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EyeSeeYou Posted 20 years ago
Speech & Pronunciation

Tapped t in 'potatoes'

Do you pronounce both Ts as tapped T or just the second one?
  

Top answer

The first T is intervocalic at the beginning of a stressed syllable, so you use aspirated T. Only the second one takes the sound of tapped T. ) puh - T'AYdoes Again in tomatoes , only the second T has the tapped T sound.

— CalifJim

  • The first T is intervocalic at the beginning of a stressed syllable, so you use aspirated T.
  • Only the second one takes the sound of tapped T.
  • ) puh - T'AYdoes Again in tomatoes , only the second T has the tapped T sound.
  • The first is aspirated, but not for the same reason as seen above.
  • The first T here is aspirated because it is word-initial.
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3 Answers
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The first T is intervocalic at the beginning of a stressed syllable, so you use aspirated T.
Only the second one takes the sound of tapped T. (It's intervocalic at the beginning of an unstressed syllable.)

puh - T'AYdoes

Again in tomatoes, only the second T has the tapped T sound. The first is aspirated, but not for the same reason as seen above.
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It depends what sort of English you mean. Strictly speaking, what Califjim says applies only to north American English.

In British English, the same sound would be applied to each T:

Poh-TAY-Toes

Toh-MAH-Toes
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Yes. That's absolutely right.
EyeSeeYou had asked specifically about American English in a previous post.
Unfortunately, we did not mention that AmE was again the focus in this thread, which would have avoided the confusion.

CJ
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