elided a bit but not gone.  I cited two speeches in my (I don't know why, I did NOT link to videos) deleted post here.  One was in a line about a police officer who was killed in Dallas and the other in a line about a 6 year old who wrote to him.  I heard it in both and so did another native speaker listening over my shoulder.



Thank you, this is very helpful. Is there a chance that the elided "t" was */ɾ/?*



Truffula said:


> - The "t" in "wanted" as pronounced in speech by a native speaker is not the exact same sound as the "t" in "tomorrow" or the "t" in "stop" or the "t" in "establish" and all three of those are slightly different "t" sounds too.  But, they are all the same phoneme so we don't consciously note the difference.  So we really don't have a clue, even though we hear it all day every day!  Shocking, I know.  I think you can guess how difficult it sometimes is to draw hard lines about sounds in everyday speech, since it is highlighted in recent days by news about people possibly mis-hearing the President and quoting him (the "I vs I'd" and the "shithouse vs shithole" incidents...)



I am perfectly aware of all of this, that's why I am very skeptical about anyone's judgment. You could have a trained phonetician (and a native speaker) say what he hears and then carry on a phonetic analysis only to find out he was wrong most of the time.



Truffula said:


> So there's more than one thing here:  1, what do we hear as "wanted" when it's in the right context?


I have a theory that many natives hear "t" where there (acoustically) isn't one. This thread seems to confirm it. What do you think?


Truffula said:


> 2, what do we naturally produce for "wanted" when we're not thinking too hard about it?  a


This has been studied, in most cases in non-careful speech it's */ɾ/~/n/ *and probably others.


Truffula said:


> nd 3, what range of sounds sound right vs sound subtly wrong vs sound completely wrong to a listener who is a native speaker of English?


This has been studied for sure, but I know almost nothing about it.


Truffula said:


> (Also possibly 4, how do we talk in text about this range of sounds??)


Good point. Even IPA can show only so much.


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## dojibear

Giesiek said:


> I'll have to disagree here. I do stand by my belief that the average Joe, if you asked him, say, what sounds he produces in "water", there is a chance he would swear it's */d/* and if you told him it's actually */ɾ/*, he would tell you that he knows better what he says.



We don't disagree. You changed the statement we are "agreeing/disagreeing" about.

I said the average American can tell whether "nt" is pronounced */n/ *(totally omitting any T sound) or /ɾ/ (a normal midword T sound).

I never said they could distinguish /d/ and /ɾ/ (two normal midword T sounds). That's different. Neither of those is /n/.

Note - I believe some Americans pronounce the "t" in "water" as /d/. I have seen websites that say that T is pronounced as /d/ in some mid-word positions: specifically this one, where "t" is a single consonant between two vowels.


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## cointi

dojibear said:


> We don't disagree. You changed the statement we are "agreeing/disagreeing" about.



It was just an example illustrating that native speakers' judgments cannot always be relied upon.




dojibear said:


> I said the average American can tell whether "nt" is pronounced */n/ *(totally omitting any T sound) or /ɾ/ (a normal midword T sound).



Given those two are allophones in this context, and so by definition they are perceived by native speakers as one phoneme, how can you be sure?



dojibear said:


> I never said they could distinguish /d/ and /ɾ/ (two normal midword T sounds). That's different. Neither of those is /n/.



No, you didn't. It was an example, though not much different.



dojibear said:


> Note - I believe some Americans pronounce the "t" in "water" as /d/. I have seen websites that say that T is pronounced as /d/ in some mid-word positions: specifically this one, where "t" is a single consonant between two vowels.



I believe it's possible for a few people to pronounce it with /d/ but for an overwhelming majority it will be /ɾ/ in non-careful speech.

I have seen those websites as well. Given how few people actually pronounce water with /d/ I think they meant /ɾ/ but resorted to a simplification since most people hear /d/ anyways.

In the respective phonetic contexts we are discussing here, /d/ and /ɾ/ and /n/ and /ɾ/ are not easy to distinguish because of the similar places of articulation. Why do you agree that Americans may indeed mistake /ɾ/ for /d/ but at the same time you say that they wouldn't mistake /ɾ/ for /n/? How are those two cases different? How is /n/ different from /t/? Is it because /n/ is a nasal?

Not that I am not necessarily disagreeing, I am by no means sure of native speakers' ability (or lack of it) to distinguish those sounds.


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## dojibear

dojibear said:


> I said the average American can tell whether "nt" is pronounced */n/ *(totally omitting any T sound) or /ɾ/ (a normal midword T sound).





Giesiek said:


> Given those two are allophones in this context, and so by definition they are perceived by native speakers as one phoneme, how can you be sure?



The sound /n/ is the phoneme "n". The sound /ɾ/ is the phoneme "t". They are obviously not allophones.


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## Truffula

Hmmm.... I guess I think it's possible the sound I heard in Obama's "wanted" for the "t" was /ɾ/ - I know /ɾ/ from Spanish classes.  I'd have to try listening to someone say words with /nɾ/ in them though to be sure it was the same... the full /ɾ/ comes from the 'flap' and after the "n" there's only half the flap, mouth-motion wise, I think... so it might not sound the same.  I feel like we're trying to make phonemes again, just smaller ones... 

