I know this isn't important

[rhiannon55]

But why do people pronounce "imporTant" by saying "imporDant" or even worse "impor_unt"? Drives me crazy.

[BeyondGeography]

1. Jimmy Carter did that all the time

I thought it was an accent thing, and (maybe because I was rooting for him) therefore charming.

[Shell_Seas]

2. What people?

People with lisps? Speech disorders? Heavy southern accents? Heavy northern accents? 5 year olds?

I'm trying to go over in my head when people say, "important," I'm not sure I've heard anyone use it incorrectly like that. It may be a regional dialect thing.

[rhiannon55]

7. I hear pundits do it

and politicians. I know Lyndsey Graham does the D thing, so maybe it's a southern accent. The leaving out of the T altogether, I wish I could cite someone who does it. I'll try to pay more attention.

[raging moderate]

3. Because the velar R sound has the tongue humped in the middle with the tip down.

This increases the effort required for contact between the tongue-tip and the alveolar ridge behind the upper front teeth. Although it is possible to make a T sound with the tongue-tip behind the bottom front teeth, the result will not be as clearly defined as the alveolar ridge T sound.

[SharonClark]

6. So physical as well as cultural differences?

[SharonClark]

4. Pronunciations are usually learned at home.

I tend to follow what people are saying as well as how they say it so it can be a brief distraction but also kind of fascinating. I'm American but my Australian is near perfect (I've been told).

[Glorfindel]

5. I'd never really thought about that. I tend to say "importUnt," I believe.

One of the many, many strangenesses of our wonderful English language. My favorite is that we (most of us) pronounce "wh" as "hw" as in which, what, when, where, and why.

[SharonClark]

9. So you say hich, hat, hen, here, and hy?

Where are you from that you pronounce any of those words without the 'w'?

The pronunciation of the digraph ⟨wh⟩ in English has changed over time, and still varies today between different regions and accents. It is now most commonly pronounced /w/, the same as a plain initial ⟨w⟩, although some dialects, particularly those of Scotland, Ireland, and the Southern United States, retain the traditional pronunciation /hw/, generally realized as [ʍ], a voiceless "w" sound. The process by which the historical /hw/ has become /w/ in most modern varieties of English is called the wine–whine merger. It is also referred to as glide cluster reduction.

[Glorfindel]

11. Of course not. I'm from the southern Appalachians, and I pronounce the "hw" in those words.

I have noticed that some people say "wich," "were," "wy," and "wen." And when I say "whine," it doesn't sound like "wine." I first became aware of this "hw" thing studying Gregg shorthand. The "h" in these cases is represented by a dot preceding the vowel. I think it's a pity that shorthand is a dead or dying skill. I always enjoyed taking dictation, and shorthand, along with other things, kept me out of combat, though not out of Vietnam.

[SharonClark]

14. Interesting. Thanks for the explanation.

[tblue37]

8. It is part of the natural evolution of language to elide some sounds, especially

if they are hard to pronounce, and to drop other sounds altogether. That is how the silent "e" came to be at the ends of words and morphemes. It was previously a pronounced "schwa" sound (sort of like saying "uh" softly), but it eventually just dropped off.

The "t" sound in "important" is a bit awkward to articulate, and if spoken too forcefully sounds weird, like saying, "diDn't" with an overstress on the middle "d" so the word sounds like "diD-unt." But speaking the "t" softly tends to make it disappear, and when one is speaking at normal conversational speed, it will almost inevitably get elided and disappear.

[rhiannon55]

10. Thanks for your explanation, tblue37

I was being a cranky English major about it. I assumed ignorance (not know how to spell the word), when it's really a linguistic thing.

I will stop being cranky about it. 😊

[cbreezen]

12. Depends on where you grew up.

I pronounce it with the "t" (from the West coast) but, in Texas and other Southern states, you will hear it pronounced with a "d". Never bothered me.

[malaise]

13. LOL

[First Speaker]

15. I pronounce it "Throat Warbler Mangrove"...

[Iggo]

17. Thank you, Mr. Luxury Yacht.

[rock]

16. I pronounce it "imPOR?unt"

Where the "?" is a glottal stop, which, as I understand it, is pretty much standard. The English/American "t" is has a wide variety of renditions depending on (among other things) context: "t non-aspired","t aspired", "d", "?","ch" or "sh" preceding "i", and of course null (silent). You apparently have good discrimination for the phonetics!