The international community condemned the attack unanimously.

Words 7 Difficulty Intermediate Featured sound Silent T after N
dhee the ihn·ter·NA·shuh·nuhl international kuh·MYOO·nuh·tee community kuhn·DEHMD condemned dhee the uh·TAK attack yoo·NA·nuh·muh·slee unanimously
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In casual American English, "The international community condemned the attack unanimously" sounds like "dhee ihn-ter-NA-shuh-nuhl kuh-MYOO-nuh-tee kuhn-DEHMD dhee uh-TAK yoo-NA-nuh-muh-slee". Several things happen here, and the headline one is the Silent T after N: the T after N drops out entirely. Keep stressed words long, unstressed words short, and link the consonants forward into the vowels.

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Common mistakes

Pronouncing the silent T after N.

In "international", the "t" right after N is dropped — the tongue skips the T stop and moves directly from the N position to the next sound. /t/ is completely silent — the tongue skips the T stop and moves directly from the N position to the next sound.

Saying a hard "T" in the middle.

In "community", the "t" between vowels sounds like a quick "d" — the tongue briefly taps the ridge behind the upper teeth. /t/ or /d/ becomes a quick tap [ɾ] — sounds like a soft D. The tongue briefly taps the ridge behind the upper teeth.

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Why it sounds different

What makes this sentence sound American.

In "international", the "t" right after N is dropped — the tongue skips the T stop and moves directly from the N position to the next sound. This is called the Silent T after N, a small move that separates 'classroom' from 'native'. It comes out as ihn-ter-NA-shuh-nuhl.

The breakdown

What's happening in this sentence.

Small tricks that turn a textbook sentence into how an American actually says it.

(j/w)
Vowel-to-Vowel Linking between "the" & "international"A brief glide (y or w) bridges two vowels for smooth flow.
·
Reduced Words (to, for, of) in "the"Full vowel reduces to schwa /ə/ or other weak vowel. Consonants may simplify.
t→∅
Silent T after N in "international"In "international", the "t" right after N is dropped — the tongue skips the T stop and moves directly from the N position to the next sound.
ə→◌
Silent Schwa Before L/M/N/R in "international"Schwa is absorbed — consonant becomes the syllable nucleus.
t→ɾ
Flap T in "community"In "community", the "t" between vowels sounds like a quick "d" — the tongue briefly taps the ridge behind the upper teeth.
✕
Silent T/D Across Words between "condemned" & "the"The /t/ or /d/ at the end is dropped — surrounding consonants flow directly.
Word by word

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Each word has its own page with examples, common mistakes, and related words.

the dhee international ihn·ter·NA·shuh·nuhl community kuh·MYOO·nuh·tee condemned kuhn·DEHMD the dhee attack uh·TAK unanimously yoo·NA·nuh·muh·slee
Watch out

Common pronunciation mistakes in American English.

The textbook way isn't wrong — it's just not how anyone actually says it.

01

Pronouncing the silent T after N.

In "international", the "t" right after N is dropped — the tongue skips the T stop and moves directly from the N position to the next sound. /t/ is completely silent — the tongue skips the T stop and moves directly from the N position to the next sound.

ihn-ter-NA-shuh-nuhl→ihn·ter·NA·shuh·nuhl
02

Saying a hard "T" in the middle.

In "community", the "t" between vowels sounds like a quick "d" — the tongue briefly taps the ridge behind the upper teeth. /t/ or /d/ becomes a quick tap [ɾ] — sounds like a soft D. The tongue briefly taps the ridge behind the upper teeth.

kuh-MYOO-nuh-tee→kuh·MYOO·nuh·tee
03

Pronouncing the vowel before M/N too pure.

In "unanimously", the "a" vowel before M or N raises and fronts toward [eə] — the tongue pulls up and forward, breaking the vowel into a tense glide as it anticipates the nasal. The "/æ/" vowel raises and fronts before M or N — tongue pulls up and forward, producing a tense [eə] glide (between /e/ and /ə/). Not a pure /æ/.

yoo-NA-nuh-muh-slee→yoo·NA·nuh·muh·slee
04

Treating every L the same.

The L in "international" is a dark L — the back of the tongue rises toward the soft palate, adding a small "uh" quality before the L. Dark L adds a small schwa-like "uh" before the L. The back of the tongue lifts toward the soft palate.

ihn-ter-NA-shuh-nuhl→ihn·ter·NA·shuh·nuhl
Questions

Questions people ask about this.

Why do the T sounds turn into D-like sounds in this sentence?
That's the flap-T rule: when /t/ sits between two vowels — inside a single word, or across the boundary between two words — Americans replace the crisp T with a quick D-like flap. It's one of the most distinctive sounds of casual American speech and one of the first things to copy if you want to sound less textbook.
Why is "the" said so quickly in this sentence?
Function words — articles, prepositions, auxiliaries, pronouns — reduce to short, unstressed schwa shapes in casual American speech. Pronouncing them fully like the dictionary entry is a dead giveaway of a textbook accent. Native speakers stress only the content words and let everything else collapse.
How are the words connected in casual American speech?
Americans don't pause between words. A consonant at the end of one word links forward into the vowel that starts the next; two vowels in a row get bridged by a tiny W or Y glide; an identical consonant repeated across a word boundary is held just once. The result is a continuous flow rather than a textbook word-by-word delivery.
Is this how the sentence is taught in textbooks?
Textbooks usually teach the citation form — every word pronounced fully, every consonant crisp, every vowel pure. Americans actually flap their Ts, drop function-word H's, link consonants forward into vowels, and reduce unstressed syllables to schwa. The respell on this page shows the casual form you'll hear in real conversations rather than the textbook version.

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