"With the" Does one pronounce both "th" sounds?

Question

Take the random sentence "Start with the basics." Would you pronounce both "th" sounds separately or link them essentially saying "withe". Being a non native speaker I find pronouncing both difficult without disrupting the "flow of speech" which is often stated as being very important when speaking english.

Answer 1

I think it depends on the region whether or not someone will say both "th" sounds or not. I'm American and from the Pacific Northwest, and I tend to merge the two words into sounding like this:

Start wi-thuh basics.

As with most languages (I'm sure), people are lazy, and sounds will tend to mesh together if they're similar enough. But as I said, it probably depends on who you ask whether or not those words are said separately or not.