I’ve always pronounced the word “Southern” to rhyme with howthurn. I know most people say it like “suthurn” instead. I didn’t realize that the way I pronounce it is considered weird until recently!
.ǝdoɹnƎ uᴉ ƃuᴉʌᴉl uɐᴉlɐɹʇsn∀ uɐ ɯɐ ᴉ ʇnq .ǝɯᴉʇ ǝɥʇ ll∀
Australia is so hellbent on making words sound cute by shortening everything. It makes me giggle even when they are mad.
The sprinkles on bread is adorable
Fairy bread is the best.
My wife has to be careful when picking child names because I will immediately Australianise it to something stupid.
As an American, it didn’t click for me until I visited London for the first time why names like Leicester and Gloucester were pronounced the way they are by Brits. My dumb American brain sees the names as Lei-cester and Glou-cester rather than Leice-ster and Glouce-ster.
oh wow, you blew my mind
I don’t personally do this, but many people in my family say the days of the week with “dee”. Like “Sundee”, “Mondee”. I think it’s charming, but one of their children said they were weird for saying it that way.
Also, as a programmer, there are some words that programmers use that are abbreviated which I refuse to pronounce the way that others pronounce them because I think it’s weird, but virtually everybody pronounces them different to me.
For example, there is a common keyword in programming languages called “enum”, and most people I know pronounce it as “EE-num”, like it rhymes with “ME dumb”. But “enum” is short for “enumeration”, so I pronounce it as if it’s the first two syllables of “enumeration”, like “ee-NUUM”. Although I think the normal pronunciation is weird, I don’t say anything to people. I just pronounce it the way that I think it should be pronounced. But on multiple occasions, other programmers have called me out for it and asked why I pronounce it “wrong”.
There are several other programming terms like this, but they don’t immediately come to mind. Enum is the most common example.
Do you pronounce “char” like “care”?
I typically pronounce “char” as “character”. Honestly, I rarely have any reason to talk specifically about chars, so it doesn’t come up often.
The next logical question is, then, why don’t I pronounce “enum” as “enumeration”? And the answer is that I often do. But I do say it both long and short.
I do, especially in VARCHAR as vare-care where everyone else is on the varr-carr train.
Reminds me of my highschool computers teacher who pronounced “modem” as “mo-deem”. Because it’s short for modulator/demodulator.
Continuing the programming vernacular, I was waiting to checkout at Best Buy in America like a month ago, and all the registers were empty forcing everyone to check out at customer service by the geek squad.
Someone came up behind me and asked if we were in the place to checkout. I replied, “Yes, this is the queue.”
Shortly after that, he had the same conversation with the person behind him and also used the word “queue” to which the third person asked if he was British, and the second guy just said he repeated what I said so I had to chime in and say I wasn’t British, just a programmer.
It bugs me a bit when people treat acceptable synonyms as foreign just because it’s not the word or within the range of words they would’ve chosen.
I had something similar happen getting off a plane at London Heathrow. I asked airport staff where I could find the restrooms and they replied with a slightly confused look, “do you mean toilet?”
I thought the Brits used Loo? Toilet feels so crass lol
That’s exactly what I thought! I figured that if airport/airline staff there were paid as poorly as in the US (with modern cost of living considerations), maybe it’s more common than I thought at the time.
I don’t get it. Are there other pronunciations for queue?
Their story is more about the choice of words. In America, we typically call it a “line”. In England, it is typically called a “queue”.
“ee-NUUM” seems like it would roll of the tongue easier than the former and that’s the way I would say it too because of what it’s short for, so I get it!
I sound out Wed-nes-day instead of saying Wends-day.
I hear most people say “library” and I do too, but I’ve met educated people who say “liberry.”
Spoken language is about communication with the immediate group of people you’re interacting with, and is fluid, so while I agree with the idea you suggest of enum on an intellectual level (as well as several others), using the generally accepted way to pronounce things verbally reduces misinterpretation, so I pronounce things as they are generally pronounced. Spoken language is too ephemeral to be imprecise or use your own flair, IMHO. It’s a communication method that has shared rules, not a self-expression medium that is owned by you alone like what clothes you wear. There’s way more wrong with how the English language pronounces things than a few niche technical terms, but those weren’t decided by any one person. In fact that’s why it’s such a mess, but it’s functional.
Just my opinion from a sociological and practical standpoint. Probably contributing to that, I’m AuDHD and so misinterpretation is something I’ve struggled with my whole life. So precise communication is something I’ve spent a lot of time perfecting, especially at work. For reference, I’ve been a software product analyst, product manager, engineer, and currently architect as well as I used to run a nonprofit focused on ethics in the software industry, so I have had to do a lot of communicating ideas around software at many different levels for decades with both technical and nontechnical people.
