2

I understand the word incredulous has a soft g in place of or augmenting the soft d. So, it's

in-credge-you-less

not

in-cred-you-less

Google (https://www.google.com/search?q=incredulous | /inˈkrejələs,iNGˈkrejələs/) agrees and the pronunciation has this soft g sound.

But the word "incredulity," Google (https://www.google.com/search?q=incredulity | /ˌinkrəˈdo͞olədē/) does not give this soft g but only the soft d.

i.e., I expected:

in-credge-ool-it-ee

but Google says:

in-cred-ool-it-ee

Which is correct? 'g' or 'd'? And for both words? Or are they different? And why?

Improve this question
8
  • Bear in mind that 'incredible' has a hard d. Your pronunciation may be regional.
    – Weather Vane
    Commented Oct 20 at 21:33
  • You might like to listen to the UK and US pronunications of 'incredulous' at Cambridge Dictionary.
    – Weather Vane
    Commented Oct 20 at 21:39
  • I can't hear a j in either of the OP's links, but a definite d.
    – Weather Vane
    Commented Oct 20 at 21:42
  • 1
    Normally, those words are pronounced with /j/; it is only because of unusual assimilation that you can hear /dʒ/ (/d/ and /j/ become /dʒ/).
    – LPH
    Commented Oct 20 at 22:12
  • 1
    @LPH: The assimilation of /dj/ to /dʒ/ is not unusual in incredulous; it's the first pronunciation in Merriam-Webster and the only pronunciation in the American Heritage Dictionary.
    – Peter Shor
    Commented Oct 21 at 21:23

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
6

The difference is because the vowel after the “d” is stressed in incredulity but not in incredulous.

At one point, the letter "u" was pronounced more or less like its name in both words: "yoo" (in the International Phonetic Alphabet, the "y" sound is spelled /j/, so we'd transcribe it /ju/). But the "y" or /j/-sound in English tends not to be stable when it comes after various consonants (among them t, d, s, z, n, l, r). In particular, after a stressed syllable, /tj/ tends to fuse into a "ch" sound (IPA /tʃ/) and /dj/ tends to fuse into a "j"/"dg" sound (IPA /dʒ/). This is called "yod coalescence". So incredulous used to be pronounced like in-cred-you-lus, but this evolved to be more like in-credge-u-lus. Compare the pronunciation of individual or perpetual.

However, that evolution didn't happen as easily when /tj/ or /dj/ came before a stressed vowel sound. In that case, American English speakers tend instead to drop the "y" or /j/ sound and leave the /t/ or /d/ intact. This is called “yod-dropping”. Compare the pronunciation of the words tune, dune, dual: American English speakers tend to pronounce the letter "u" in these words as "oo" /u/ rather than as "yoo" /ju/.

Another similar case is the t in future vs. futurity or perpetual vs perpetuity. People do sometimes use the same consonant sound for both. But often, the second (but not the first) of the words in these two pairs is pronounced with a plain /t/ sound before the following vowel: /ˈfjutʃəɹ, pəɹˈpɛtʃuəl/ (FYOOCH-er, per-PETCH-u-al) vs. /fjuˈtʊɹət̬i, ˌpəɹpəˈtuət̬i/ (fyoo-TURE-i-ty, per-pe-TOO-i-ty).

Improve this answer
1
  • I will never accept that many (if any) native Anglophones either detect or generate different sounds for prince and prints unless they're deliberately speaking very unnaturally.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Oct 21 at 15:39

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .