Re: basic two-consonant clusters in English

<analyst41@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:d9399fc6-85b3-491b-8e87-19771daa7200@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
On Oct 31, 11:37 am, "Richard Wordingham" <jrw0...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
<analys...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> is "backed down" homophonous with "back down"?

In my speech they're distinct, but probably with some overlap. In the
former the vowel is slightly shorter and the velar stop shows
fricativisation, and the glottal stop, when present, seems to follow the
velar rather than be co-articulated. I think the voicing onset in the
former is also later relative to the dental explosion.

I guess something similar would apply to "talked to" and "talk to".

I think I understand most of what you are saying here, except why
there would be a glottal stop in either utterance - or for that matter
in "breakdown" as I understood Nathan to have posted.

There's a tendency to reinforce final stops in English with glottal stops. Before a word beginning with a glottal stop, the final explosion may be deleted, especially if it is /t/, with only the glottal stop remaining.

I remember reading that glottal stops in English are pretty recent and
that there are living English speakers who do not have them in their
speech at all. Did they originate in cockney and then make their way
into general British and American English?

I'm not sure of the history in the Americas. The glottal reinforcement is reported to be absent in Australian English.

Richard.

.