So, in my case, enum is programmer jargon and is not something that I’d pronounce at all to a layman or larger audience. I don’t think anybody has ever misunderstood me. I often also simply say “enumeration”. But again, that is still jargon. For a programmer, an enumeration is a data type, and for the layman, it probably just means something like “numbered things”.
Spoken language is too ephemeral to be imprecise or use your own flair
I would say that this is a good rule of thumb.
But then, how do I put this? I think people who are on the spectrum are much more concerned with misinterpretation than neurotypical people. I understand why, as I’ve struggled with being misinterpreted in the past. Being misinterpreted feels like a major disaster. But I noticed that other people basically assume that they’ll be understood, no matter how poorly their message is conveyed. I suspect that you’ve noticed the same thing. I don’t go that far, but I definitely think there is room for self-expression.
In the end, if you understand and feel comfortable with the normal rules, then you can understand where it’s okay to start to break them. Some estimates say that Shakespeare invented 1700 words in his written works. I’m sure that in the majority of those instances, he expected to be understood, despite using a word that nobody else had ever used.
Your fashion metaphor is actually a pretty good one, I think. There is room for expression, but there are also general guidelines to follow. In a typical office environment, nobody comes in to work nude or wearing a toilet seat around their neck. Okay that’s extreme, but nobody wears tons of jewelry like Mr. T, either. What I’m saying is that, outside of high fashion like you see on runways, people do follow a basic set of clothing rules, some of which are social and not specifically practical, and their self-expression is only built on top of that base.
The basic rules for clothing are to conceal certain areas, to provide comfort and protection. That sort of basic thing. So with that, everybody’s clothes serve that purpose. And then, like I said, there are some social rules. You know, like don’t wear a white dress to a wedding. When people violate those rules, other people notice and are often confused. And once the basic purpose of clothing is met, then there are areas for flair. I would say that the same thing applies to language.
sudois spokensoo-dooin my house. Where I live alone.I pronounce it the same as you, and by the way, that’s also the pronunciation listed on Wikipedia.
But I can’t remember how other people that I’ve worked with pronounce it. I’m sure it’s come up, but I just don’t recall.
I think the fact that its configuration file is called sudoers is fairly decisive that other pronunciations are wrong.
Over time I switched to saying it like you. It’s more internally consistent for me to pronounce all abbreviations the same as the words being abbreviated. That applies to enum, char, var, serde, num, regex, etc.
My wife says I pronounce crayon wrong. The way she says it, it’s a single syllable word that is the same as the first syllable of cranberry. I say it as two syllables: cray-on.
Being fully honest, I’ve started drawing it out and articulating both syllables more because I know she doesn’t like it.
You’re correct. It’s two syllables. My wife is from the east coast and says it like “cran” or “crown” and some people here in the Midwest say it as a single syllable.
Dictionary defines the pronunciation as two though. Crayola, the brand that (essentially) invented them, uses two syllables as well per their commercials.
I say it as two syllables: cray-on.
I have never heard it pronounced any other way. Not American though (and I suppose you may not be either!).
Solder. I taught myself, never really talked to anyone about it, and for like a decade, I pronounced it like it’s spelled. With an L.
I just can’t break the habit
If it makes you feel any better, that’s the correct pronunciation in England.
Thats the correct pronunciation outside of the USA.
My aunt does the same with ‘salmon’.
Tbf my brother has a grade school teacher growing up with that as a last name and it was pronounced “SAUL-mon”. Seems confusing for children learning to read or ESL lol.
I’m German. One day my house was being renovated and they were working with jackhammers to remove parts of the facade. It was incredibly loud and I couldn’t bear it. I lived close to university and had recently stopped working in one of the institutes. I knew though that my former colleagues had couches in some of their offices so I thought I’d give them a visit. I walked over to the institute and greeted my Australian former coworker. I explained about the noise in my house and said I was “looking for asylum”. Knowing the word “asylum” only from written language, I had no idea it was not actually pronounced “ay suh lum”. He asked “you’re looking for what?” as he obviously hadn’t understood. I repeated “ay suh lum” confidently and he politely said “ah”. Not long after, I learned the correct pronunciation of asylum and that memory has haunted me ever since. It’s been almost 10 years but I still cringe about it.
