vowels - Pronunciation of "beaches" and "bitches"

For me it is often hard to distinguish between these two words while speaking. The t in the bitch is almost neglectable in speech.

What is the correct pronunciation of these two words?

Answer

English spelling is crazy, these two words are pronounced identically except for the first vowel. Don't worry about the 't' at all, it's not really a separate sound.

In Standard American English (the British and other varieties of English might have slightly different vowels):

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  'beaches' = beeeeeeee - chez, The 'eeeee..' sound, when exaggerated, is like when you clench your teeth and smile, very tense and long. In IPA, it is /bij tʃiz/

  
  


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  'bitches' = bih - chez. the 'ih' sound is very relaxed and short. In IPA, it is /bi tʃiz/

  
  

I hope that clears up the pronunciation of the vowels.

As to the 'tch' vs 'ch', they are written differently but pronounced the same; the 't' is not really pronounced separately from the 'sh'. An example is better:

'ditches' vs 'dishes': these two are pronounced identically except for the consonant in the middle. The middle consonant in the first word is pronounced ike the first and last consonant in 'church'. There's no separate 't' sound, you sound out a 't' and a 'sh' at the same time. The technical terms for these are 'fricative'' (for 'sh') and 'affricate'' for a combined 'stop' and fricative sounded out at the same time. (please pardon the technical vocabulary but these are very precise concepts that have a precise vocabulary to go along with them.