Brian:
>How? That's a serious question. I can easily manage ['l?@n],
>with an alveolar flap, or ['l?n.], with nasal release of the
>[d] making it sound very much like the alveolar flap, but I
>don't see how you get true flapping without at least a bit of
>a vowel in the second syllable.
Actually, you're right. An error on my part. I use [d]. At any
rate, obviously my accent doesn't have the "glottal" rule that
Miguel speaks of. I similarly use [d] in "spitting" [spIdn.]. Never
ever do I say [spi?n.] because, as I've said, medial glottal stops
are largely foreign to my speech pattern.
Further, after some consultation with friends and listening to their
normal pronunciations of the word in a sentence, I now know that
a) I'm not the only one pronouncing it like that and b) that the
other pronunciation I've heard from one friend is more like [latn.]
with an unaspirated alveolar stop, rather than a bonified glottal
stop.
Thanks, Brian, for correcting me on that one.
- gLeN
_________________________________________________________________
The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE*
http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail