I’m a non-native speaker and I have always pronounced all words with syllables ending in ‘n’ followed by a /k/ sound with the velar nasal /ŋ/. For example: think / increase (v+n) / income / incomplete. This was just acquired naturally without any intentional training. (I understand that words ending with ‘nk’ like ‘think’ do … Read more
How do you pronounce “English Speakers”? Do you treat sh and s as similar consonants? Answer As an American native English speaker, the adjacent “sh” and “s” are both pronounced and would be heard by those who grew up with English. Yes, the sounds are related, but that does not imply the sounds should be … Read more
To native speakers of English, how do you compare a vowel before a dark L and one without a dark L. Example words: gold, goal, sold, soul, hole, hold, bowl, bold go, so, ho, bow(noun) . pool, school, cool, tool poo, coo, too . ball, hall, wall, mall awe Is the vowel/(start of diphthong) rounder? … Read more
My dad and I were playing a game in the car where we picked a letter and then each alternated saying a word that started with that letter. We did it with b, for example, it might go: Dad: bath me: ball dad: buffalo me: bank etc. As we were playing/debating the rules of our … Read more
Could you explain to me what happens from the linguist’s point of view when the sounds meet in the speech? Answer Briefly (because stuff like this happens whenever words meet up in speech, which is to say in every sentence), the phonemics of words that (occurring in a phrase, where words is stressed and that … Read more
Don’t native speakers in some regions pronounce [ŋ] simultaneously with the [n] sound in order to connect it without releasing the “g”? For instance, can the word “singer” instead of sɪŋ·ər, be pronounced more like sɪŋn·ər? I’m asking because every time I try to pronounce that word, the “g” sound is released automatically, even though … Read more
Why is the word folks sound like it’s pronounced [foʊks] rather than [fɔɫks]? It’s as though people are thinking it’s spelled fokes. Answer This is the result of historical loss/vocalization of the sound /l/ in certain contexts. As Max Williams mentioned, we also see this loss in -alk words like walk, talk, chalk, balk, stalk. … Read more
I was wondering what exactly happens when the common English speaker* pronounces /z/ and /ð/ right after, for example , the word – combo “is this …”. Honestly, for me it’s almost impossible to pronounce this combination without making a very small break between the /z/ and the /ð/. When I hear Americans pronounce this … Read more
How do you pronounce "it would", "it was", etc. in American English? That is, how do you pronounce the T when it precedes a semi-vowel such as "w"? Is there a stop T or not when the words are pronounced fast? I know, when followed by a vowel, it’s a flap T (as in "it … Read more
I’m asking specifically about Yod* coalescence when connecting two words together. Some very (neat) phenomenon in American English is to “fuse” you/r/s when the word ends in t/d/z: I was thinking about you -> aɪ wəz θɪŋkɪŋ əˈbaʊtʃu what did you do? -> wʌt| dɪʤu du? close your eyes -> kloʊʒəɹ aɪz From my observation, … Read more
