relaxed pronunciation in writing?

Wow! this is getting interesting! thanks for all the comments!

Toot, I'd like to see the comments to your post. I thought these "wanna" and "gonna" were reflections in writing of the American pronunciation, which, as far as I know, tends to relax and omit the -t- (for example, they say "tweny" instead of "twenty", while I think that in England, even in informal speech, they wouldn't say that. Am I wrong?

Any Brits around here? Do you say "gonna" and the others? Do you use them in writing? And Aussies?

...Obama is justly noted for the clarity and precision of his speech.

I don't deny that. What is say is this: Listen to him very carefully, and you will hear some of the more relaxed or casual forms of speech that we are discussing here.

Actually in Australia "going to" is more often shortened to what sounds like "gunna" - like this .

It wasn't uncommon in my rural area to hear a procrastinator nicknamed "Gunner" - as in someone who's always "gunna" do something but never does.

Similarly, a local kindergarten was named "Wydinia" , assumed by some to be an Aboriginal name but later claimed by the building committee to be because of people constantly asking "Wydinia (why didn't you) do it this way ...?"

I don't deny that. What is say is this: Listen to him very carefully, and you will hear some of the more relaxed or casual forms of speech that we are discussing here.

For the record, NA, I have no doubt at all about that. What I'm skeptical of are claims by folks that any native speaker doesn't use relaxed forms when speaking at normal speed. Presidents might hyper-enunciate during the slow-as-molasses State of the Union speech, but that would be about the only time.

Yes, I have known plenty of Gunners in Australia. But would never use it in writing, even informally - don't know about the younger generation though, I can only speak for the oldies.

Must admit I have sometimes been surprised to see non-native speakers on TT using wanna, as though it had been taught to them as normal English.

We don't disagree at all, zashibis. I read into your earlier comment something that wasn't there.

Are we still using Betty Windsor as a benchmark for good British English?

You can be sure she will be pronouncing 'house' as 'hice' and gone as 'gorn'.

plenty of wannas and gonnas in Britain too.

I dinna ken aboot that

Written the way they are, the "gonna" (and so on) is going to sound American, whereas the slang "going to" in places such as Australia or England might rather be "go-na" (where the "go" is pronounced "go")...

In England the first vowel of 'gonna' is a schwa - it definitely doesn't sound like go-na.

for example, they say "tweny" instead of "twenty", while I think that in England, even in informal speech, they wouldn't say that. Am I wrong?

'Tweny' (or rather, 'twenny') is very common in England too.

Whether they like to hear it or not, even the biggest pedants/prescriptivists use these reduced/contracted forms in informal, connected speech (and it's certainly not restricted to certain socio-economic or class groups). I think an issue arises when L2 speakers of English use 'gonna' and 'wanna' in (semi-)formal writing - they're so used to seeing them used in informal contexts, such as in texts or when communicating online, that they don't realise that it isn't considered appropriate by the majority of speakers in more formal contexts.

My feeling (from trying to analyse my own speech - difficult to do) is that I wouldn't hesitate to use 'gonna' in speech but that I might try to self-correct to avoid 'wanna', which feels far more marked (as informal etc.) to me.