The original question of 'is the t silent' becomes 'what does the t really sound like' and to me there is no satisfactory answer because the sound is never really audible separately, it's a lot like representing a rainbow as 7 distinct colors... it isn't; it's a gradient, but because of how our eyes work, we see certain frequencies as being 'basic' colors and others as being 'in between' colors and this psychological situation influences how we represent what we see.  So you go from this:







to this:






And we're pointing to a spot in the middle and trying to decide if it's green or yellow or yellow-green or chartreuse or.... but there simply aren't enough names for every single shade.


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## cointi

dojibear said:


> The sound /n/ is the phoneme "n". The sound /ɾ/ is the phoneme "t". They are obviously not allophones.



Yes, you are most likely right about this.

My thinking went like this: If /nt/ cluster (as a whole) can be pronounced either with

1)/nt/
2)/ɾ/
3)or /n/

they are allophones in this specific context.

I see now I should probably not have started with the cluster. I should have started with the "t". *I should have said that [lack of t] is an allophone of "t", which leaves us with /n/. My bad.*

*But* you agreed that natives have a problem distinguishing /wɔː*ɾ*ɚ/ and /wo*d*ɚ/. We have the same story in /ˈwɑː*ɾ*ɪd/  and /ˈwɑː*n*ɪd/. What we have in the first pair is a flap */ɾ/ *and a *separate phoneme* and natives' *inability* to distinguish them. What we have in the second pair is a flap */ɾ/ *and a *separate phoneme* and, according to you, natives' *ability* distinguish them. So the setup is the same. Why would the ability be different in the second pair?


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## cointi

Truffula said:


> Hmmm.... I guess I think it's possible the sound I heard in Obama's "wanted" for the "t" was /ɾ/ - I know /ɾ/ from Spanish classes.  I'd have to try listening to someone say words with /nɾ/ in them though to be sure it was the same... the full /ɾ/ comes from the 'flap' and after the "n" there's only half the flap, mouth-motion wise, I think... so it might not sound the same.



I am not a phonetician, but to my ear, it is more common to replace the whole cluster /nt/ with /ɾ/ rahter than /nɾ/. Do you see it as a possibility?



Truffula said:


> I feel like we're trying to make phonemes again, just smaller ones...



Are we really? Most realizations we are discussing here have been described and named already. They are well established in the literature.



Truffula said:


> The original question of 'is the t silent' becomes 'what does the t really sound like' and to me there is no satisfactory answer because the sound is never really audible separately, it's a lot like representing a rainbow as 7 distinct colors.



Yes, you are right and you provide an apt metaphor. But I think there *is* an answer to the original "is the t silent" question. If we are to believe people who make a living analyzing those things, then yes, the "t" is sometimes silent. *They seem to be really sure about his.* As you rightly point out, *there are many stages between "t" and "no t".*


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## cointi

Ok, I have found the answer.

_"_Many speakers of American English require a similar rule to describe a sequence of an alveolar nasal followed by a stop. In words such as painter and splinter, *the /t/ is lost* and a *nasal tap *occurs. *This has resulted in winter and winner and painting an panning being produced in the same way*_."_

Peter Ladefoged, Keith Johnson, A Course in Phonetics (sixth edition), p. 75

I think it is reasonable to assume that at least for some native speakers who believe they hear the "t", what they really hear is a nasal tap which they interpret as "t", just as in _water, _where they believe they hear the "d", but what they really hear is an alveolar tap.


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## Truffula

Well, I agree with that too.  Sometimes we say "winter" and "winner" the same, I said so earlier on.  But Obama while giving speeches _doesn't_ do that... he might while conversing privately though.  I think he probably is more careful about pronunciation during speeches than usual; most people would be.

I can say "winner" with a Spanish single "r" sound (the closest I can come to being sure I'm doing a flap /ɾ/ and it sounds like I've got congestion.  So when we are nasally stopped up we do often say flap /ɾ/ for nn or nt either one... because "n" is hard to say without nasal.

Anyway, I'd also add that when a native speaker hears an "alveolar tap" and believes they hear a "d" they do hear a "d" because that inter-word alveolar tap is part of our "d" phoneme.  What they don't hear is an IPA /d/ I guess.  

And I think the sound after "n" in "wanted" pronounced by Obama is probably a portion of a flap /ɾ/, but not the whole thing.  My best guess.  

So sometimes also we say "wanted" with the same inside word t sound that you hear in "intend" - when we're being dramatic or emphasizing, perhaps - but usually not.  Usually that version of the "nt" combination is saved for words where the vowel after the "nt" is the vowel of the accented syllable in the word.  And sometimes it's very like flap /ɾ/.  And sometimes it's some other kind of "flap" sound.  It's a slightly sharper movement of the tongue coming off the "n" than for a word without a t, is all... and sometimes that "slightly" becomes completely inaudible.  Yellow shading into green.