I understand the feeling, but that fear of being wrong is a plague, it prevents learning altogether. Especially languages ! we should be brave enough to proudly make mistakes and learn from them. Proudly. With pride
English is a bastard language without phonetics so you’ve just got to memorise every word, every phrase, and of course every idiom since half the language is just archaic expressions cobbled together without rhyme or reason (e.g. “rhyme or reason”)
That being said, German has a lot of traps to. The pronunciation of “ee” in himbeere and beerdigung, and guessing the spelling of words using “e” vs “ä” is a nightmare
agghh these comments my eyes the fauxnetics please god why can’t Lemmy have a bigger linguistics community and you mfs wonder why i still use Reddit
There just aren’t many linguists unfortunately. I’m a huge grammar and language nerd but learning IPA takes time and exposure to a lot of sounds you’re not used to. I wish more of the reddit linguists would come over. Even the grammar communities here are dead.
If you start one I will subscribe
US American. I’ve lived overseas a long time and pronounce the ‘h’ in ‘herbs’ because, as Eddie Izzard once said, “it’s got a fucking ‘h’ in it”. I don’t know when I switched but my mom laughed at me when we had a call recently.
One I only noticed a couple years ago: turmeric (was saying, and still frequently hear) ‘toomeric’.
Do you also pronounce the ‘h’ in hour and honor?
Those two examples have an “o” after the “h”. Are there any other words starting “he” that Americans treat the “h” as silent?
I lived in Philly for years and never noticed the way people say “erbs” but since returning to Australia I hear it constantly.
Edit: I hear Americans say it constantly. No one in Australia says “erb”.
Heir
Yeah you’ve been away a while, we say 'oagies now.
Hno. I do say ‘historical’ rather than ‘istorical’, but that’s the only one I can think of in the global English-speaking world that has any number of adherants off the top of my head.
Ever since that IT Crowd episode I can’t not pronounce pedestal as “pedal stool”.
The mountain range on the eastern side of the U.S. is the ‘apple-at’chans’. At least nearly everyone from the southern end of them say it that way (source: I’m from there).
‘Apple-ay-shuns’ is just as strange as saying ‘Nor-folk’. Immediate indicator of you’re an outsider.
Huh.
I’m from the PNW and I’ve always pronounced it Apple-Ah-Shuns.
For Norfolk… I’d basically pronounce that as Nor-Fuck.
Yeah, I’m saying a whole lot of people say it with a “shun” at the end. I blame the media and people originally trying to differentiate themselves from a perception of being an ignorant hillbilly. The hillbilly prejudice is much better now, but I was still personally encountering it even in the aughts. And the pronunciation has stuck because "that’s the way you’ve always heard it said. "
Everyone who lives in those hills (with the exception of a few pockets of yankees) says it “at-chan”.
How do you pronounce Norfolk?
Ok, at least the Virginia version is ‘Nor-fuck’. And some long time residents say ‘Naw-fuck’.
It’s Helico-Pter not Heli-Copter. It’s a greek word from hélikos (screw, spiral, winding) and pterón (wing).
And since I’m fun at parties, I consequently pronounce it with a slight pause before and stress on the P and not a miniscule pause after the I and a slight stress on the O.
You know the famous mage from Forgotten Realms? I pronounce their name “EL-ah-min-ster”
Oh, I also have a terrible Boston accent so I nearly caused an HR incident when talking about “hooked horrors” aka “hookt ho-ahs” or as my coworker heard “hooked whores”. Horror is the best word to check for a Boston accent with.
“jaws” is an equivalent of that for a metro NY accent. i could never hear my own accent until someone had me say it and really listen for it. now if you’ll excuse me i need to walk my dawg to the cawfee shop
What? Why? There’s not even an A in Elminster.
Because I misread it initially as Eliminster and because my mispronunciation became a meme between my friend group. It is cemented forever in my brain as Eliminster.
Garage.
GraJ
Catch shit for it all the time, but at this point I think it’s more like a harmless Easter egg.
My grandma rolls the R in “Three”, and it’s become a game to get her to say it. She handles it with great humor.
I’m cool to have my own version of that.
You’d feel at home in Ontario.
- Toronto: Tronnah
- Grocery: grosheree
Team grosheree 4 lyf
Anyone who says gro-suh-ree can fuck right off back to whatever prep posh school for fancy people they came from
Anyone using 3 syllables may as well be the queen of England.
Grow-shree
Grow-sree
Always just call it a car hole.
Well ooh la we dah
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How about Chipotle as cheepotole
I love this. I say cheese-poodle.
Friend says Chipoltay
I pronounce spigot as “spicket” but that’s normal where I’m from.
My mom had a couple of weird ones that took me a while to unlearn:
Stipend = “stipp-ind”
Antibiotics = “antee-BEE-otics”I say anna-bee-otics. My father is a veterinarian, and would abbreviate antibiotics to anna-bees when speaking with techs about prescriptions. This affected how he’d say antibiotics, and I spent so much time with him over the years I picked up the habit.
It’s pronounced quickly, where if I say it properly I spend conscious thought saying an-tie-bye-otics.
