Day 16 - Dropping the D and Saying "and" - Understanding Fast Speech in English

Hi. It's Day 16.

After this, just four more days to go

in our 20-day fast speech challenge.

I have question for you.

Do your or did your grandparents speak a different language than you?

My grandparents on my mother's side

spoke a little Polish and a little Serbian.

My grandparents on my father's side spoke Tagalog.

When I talk about my grandparents,

I'm dropping a letter. Can you tell which one?

English with Jennifer

In fast speech, we often drop a D when we have the combination A-N-D.

As in, "grandparents."

There is a D. That's how we write the word,

but when we say it in fast speech, the D often gets dropped:

gran(d)parents.

Listen. As I read these examples,

I'll drop the D in each word.

It's perfectly fine to pronounce the D,

but in fast speech we often drop it

in that a-n-d combination plus another consonant.

That's why I also drop the D in these words.

"Handsome" is an exception.

The D is always dropped.

And it's not just A-N-D.

It's any vowel plus n-d plus another consonant.

For example:

You might hear:

In fast speech, you might hear someone say:

With the conjunction "and" we not only drop the D...

We reduce the vowel sound to a schwa sound /ə/.

So you may hear not "bread and butter,"

but "bread'en butter."

In fact, it might even sound like we're dropping the vowel sound

and just using an N.../n/...bread'n butter.

Listen closely.

I'll say a sentence or phrase.

You try to understand.

That's all for now.

Thanks for watching and happy studies.