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.