Pronunciation of "t" after "c" and before "l" ("act like") [duplicate]

Question

"Do you know why they act like that?"

Do native speakers pronounce the "t" after the "c" and before the "l" in the sentence above? I'm under the impression that they don't do it and just say "ac like that." Is this just my impression?

Answer 1

Just behind your upper teeth - you can feel it with your tongue - there is a little shelf-like part of your mouth. It slopes slightly upwards. Behind that your mouth suddenly arches upwards to form the roof of your mouth. That shelf-like part you can feel there behind your teeth is called your alveolar ridge. In English, we make the following consonant sounds there:

• / t, d, n, l, s, z /

[Those last two sounds, /s/ and /z/, are a bit different. We don't touch central bit of the tip of the tongue against the ridge with these. Instead, (- there's a kind of line or seam that runs down the centre of the tongue there called the mid-sagittal line), we create a furrow along the mid-saggital line and the edges of our tongue rest against that shelf as air whistles down the channel in the middle.]

Anyhow, those sounds that we make on the alveolar ridge are very unstable in English. They very often disappear or they change dramatically according to the other sounds that they are next to.

Of all of these sounds, /t/ and /d/, the alveolar plosives (these consonants are like mini ex-plosions) are the most unstable, closely followed by /n/.

Alveolar plosive elision

As a rule, when the sound /t/ or /d/ occurs at the end of a syllable, it is liable to deletion whenever the following two conditions are met:

1. It is surrounded by consonants (not including /r/ or /h/).
2. The preceding consonant has the same voicing. (It must be unvoiced for /t/).

This means we can drop the /t/ in left work, because /f/ like /t/ is voiceless (there's no buzzing of the vocal folds). We can't drop the /t/ in halt work though, because the /l/ there is voiced.

This context will allow for /t/ or /d/ elision in nearly all cases in Gen Am and SSB English. However there are many other instances where /d/ or /t/ may be also be elided. For example, /t/ is freely omissible in normal speech in contractions with not - regardless of whether followed by a vowel:

• aɪ 'kɑ:n 'ɑ:nsə [I can't answer - Southern Standard British English]
• aɪ 'kæn 'ænsɚ [I can't answer - General American]

The Original Poster's example

act like, /ækt laɪk/

The /t/ here is surrounded by the consonants /k/ and /l/. The segment /k/ doesn't have vocal fold vibration and therefore is voiceless, like /t/. This means that the /t/ in this example fulfills the requirements for alveolar plosive elision and will frequently be elided, even in careful speech: /æk laɪk/.

Whether or not a /t/ were articulated here would be very difficult for a listener to discern, in norml speech at least. This is because of it being articulated after another voiceless stop and its being homorganic (made with the same parts of the mouth) as the following /l/. Try it and see!

Further reading:

John Wells's phonetic blog: Corn beef and fry rice

Rules affecting consonants: UCL Phonology of English handout

John Maidment's Blog: Elusive elision

Answer 2

I'm British. My experience is that the t is not silent, although it may be a little de-emphasised, or slightly elided with the following t. It is is difficult to depict it without using phonetic symbols (which I don't know) but it may be something like "ac'tlike" rather than two clearly separate words "act" "like".

Answer 3

Many American native speakers don't; most British native speakers do.