Welcome to Daily Tips on Learning English. Today’s tip is on the pronunciation of the letter “t”.
Of course the letter “t” is usually pounced “t”. But you may have noticed that in fluent speech, native speakers sometimes pronounced the “t” as “d”. That happens when the “t” comes between two voiced sounds.
Do you know what sounds in English are voiced? Well, there’re 15 voiced consonant sounds in English. b, d, g, m, n, ɡ, z,δ, l, r, dз,з,j,w. Also, all vowel and diphthong sounds in English are voiced. So let’s look at some examples of words in which the “t” may be pronounced “d”.
No.1 “matter”. “matter” is often pronounced “mader” as in “What’s the matter?”
No.2 “atom”. “atom” is often pronounced “adom” as in “The first atom bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.”
No.3 “twenty”. “twenty” is often pronounced “twendi” as in “That will be twenty dollars, please.”
No.4 “little”. “little” is often pronounced “liddle” as in “He got a little angry.”
No.5 “city”. “city” is often pronounced “cidi” as in “Did you grow up in the city or the country?”
No.6 “butter”. “butter” is often pronounced “buder” as in “Pass the butter, please.”
When people speak slowly or emphatically, however, they usually pronounce the “t” like “t”, not like “d”. Also, a “t” does not sound like “d” when it comes before a stressed vowel as in “return”.
This has been today’s daily tip on learning English. Tune in tomorrow for another tip.