CHAPTER 12
Connected Speech
What is connected speech?
Language learners often feel that natural, spoken English is
fast and hard to understand. They can’t hear each word
clearly; instead, all the words sound like one long, confusing
stream of sound. This is because when people
talk normally, their words naturally blend
together and change in predictable ways. (This
happens in all languages, not only in English.)
We call this connected speech.
Connected speech is not sloppy, uneducated, or
bad. It’s just normal. It happens when people
speak quickly and casually, but also when they
speak slowly and formally. Connected speech is not limited to
one geographic area or one variety of English. Native
speakers of Standard North American, British, Australian, and
New Zealand English all use connected speech, as do speakers
of all regional dialects. In other words, any time people
speak, they’re using connected speech. (Ladefoged 2006 pp.
109-110)Why is there connected speech?
When people speak, there are usually two parties involved—
the speaker and the listener. Both of these want their job to
be as easy as possible: The speaker wants to be able to speak
easily, and the listener wants to be able to understand easily.
But the needs of these two sides are in con$ict:The speaker: The speaker’s mouth basically wants to work
in the easiest way possible, with the least movement or
e"ort. This leads the speaker’s articulatory system to take
shortcuts—to move from one sound to the next
in the shortest and easiest way, to blend
sounds together when it can, and to change
and sometimes omit sounds. Our mouths are a
little bit lazy.The listener: On the other hand, listeners
need to be able to hear the di"erence between14712.1 Connected Speech