What's that sound?

[eido]

Has someone asked this question before? If they have, redirect me to the thread.

A while ago, I noticed in English we make this sound before a vowel that doesn't belong to the main vowel but nonetheless is present in the pronunciation and almost can't be removed if you want to sound native. It's like a schwa. Like, when you say 'eat', you don't just say /iːt/. You say /əit/. It's like a warm-up sound. What is this? Is there a name for it? Or am I going crazy?

I'd appreciate any analysis you have. Just don't treat me like a dolt. I know I can behave like one, but I try not to show how deep my inherent confusion goes.

[rdearman]

I think you mean dipthongs... although I'm no expert.

https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/diphthong

[Dragon27]

Long i: is usually a narrow diphthong in English (somewhat like [ɪi]). In some accents (like Australian) it can be rather noticeable. [əi] can be heard here, for example (Pronunciation by greengobbie92 (Male from Australia)).
Not sure if that's what you're talking about. Maybe you could provide more examples? Are you talking about specific vowels, or any vowels? Does this happen at the beginning of the word (starting with a vowel), or in the middle?

[lavengro]

Has someone asked this question before? If they have, redirect me to the thread.

A while ago, I noticed in English we make this sound before a vowel that doesn't belong to the main vowel but nonetheless is present in the pronunciation and almost can't be removed if you want to sound native. It's like a schwa. Like, when you say 'eat', you don't just say /iːt/. You say /əit/. It's like a warm-up sound. What is this? Is there a name for it? Or am I going crazy?

I'd appreciate any analysis you have. Just don't treat me like a dolt. I know I can behave like one, but I try not to show how deep my inherent confusion goes.

I'll take a shot at providing responses, in the order of your questions:

1. not that I am aware - not on this forum at least;

2. no idea, I don't really hear anything;

3. it may be open for naming, like a newly-discovered star, so you may want to consider helping yourself before I swoop in myself and name it "Stanley;"

4. as per Dobbs: "You might very well think that - I couldn't possibly comment."

[robaleman95]

If we're thinking of the same thing, I think I've heard this referred to as 'gliding vowels'.

Like contrast with Spanish where each vowel sound is constant (ie, tongue stays in the exact same position) throughout the entire duration of the sound, whereas in English our vowels like in 'eat' tend to shift very slightly from the start to the end of the vowel sound (tongue kinda glides slightly throughout that 'e' sound).

[smallwhite]

Wikipedia > English phonology > ... > Vowels

Wikipedia > General American > ... > Vowels

In particular,

Ctrl+F > "FLEECE" on the 2 pages above

and

Wikipedia > General American > ... > Pure vowels

/æ/
is realised as
[eə] or [ɛə] or [æ]
in the words
ban, tram

etc, and maybe the bits about the dark L - do your "feel" and "feet" rhyme?

[kulaputra]

English is full of diphthongs which are entirely unmarked in our orthography, which is one of the biggest pronunciation stumbling blocks for Anglophones learning other languages (quieyro coumeyr, anyone?) and for ESL learners (learning to predict which diphthongs appear where and then actually pronounce them). Few (in some dialects, almost no) English vowels are pure monophthongs. On top of this, English exhibits great variation in vowel quality between dialects, much greater then the difference between consonant inventories of various dialects (generally; there are exceptions). Indeed, nearly every vowel and most of the diphthongs found in the world's languages are found in at least one English dialect (although not necessarily phonemically, only phonetically).

The diphthong in question in "eat" does not consist of a schwa in most dialects. Usually it's a [ɪi] diphthong, as mentioned previously by Dragon27. If you specify a dialect and a word, I can probably tell you what diphthong is being produced in that specific context.

[eido]

Long i: is usually a narrow diphthong in English (somewhat like [ɪi]). In some accents (like Australian) it can be rather noticeable. [əi] can be heard here, for example (Pronunciation by greengobbie92 (Male from Australia)).
Not sure if that's what you're talking about. Maybe you could provide more examples? Are you talking about specific vowels, or any vowels? Does this happen at the beginning of the word (starting with a vowel), or in the middle?

It's probably a diphthong. But it's hard to believe every word has a diphthong in it. It happens anywhere there's a vowel. Uh-ee-tuh-eeng (eating), muh-een (mean), etc.
I thank you for educating me about the narrow diphthong.

etc, and maybe the bits about the dark L - do your "feel" and "feet" rhyme?

Like, purely? No. They're distinctly their own words, with no rhyming ending. But they sound somehow different and the same when I say them one after the other.
I think you got close with the /æ/ sound. If they're pronounced /bæən/ and /træəm/, that sounds familiar.

English is full of diphthongs which are entirely unmarked in our orthography, which is one of the biggest pronunciation stumbling blocks for Anglophones learning other languages (quieyro coumeyr, anyone?) and for ESL learners (learning to predict which diphthongs appear where and then actually pronounce them). Few (in some dialects, almost no) English vowels are pure monophthongs. On top of this, English exhibits great variation in vowel quality between dialects, much greater then the difference between consonant inventories of various dialects (generally; there are exceptions). Indeed, nearly every vowel and most of the diphthongs found in the world's languages are found in at least one English dialect (although not necessarily phonemically, only phonetically).

The diphthong in question in "eat" does not consist of a schwa in most dialects. Usually it's a [ɪi] diphthong, as mentioned previously by Dragon27. If you specify a dialect and a word, I can probably tell you what diphthong is being produced in that specific context.

I feel attacked. I pronounce Spanish that way. I'm a failure, haha.
Here's me pronouncing some words. I deliberately went slow to catch the sounds. I'm from Colorado, if that helps.

[Mista]

I think glottal stop is what you're looking for

[kulaputra]

I think glottal stop is what you're looking for

I don't think so. The glottal stop in English never occurs in the middle of a syllable, only finally (when replacing t) or right before a final t, or at the very beginning of a word which starts with a vowel (the specifics vary depending on the word or dialect). If a glottal stop occurs in "eat" in any dialect of English, it will replace the t or immediately precede it. In my dialect, it replaces the t when "eat" is said in isolation or before a word beginning in a non-alveolar consonant; before an alveolar consonant, I realize the t as a [t] and before anything else (that is, vowels) it becomes an alveolar flap. This, I believe, is fairly typical of North American English.

@OP you're not a failure, it's hard to overcome the phonetic tendencies of your L1, but being aware of them helps overcome them, and so I hope this has helped you. FSI Spanish has a section devoted towards getting you to avoid diphthongizing vowels where they needn't be.