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English: Pronunciation (accents) t -> ch | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 4083 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes  Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 1 of 10 30 September 2014 at 10:08pm | IP Logged |
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I have recently been paying attention to English pronunciation [american/british].
One obvious fact that I have been noticing is that t is often pronounced very close to "ch", and similarly with d. Eg, "I'll train you" -> "I'll chrain you". "What do you mean" -> "Wha jchu you mean?" I pronounce T as a distinct T and D as a distinct D, so this is a bit difficult for me. Any other English learners have this issue? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4910 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 2 of 10 30 September 2014 at 11:42pm | IP Logged |
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You're right in both cases, and sometimes people write "whachu talkin bout?" in comics and such.
Since I've lived outside the USA for about 14.5 years now, I notice more odd things about the American accent every time I visit. Some Americans slur almost every word (sort of like "I'll shrain you"), and some just drop consonants all over the place ("draw consonance aw or the play"). Tha's jus wunnerful. A few months ago I heard a stewardess talk about the landing procedures and it was like she just couldn't say consonants. The other issue with American English is that a pure vowel just doesn't seem to exist, one of the reasons American accents are so strong in other languages. Every single vowel seems to become a diphthong. I didn't notice it when I lived there, of course, because it just seemed normal. Now when my children watch the Disney channel, I cringe a little when I hear the American kids talk to their dee-ad (dad) and maum (mom) about schoo-ul. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 4083 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 3 of 10 01 October 2014 at 2:01am | IP Logged |
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Huh. I thought "I'll chrain you" was how the Brits also said it. I say this because this particular sentence was spoked by Emily Blunt in Edge of Tomorrow, and I thought "oh, so thats how the Brits also say T".
I've been trying to identify what makes some of the Indian accents so jarring, and the other Indian accents nice (to my ears). The hard Ts and Ds are one factor, so I thought maybe a T is supposed to be a ch. I should perhaps get Assimil English (British Version). Edited by Gemuse on 01 October 2014 at 2:02am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Sizen Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4340 days ago 165 posts - 347 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Catalan, Spanish, Japanese, Ukrainian, German | Message 4 of 10 01 October 2014 at 6:40am | IP Logged |
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Off the top of my head, where I'm from (Central Alberta), "t" seems to become "ch"
before "r" and also before "u" even when it's pronounced as a schwa, but not when it's pronounced like the "u" in "cut" (so a word like "tuck" isn't pronounced "chuck"). Chrick, chrap, achractive, cenchral, etc. Nachural, facchual, acchual, etc. The exception to this rule is when "tu" is at the beginning of the word, in which case you can choose between two pronunciations for a limited number of words which are more commonly pronounced "tu": Tulip or chulip, tuesday or chuesday. (Other words like "tutor" or "tube" are generally pronounced "tu" in my part of Canada.) The same rules apply to "d". Remember, "adult" isn't pronounced "adjult" because it's pronounced with the "u" of "cut". Djrain, djrape, djrop, etc. Edjucate, adjulation, etc. Just like "tu", "du" at the beginning of a word isn't commonly pronounced "dju" except for a limited number of words (only one I can think of in this case): During or djuring. (Never heard "djuke", "djuel" or other such pronunciations in my part of Canada before.) There might be more rules, but I can't think of them currently. This is similar to "t" and "d" becoming "ts" and "dz" respectively before close front vowels in Quebecois French (the variety of French I decided to learn). Once I figured out the general rules that governed this change, I was able to look at my vocabulary and make the needed adjustments. At a certain point, it became natural, and now I don't even think about it because "ts" before "i" just sounds and feels right. Listening for specific contexts where the sound changes and noting them down could help you in finding patterns in the dialect of English you're learning. Once you've figured out some rules, it's just a matter of practising and making it a habit. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| robarb Nonaglot Senior Member United States languagenpluson Joined 5060 days ago 361 posts - 921 votes Speaks: Portuguese, English*, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, French Studies: Mandarin, Danish, Russian, Norwegian, Cantonese, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Greek, Latin, Nepali, Modern Hebrew | Message 5 of 10 01 October 2014 at 6:43am | IP Logged |
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In General American t->ch only occurs before r or ur
so: I'll /chrain/ you but never: that's /choo/ bad although the latter is a common mistake by Brazilians, where t->ch occurs before i and they don't have the normal English aspirated t. There are lots of different accents in Britain, but I think it's often similar to GA. There are many accents in Britain where ty -> chy, as in: I don't know the words to that /chyune/ Conversely, the r-rolling accents of e.g. Scotland do not have t->ch. However, this is entirely predictable: the transition from ch to rolled r is so awkward that such a phonetic situation would be extremely unlikely to arise in any natural language. Edited by robarb on 01 October 2014 at 6:44am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| AlexTG Diglot Senior Member Australia Joined 4639 days ago 178 posts - 354 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Latin, German, Spanish, Japanese | Message 6 of 10 01 October 2014 at 8:52am | IP Logged |
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You'd probably find the book How To Do Accents interesting. It shows all the features you need to listen out for when learning to do an
accent in English. Edited by AlexTG on 01 October 2014 at 8:52am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4708 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 7 of 10 01 October 2014 at 9:29am | IP Logged |
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I am pretty sure palatalised vowels influence the consonants t and d, but I'm not sure if
the result is always CH or a more lighter variant of the palatalization - I see it as some sort of assimilation phenomenon. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| smallwhite Pentaglot Senior Member Australia Joined 5309 days ago 537 posts - 1045 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin, French, Spanish | Message 8 of 10 01 October 2014 at 11:02am | IP Logged |
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I think we're talking about the Yod-coalescence?
I was told to "chune" into radio stations when I lived in Australia many years ago, but recently I'm back, and they're telling me that the following program is for "ma-TOO-a" viewers only. (tune, mature) 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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