How do u pronounce letter and ledder

'Ledder' is not an English word, but in natural speech, 'letter' is usually pronounced as if it were spelled 'ledder'-- it is called a 'flap-t' sound-- /d/-- and comminly occurs in the case of unstressed 't' between vowels or between a vowel and 'l', primarily.

butter = /'bu d?r/
mettle = /'me d?l/
one at a time = /wun æd? 'taim/

Don't you mean "ladder"?

Additional 'flap-t' words:

water
city
party
meeting


Mister M, thanks for providing the term 'flap-t' for the /d/ sound in these words. I wasn't aware there was a word for it. I just tell my call center students that the "t" is often pronounced as a reduced /d/ or that the /t/ sound is sometimes omitted altogether in Americ

There must be a more formal word for it, Eric, but that's the name I learned in teacher training. Four "t"s-- flap-t (letter), glottal-stop t (let me) , aspirated t (right!) and elided t (I wanna).

Thanks a mil, Mr M! This info would come in very handy when I take the CELTA in February. Might be just the thing I'd need to get an 'A'.

As far as I know, the tapping of the /t/ sound is typical of American English. British speakers don't generally do this. So in British English, the pronunciations of the two words are quite different, the former with a /t/ and the latter a /d/.
HTH

Agreed.

A great example is also the American pronunciation of "Atlanta" where it often sounds like
"Adlanna".

Hi everyone,

This is my first post in this forum. For questions like this, I think it would be better to post a sound file to demonstrate the voice needs to be pronounced. So I wonder if someone could help.

the formal name for this sound is either 'tap' or 'flap', and it can be described as a voiced, alveolar, tap or flap sound.