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## cointi

Truffula said:


> But Obama while giving speeches _doesn't_ do that... .



You seem to be sure about it and I can't tell (but am inclined to say there's a nasal flap) so I guess it's best to leave it at that. I appreciate your opinion.



Truffula said:


> Anyway, I'd also add that when a native speaker hears an "alveolar tap" and believes they hear a "d" they do hear a "d" because that inter-word alveolar tap is part of our "d" phoneme.  What they don't hear is an IPA /d/ I guess.



Yes, but by the same logic you can say that when a native speaker hears the /glottal stop/ or even the /no-t/ allophone of /t/, he does hear the /t/. You will agree that it is a bit absurd.



Truffula said:


> And I think the sound after "n" in "wanted" pronounced by Obama is probably a portion of a flap /ɾ/, but not the whole thing.  My best guess.



Mm. Thank you.



Truffula said:


> So sometimes also we say "wanted" with the same inside word t sound that you hear in "intend" - when we're being dramatic or emphasizing, perhaps - but usually not.  Usually that version of the "nt" combination is saved for words where the vowel after the "nt" is the vowel of the accented syllable in the word.  And sometimes it's very like flap /ɾ/.  And sometimes it's some other kind of "flap" sound.  It's a slightly sharper movement of the tongue coming off the "n" than for a word without a t, is all... and sometimes that "slightly" becomes completely inaudible.  Yellow shading into green.



Thank you, I agree with everything you say here. If you take a look at some earlier answers in this thread, you will see the difference between what you say and what other native speakers say. I am glad we made things clear.


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## Dictatortot

I speak here only for myself, as an AmE speaker from the American South:  when I pronounce such words as "wanted" or "winter," the medial sound is VERY similar to /n/, and sometimes it's precisely /n/ ... but more often, instead of touching the alveolar ridge with the front blade of my tongue, I strike it with the very tip of my tongue, resulting in a discernible tap or "pop" mid-articulation.  It's not quite the Spanish medial /r/: for one thing, my tongue curls a bit inward, giving the sound rather a hollow timbre.

I'll leave others to judge whether that's what Obama does.


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## cointi

Dictatortot said:


> I speak here only for myself, as an AmE speaker from the American South:  when I pronounce such words as "wanted" or "winter," the medial sound is VERY similar to /n/, and sometimes it's precisely /n/ ... but more often, instead of touching the alveolar ridge with the front blade of my tongue, I strike it with the very tip of my tongue, resulting in a discernible tap or "pop" mid-articulation.  It's not quite the Spanish medial /r/: for one thing, my tongue curls a bit inward, giving the sound rather a hollow timbre.



You might want to consult a specialist, sir, as it appears that you are speaking slang.


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## dojibear

The IPA symbology was not designed for AE, and it does a poor job of describing some AE sounds. There are versions that use superscripts, subscripts and special symbols to get closer: those show start-word-T as a combination of symbols, not just /t/. But dictionaries seem to use simplified IPA, where they use /t/ for several different sounds.

It would be a mistake to think the sounds of AE "must" match IPA symbols, and therefore that the various "t" sounds in "-nt-" are all perfect matches for specific IPA combinations. 

It would also be a mistake to assume that AE speakers (non-linguists) cannot distinguish sounds as "different" because they do not have different simple-IPA spellings. AE speakers don't even use IPA. It's symbol set is meaningless to them, and does not restrict them.

An example of this is shown above, where someone points out the the "t" sound following the "n" sound in "nt" is not the same as the Spanish R sound (written /ɾ/ in IPA). Someone else points out that their "n" in "winter does not match /n/.


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## Forero

There are lots of ways to pronounce _wanted_, and I use lots of ways myself. One thing I notice is that the vowel I use in _want_, _one_, and _won_ (and derivatives thereof) is not like the vowel in any other word. It is very close to [ɤ] but nasalized. It is slightly rounded but not an [o].

Depending on context, I may use an unvoiced tap, a voiced tap, a nasal tap, or a regular [n] in "wanted".

The unusual vowel may have something to do with why the following consonant(s) can vary so much.

I would like to comment on Obama's pronunciation, but I have not been able to locate an example of him saying "wanted".


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## Truffula

Forero - find a transcript of one of his speeches that includes the word and then find a video of the speech.

I had a post earlier in this thread with details, but it was hidden by moderators.

Like you, I say "wanted" several different ways depending on the context/sentence, though they're all pretty similar sounding, they're noticeably different too.  The Spanish tap r sound (or at least the best I can approximate it, not being a native Spanish speaker) can sometimes be the only consonant sound I make to pronounce the "nt" combination.


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## Forero

I found a video of Obama's speech at the Dallas Memorial Service, and when he says "... telling his family 'This is something I wanted to do'", He pronounces "wanted" with only an "n" between the "a" and the "id". The "a" is open, like the "a" in father, and is not nasalized.

His speech is careful, but seems to be intentionally casual sounding, and it shows he is well educated but not a stickler for "proper" pronunciation. He sounds neither common nor elitist.


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