I want to talk to you today about the word ‘strategy’, or more importantly, how to pronounce the word ‘strategy’.

The word begins with an intense consonant cluster, of three consonants: the STR – ‘stir’, ‘stir’. So, you bring the tongue up for the S and release air: ‘s-‘. Then you block the air with the tongue, you bring it up to touch the upper palate – ‘st-‘. Okay? And then you round your lips and pull the tongue in for the R: ‘str-‘. You want to pronounce all three consonants together, as if it’s one consonant, all right? You don’t want to put any breaks between them. It’s not ‘s-t-rategy’, it’s ‘str-‘.

Then you open to an A as in “cat” – ‘stra-‘, ‘stra-‘. So, bring the jaw down, push the tongue forward, and bring the lips to the sides: ‘stra-‘, ‘stra-‘. Then the T becomes a flap T, so it sounds like a D – ‘stra-duh-‘. And the vowel after is a schwa: ‘stra-duh-‘, ‘duh’, ‘duh’. ‘stra-duh’. And then you end it with ‘gee’: ‘stra-duh-gee’. “It’s a great strategy”. “We’re thinking of a new strategy”. Strategy.