You might already know that there are several different ways Americans pronounce the letter T: Flap T, Stop T, and True T, or, sometimes, dropped. The word ‘seventy’ is an exception, it doesn’t follow the rules.
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Video Text:
In this American English pronunciation video, we’re going to go over the pronunciation of the word seventy.
This week’s Word of the Week is seventy. This is a three-syllable word with stress on the first syllable. Seventy. DA-da-da. It begins with the S consonant sound, ss, ss, teeth are together and tongue tip is down here, corners of the lips may pull wide. Sssse-. Then we have the EH as in BED vowel. And you can see the jaw does need to drop for that sound. Se-. Vv. Then the V consonant sound, where the bottom lip comes up and touches the bottom of the top front teeth. Sev-, sev-. Seventy. Next we have the schwa-N sound. Don’t worry about making a separate schwa sound, seven-, seven-, just go straight into the N sound, where the front part of your tongue will lift, and the flat, top part will touch the roof of the mouth.
Next we have the T. The T in clusters is usually a True T. But sometimes, when it follows an N, we leave it out altogether. In this particular word, we have an exception. It’s a Flap T. Seventy, seventy. Seven-ty. So the tongue is already in position for the N, all you have to do is pull it away to make the flap T sound. Seventy, seventy.
Then we go straight into the EE as in SHE vowel, where the tongue tip is down, and the front part of the tongue is stretching up towards the roof of the mouth. Seventy, seventy. Tomorrow, my grandma’s turning 70.
That’s it, your Word of the Week. If there’s a word you’d like to suggest for the Word of the Week, put it in the comments below.
That’s it, and thanks so much for using Rachel’s English.
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