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American English Pronunciation: The Stop T

Here’s everything you need for a PERFECT “Stop T” 

Tagged With: Stop T ////  YouTube blocked? Click here to see the video.

Video Text:

I’m excited for you because in this video you’re going to perfect one of the main consonant sounds in the American English accent, and it’s a sound you might not even know about. I’m talking about the stop T. The trick is, it’s actually not a sound. There’s no sound. The air stops, and that’s why it’s called a stop T. But it’s different from leaving the T out. And it’s easy to hear when we slow it down.  

Listen to this. The word is ‘outdoors’, and it’s in slow motion. You’ll hear two separate, distinct parts.  

Outdoors  

Let’s look at the volume of that word. 

Outdoors. 

Do you see this blank spot? No sound. That’s the stop of air, the stop T.   

Outdoors.  

So if the Stop T is no sound, isn’t that just the same thing as no T?  And if that’s true, what’s the difference between ‘fly’, which has no T, and ‘flight’, that ends in a Stop T but has all the same sounds? By the way, this is the symbol for the stop T in the International Phonetic Alphabet. 

Fly 

Flight  

They don’t sound the same, do they? But we’re not hearing a T, tt, sound. We’re not hearing that release, flight.  

Flight.  

There’s no T. but it sounds different from ‘fly’ which has the same sounds but no T. Let’s compare them again.  

Fly 

Flight 

Fly 

Flight
 

So the difference is in how the sound before the t sounds. In fly, 

Fly 

Fly, the pitch goes up, and then it comes back down, fly. It sorts of tapers off. But in the word ‘flight’, the sound has an abrupt stop. It doesn’t have that falling or tapering off. Flight. Fly. That abrupt stop is the Stop T. Let’s listen to a couple more pairs. 

Sue  

Suit  

Day 

Date 

How do we make this stop of air? And why not make a full tt, T sound? The thing about American English is we love smoothness. Everything links together in a flow of continuous sound. That’s one of the characteristics of American English. But tt isn’t very smooth, it’s a stop of air, tt, and a release of air with some energy. So the Stop T came about, where we skip the ttt release part, to make our speech more smooth. We Stop the air, but then we just go in to the next sound without tt, the release. Take, for example, the word ‘fitness’.   

Fitness 

Fitttttt-ness. F consonant, IH vowel, a stop: fit. Then the N sound. Fit-ness. Fitness. To stop the air, I cut it off in my throat at the vocal cords. The tongue c an be in position for the T, but it doesn’t have to be. Fit— the air is stopped there, fit, fit-ness.  

Fitness 

Here are a couple more words with a stop t in the middle, hear the stop, then the next sound.  

Outlast 

Partner 

Shutdown 

When do you make a stop T? Most Americans turn a T into a Stop T in two cases: when the next sound is a consonant, like in ‘shutdown’ or ‘fitness’. Also, at the end of a thought group or sentence.  For example, “He’s late!” Late, not lay. He late!  

We also make a T a stop T at the end of the word when the next word begins with a consonant like in the phrase ‘not now’, not now’. That abrupt stop, that’s the Stop T at the end of a sentence. With the stop T, you don’t hear tt that crisp True T that you hear in, for example, ‘attain’  

Attain 

A True T has its place, but not in the words we’ll study here.   

Now you’ll hear and see a whole bunch of words up close and in slow motion with a Stop T in the middle. Then there’s a section where we’re comparing a Stop T with a word that is the same but with no T sound, like ‘fly’ ‘flight’. This is going to help you really understand this sound, but nothing is as helpful as repeating out loud, so I really encourage you to do that with both the slow motion and regular-paced words.  

Apartment 

Artful 

Assortment 

Atlas 

Basketball 

Bat boy 

Batman 

Bluntly 

Butler 

Catfish 

Catnap 

Chutney 

Compartment 

Countdown 

Cutback  

Dartboard 

Department 

Dirtbag 

Doubtful  

Fitness 

Flatness 

Football 

Footbridge 

Fretfully  

Fruitful 

Hotbed 

Hotdog 

Itself 

Letdown 

Lightweight 

Meatball 

Nutmeg 

Outlast 

Outbid  

Outbreak  

Outburst  

Outdated    

Outdone  

Outdoors 

Outfit   

Outfox 

Outgrow 

Outhouse  

Outlier 

Partly  

Partner  

Pitfall  

Fly  

Flight  

Fly 

Flight   

My  

Might  

My  

Might  

Fall  

Fault  

Fall  

Fault  

Lie  

Light 

Lie  

Light  

Gay  

Gate  

Gay  

Gate  

Sue  

Suit  

Sue  

Suit  

Away  

Await  

Away  

Await  

Tray  

Trait  

Tray  

Trait  

Bay  

Bait  

Bay  

Bait  

Day  

Date  

Day  

Date  

Lay  

Late  

Lay  

Late   

Stay  

State  

Stay  

State  

Ray  

Rate  

Ray  

Rate  

Play  

Plate  

Play  

Plate 

Slay  

Slate  

Slay 

Slate  

Buy 

Bite  

Buy  

Bite  

Sigh  

Site  

Sigh  

Site  

Cue  

Cute  

Cue  

Cute  

May 

Mate  

May  

Mate  

Know 

Note  

Know  

Note  

Toe  

Tote  

Toe  

Tote    

Flew  

Flute  

Flew  

Flute  

Spy  

Spite  

Spy  

Spite  

Row  

Wrote  

Row  

Wrote  

Rye  

Right  

Rye  

Right  

Be  

Beat  

Be  

Beat  

Fee  

Feet  

Fee 

Feet  

Mow  

Moat  

Mow  

Moat  

Bow  

Boat  

Bow  

Boat  

He  

Heat  

He  

Heat  

Go  

Goat  

Go  

Goat  

Sea  

Seat  

Sea  

Seat  

Spa  

Spot  

Spa  

Spot  

Blow  

Bloat  

Blow  

Bloat  

Plea  

Pleat  

Plea  

Pleat  

We  

Wheat  

We  

Wheat  

Knee  

Neat  

Knee  

Neat  

Rue  

Root  

Rue  

Root  

All my YouTube channel members get an extra video here. It’s training stop T at the end of a word like date and fit. So, if you’re a channel member, thank you. That video has already dropped for you. If you’re not a member and you want to see that video and support this channel, please click the join button.  

Using the stop T in your spoken English is going to help you sound more natural when speaking American English. Listening and repeating out loud, repetition, is going to be the key to making the habit and speaking English with ease. If you want to train all the sounds, and other characteristics like smoothness and linking, stress and contrast, check out my online school, Rachel’s English Academy, where thousands of students are going through the training and creating the habits to speak American English with clarity, ease, and confidence, all with the help of our fantastic teachers.  Join today and try it out.  

Thanks for watching. Keep your learning going now with this video, and don’t forget to subscribe with notifications on. I absolutely love being your English teacher. That’s it, and thanks so much for using Rachel’s English.  

 Video: 

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