Name: Speak English Fluently — all 6 “D” Sounds | Rachel’s English / English Speaking Lesson
Uploaded: 2020-04-15T16:02:25.000Z
Duration: 14 min 49 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Tongue in position, vibrate the vocal cords...

Well, there are actually six different ways that Americans might pronounce that sound.

And today, we're inviting superstar Rachel's English teacher, Tom Kelly,

When you understand them, you'll figure out how you can speak more natural and easy English.

Tom teaches students in Rachel's English Academy, all day, every day,

and this is part of what he teaches them, so I'm so glad that he's here to do this for us today.

We're gonna hand it over to Tom in just a second but before we do,

make sure you subscribe with notifications if you haven't already.

We make new videos on the English language every Tuesday, and we'd love to see you back here again.

Hi! I'm Tom Kelly, a Rachel's English teacher with Rachel's English Academy.

Today we're going to talk in depth about a sound in American English

that has a lot of different pronunciations.  The D consonant.

Here are words and two word phrases that all use a different pronunciation of the D sound.

Whoa. One letter...six different pronunciations.

Luckily, there are some guidelines for when to use each one.

Now, you may have heard about the Stop T and the Flap T and the True T.

Well, the only difference between the T and D consonant is that the D consonant is voiced

So that means the D consonant has multiple pronunciations as well!

Let's start with the Classic - the True D.

As Rachel teaches in her video on the D consonant,

This means that there are two parts to creating a True D.

First, a stop of the airflow and second, a release.

The airflow is stopped by the tongue position.

The tongue will come up and the front part will touch the roof of the mouth just behind the top teeth.

It will then pull down to release the air.

The teeth can be together for the D consonant sound,

For example here is the D sound with the teeth together:

You may actually find that you get an easier, more relaxed sound when your teeth are not together.

This allows you to keep a looser, more relaxed jaw,

which is great for finding that American English flow, and natural quality.

Now, this is a voiced consonant, so you will use your vocal cords for the D.

And that will be very important later on.

or when it begins a stressed syllable in the middle of a multiple syllable word.

So, let's practice this. Here it is at the beginning: dog, diaper,

As the parent of an infant, I use this one a lot,

and the name Debra, like in the song by Beck.

Notice that my teeth are not together when I pronounce the D.

Now this relaxation helps create a more effortless sound

and it might help you find a more natural native speaker quality to your D consonant.

Now here is the True D in the middle of a word.

Again, notice my teeth are not closing to help me create this sound, my jaw stays loose.

Okay, so that's the classic True D consonant sound.

The sound we think of when we think of the letter D.

However, that is only the first of our six pronunciations.

So let's talk about number two. The Flap D.

Now that sounds similar to a flap T, right?

And that is because it is the exact same sound.

When a D is between two vowel sounds in an unstressed position,

meaning the following syllable is unstressed,

it will be pronounced very quickly, lightly, a very fast, weak version of the True D.

Now this should sound just like the Flap T

or if you come from a native language that uses a Flap R,

where the tip of the tongue bounces quickly off the roof of the mouth,

Matter, those words are pronounced exactly the same.

Madder with a D, madder,  and matter with a T, matter.

As in: No one is madder than me that English spelling is so unhelpful.

Now, this sound is used within words like: madder, ladder, riddle, cradle, buddy, academy.

It's also used when linking a word that ends with a D into a word that starts with a vowel or a diphthong,