2018-03-15 Pronunciation: can that had

Greg Malivuk
[email protected]
http://www.pastebin.com/u/gmalivuk - notes from all classes
---
The most important word to reduce is affirmative “can”. If you stress it in many sentences, native speakers will hear “can’t”.
I can’t trust him. - Two stressed words.
I can trust him. - One stressed word. (Or maybe two if you stress “I”.)
(It’s also important to reduce the vowel to [ə]: [kən] or even [kn])
---
p. 68 part 12A - Take turns reading sentence (a) or (b), and your partner responds with the correct sentence.
---
“That’s good, but I can’t hear you.” - “I” and “you” are stressed for contrast, but “can’t” still has the full [æ] vowel, so I can hear that it’s negative.

I can hear you.
I can’t hear you.
---
There are two other very common words that have different content and structure meanings.
---
“have” as a content word is a main verb about possession
“have” as a structure word is an auxiliary verb for perfect tenses
In the past perfect, this can be tricky if you don’t change the stress of structure words:
Chad had had his head hit hard. (underlined content words)
Unstressed “had” becomes [həd].
---
James, while John had had “had”, had had “had had”. “Had had” had had the teacher’s approval.
= James, while John had used simple past, had used past perfect. Past perfect had received the teacher’s approval.
---
That was fun. I knew that. - As a pronoun, “that” is stressed.
Is that book yours? I know that guy. - As a determiner, it’s not always stressed but it is pronounced with the full vowel.
I know that he lost his book. - As a relative pronoun, it’s unstressed and often reduced to [ə].
---
I knew that that would happen. - The first “that” is reduced, the second is strong.
I know that that “that” had had “had had” before it in my first draft.
(In my first draft: “...had had that…”)
The fact that that “that” had had “had had” before it in my first draft was not an accident.
---
Sometimes reduction won’t help you, because every meaning of a word is a content word:
If police police police, who will police police police? Police police police police.
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
(like: Boston cats (that) Boston dogs chase, chase Boston birds.)