Pronounce /t/ (e.g. word bought)

English as a Second Language English Vocabulary, Grammar and Idioms
1

Hi all,

Some people don’t pronounce /t/:

  1. at the and of the word.

Ex: Bought
Instead of pronouncing /bo:t/, some people proncounce this word as /bo:/.

  1. in the words like “written”.

Ex: Written
Instead of pronouncing /'ritn/, some people proncounce this word as /'rin/.

Do you think it positive or negative?

K

2

For the answer, please see /d/

Thanks

3

Where did you get this information, Khahn?

I’m particularly astounded by your information about the word written. Who supposedly pronounces “written” as /'rin/?

Amy

4

I don’t think this deletion of the /t/ is a feature of native English speech, although it’s done by a lot of Vietnamese speakers of English.

What you may be thinking of, though, is not deletion of the /t/, but its replacement with a glottal stop in some dialects. Many people in England will replace the /t/ in “bought” with a glottal stop before a vowel, so if they say, “I bought a loaf of bread,” the words “bought a” will sound like [bo?@]. When many native speakers pronounce words like “written” or “eaten”, we put our tongue to our alveolar ridge to say the /t/, but we delete the following vowel and then voice the /n/, so “eaten” sounds like [it?n]. This use of the glottal stop before /n/ sounds neutral to me, but in the US, using the glottal stop between vowels is stigmatized.

Also, in English word-final /t/ is preglottalized before a consonant or at the end of an utterance. We cut off our air before the tongue gets into position, and we never release the /t/. Many foreigners hear that and think we’re not pronouncing the /t/, but in fact we can hear that the consonant is there.

5

Hi Yankee and Amy,

Thanks alot for your explanation. Up to now, I have understood that you always pronounce /t/.

It is sure that in the words like “written”, you delete a vowel following /t/ and so it becomes /itn/.

Thanks
K

6

Van, Yankee and Amy is one and the same person. But I think you wanted to write Jamie(K)

7

Ok,

Thanks

K

8

Hi Khahn

The way you’ve written your question leads me to believe that you might think the words “written” and “eaten” are pronounced as one syllable and that is not correct.

If you have speakers on your PC, you can listen to the pronunciation. Here is the word “eaten”:
m-w.com/cgi-bin/audio.pl?eat00003.wav=eaten

Amy

9

“Yankee” is Amy. She didn’t explain it to you. I explained it. :evil:

10

Exactly, Jamie!

11

No apology. This guy’s got bad manners, and he doesn’t care if he knows the difference between the people on the message boards, as long as he gets some kind of answer.

12

No,

Before, I knew Amy and Yankee are the same person. :slight_smile:

Can you guess why I know that?

Khanh

13

Hi Khahn

It was Jamie who gave you all the detailed information in this thread, not me. You thanked the wrong person.

Amy

14

Yes,

I know that. I also know she is specialist in phonetics.

I thanked you because of your information in every detail for my questions about syntax and meaning, especially your meaning synthesis on “finished”, … :smiley: ( I thanked “one for all, all for one”, :slight_smile: , I’m just kidding).

Have a nice day
K

15

Hi Khahn

Just a little tip: Jamie is a man. :wink:

Amy

16

Hi,

Really? :o

Before, I thought “he” is a beautiful and attractive girl because of the ending “mie” in his noun. (sorry Jamie)

K