Hadar Shemesh explains how some American speakers replace the T sound with a glottal stop, a closure in the throat instead of the mouth. Examples include get me, white cat, and kitten. Both pronunciations are acceptable, though the glottal stop is optional to master.
Hi, Hadar. I'm recording this audio to ask you about glottal's top consonant in American English because I noticed many American speakers say, like, what would you know about me? Or let me know, like, t sound is disappearing, how to pronounce it? Correct. Thank you.
Okay, great question. So the T sound that is disappearing is called a held t, a t that appears before a consonant. And one of the ways to pronounce it is with a glottal stop. So the glottal stop is not a sound in English, but it's a way to pronounce the held t. Let me explain again. Let's begin with a held T. Like I said, the t that appears before a consonant is a held T. That means that it's not being released. It's. If we usually think of a T as a t sound, the tip of the tongue goes up and the air is released through the mouth. T, T, T. Get me. Get me some coffee. Get me. So I bring the tongue up, block the air, but instead of releasing it, get me. Because it's kind of like extra work for the tongue. The tongue just stays up there and. And the mouth articulates the next sound. Get me. Get me. Get me some coffee. White cat. White. The tongue is up, cat. Now, what I did now is I brought the tip of the tongue up and I blocked the air inside. When people hear that, they associate it with the T sound. A hell T. And again, like, you can only use it when the T is at the end of words. Get. Or before another consonant. Get me. Now, what happens is that people start associating this held sound with the T, right? This abrupt stop of air. Get me. But I don't have to bring the tip of the tongue up to block the air. There is another way to. To do it, and that is the glottal stop. A glottal stop is when the air is stopped in your larynx, which is your voice box, where the vocal folds are where the voice is created and vibrates, right? So basically, there are muscles there that close and open to allow air to come in. When the air comes in or comes through, the vocal cords start vibrating. And then the voice is moving towards the space of the mouth, and then it resonates there. So actually, if I stop my breath here, that's the sound I'm hearing. I'm closing the entrance of the air here. That is a glottal stop. It happens in the glottis. This is why it's called a glottal stop. Glottal. Now, because it's an abrupt stop of air. 2. This sound is also associated with the hilt T. So if I want to say, get me, I can do it here, get me. But I can also stop my breath here. Get me, get E, E, E. Get me, get me. So it's not that one is better than the other here. It's sometimes easier for some people. Get me, Cat. Right. I stopped my breath here. But there isn't one way that is better than the other. And also, having said that releasing the t at the end of words or before another consonant is also great. You're still going to sound clear if you say get me. Nothing's going to happen. It's not going to affect your flow, your fluency, and it's definitely not going to affect your pronunciation and clarity. Right, so this is the fancy stuff. When we talk about pronunciation, there is the essential things that we need to work on, the things that help you become clearer. And there's this fancy stuff that is all about the nuances and the fine tuning that you know. It's fun and it's important to know, but it's not crucial. So if you don't get it right, don't worry about it and don't psych yourself out over it. Okay? One more place where we can find that glottal stop is when there is a t, a schwa, and an n, as in the word kitten. Kitten. Now, I can release the air through the nose. Kitten, kitten. Because I don't really pronounce the t here, but a glottal stop can help me make the sound a little shorter and quicker. Kitten. Ki A, A, a glottal stop, and then an N. Kitten. Manhattan. Forgotten, forgotten, forgotten. So this is where glottal stop can actually help us if we struggle with pronouncing the nasal T like forgotten, and we don't want to pronounce the full t here. Forgotten. Even though it's completely fine and great and clear if you release the t here. Okay, So I hope this answers your question, Oksana, and I hope that it helped you understand whether or not you should prioritize this sound based on your needs and based on your time that you have available to practice and based on what you feel like, because we have to make it fun, too. So if it's fun, I recommend creating lists and lists of words where the T is at the end, the T is before another consonant and. And where the T is before a reduced vowel and an n, like kitten, and drill it in words, phrases, and sentences. And that is going to help you own that sound. Okay, and now your task, if you're watching this, is to write one word in the comments that has a l. T. Let's see if you got it.
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