fox | linguistics-y musings

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linguistics-y musings

so i was thinking this morning about people who pronounce words wrong (or, to use non-judgmental language, "people with non-standard pronunciations")([rolls eyes]). three examples that leaped to mind immediately were:

theferrett pronounced row (argument) to rhyme with "whoa" rather than with "wow"
a friend of mine in junior high once said something like "innudioes" when she meant innuendoes
just the other day, i heard someone say "drawt" and it took a little sorting out before it became clear to me that she meant draught, which is pronounced "draft"

i wonder if this has anything to do with how much reading people do, or more precisely how much listening they may or may not do. it seems pretty clear that children who read a great deal acquire a lot of vocabulary that way -- but while they may know a word in context, they may never have (had occasion to) hear it used, so they're more likely than less-heavy readers to pronounce things wrong.

maybe. i mean, i was thinking about this in the shower this morning. i don't know if there's ever been any sort of study made of different groups, much-readers vs. not-so-much-readers; and if there hasn't been, i wouldn't know how to put one together. i'd have to consult with someone who had more knowledge of research methods. and then i wouldn't expect it'd be as useful a thing to know about too many languages other than english, since we're the ones with kooky unpredictable correlations between spelling and pronunciation.

ellen_fremedon?

therealjae? others? any thoughts?

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theferrett pronounced row (argument) to rhyme with "whoa" rather than with "wow"

I do that. It's the way my mom pronounces it, too. I think I got it from her. I also got a lot of my anglicized (sp?) as opposed to americanized pronunciations and spellings from my grandmother, although I'm not sure why she spoke/wrote like that, when she was born and raised in Deleware. ::shrug::

I always forget how many words I don't know how to pronounce until I read out loud. I've been reading the Dark Tower books to C in the car, and there've just been a ridiculous number of times that I've had to go "um. I don't know how to say that word." and it's a bit embarressing...

it seems pretty clear that children who read a great deal acquire a lot of vocabulary that way -- but while they may know a word in context, they may never have (had occasion to) hear it used, so they're more likely than less-heavy readers to pronounce things wrong.

In my case, this is exactly right. I know a lot of words that most people don't, but I often don't have a clue how to pronounce them, and I'm horrible at looking them up. I can't think of any examples off-hand, but I bet Matt could. He finds it hilarious. (I think he's just jealous that I can finish crossword puzzles that he can't.)

But...row and draught aren't just English words: they're *English* words. I've been an anglophile since birth, and I didn't know that draught was pronounced "draft" until I was in my twenties.

Do you have some examples of words with American-English pronunciations that you've heard Americans mispronouncing on a regular basis (apart from "innudioes," which I actually think is pretty amusing *g*)

not really. was just thinking. names, it happens sometimes; i have a friend who pretty persistently pronounces (or at least she used to -- haven't heard it in a while, but the subject hasn't really come up) mr. neeson's first name "lie-um". (er, no. but good try. [g]) also pronounced zine to rhyme with "wine", but (a) that was easier to talk her out of and (b) current slangy words i'm less comfortable relying on for such a thing.

my father really believes the name of harry potter's godfather is pronounced "sir-EYE-us." me: "no, dad -- SEER-ee-us. like the star -- he's named after the dog star, you know, sirius?" him: "right. sir-EYE-us, the dog star." that's a conversation that goes nowhere in a hurry. :-) (but the man also pronounces donkey to rhyme with monkey, so it's a wonder i turned out as reasonable as i did. [g])

Don't take it as a conscious pronunciation. I just didn't know any better. I was since corrected, and I've tried to pronounce it the proper way.

Don't even get me started on "bouquet."

My guess is that they're people who simply have no ear for language. They hear words spoken, but just aren't catching the nuances. Possibly it's about the level of their left-brain function.

Interestingly enough (to me anyway) I pick up languages easily, and accents, too. I have a good grasp of grammar, but it's based on hearing what sounds right or wrong because I never got the hang of the actual rules. Once I hear a word pronounced properly, I have it forever. However, a friend of mine has a lot trouble with grammar because she can't hear the correct form in her head as she writes, and she mispronounces a lot of things. She's far from stupid, obviously, and she's a voracious reader, but she simply isn't getting the pronounciation.

Interesting question, btw.

Me! Me! I was TOTALLY one of those kids who read ALL the time so knew a lot of words, but not exactly how one would pronounce them correctly. (My family isn't much on the ten cent vocabulary words, so I didn't hear them). To be honest, I still do it on occasion, with certain words that I've read but never heard.

Yup, I agree with the 'heavy readers' argument. And for whatever reason, I tend to have a higher vocab than most people I know, so they can't correct me when I say something wrong. Becoming good friends with

sagamore has helped me out since he's an English major(and just generally smarter than me) and we use a lot of five dollar words in normal conversation. He clues me in when I mispronounce them. And I'm hell with names. When I'm reading, I just make up what I think it should sound like in my head whether it's right or wrong. I think that's how some mispronunciations happen. And then other times, I just read something incorrectly and it gets stuck in my brain that way. Like in the HP books, I was reading 'perfect' rather than 'prefect' because I'd never heard of or seen the word 'prefect' so my brain turned it into something it could deal with. Twas very weird. :) Oh, and I love www.m-w.com since they have the sound clips that pronounce the word for you. It's a great resource.

I once asked my mother if she was making "whores d'ovrahs". I said "are they like hors d'oeuvres (pronounced correctly)" I knew what hors d'ouevres were, and how to pronounce it, but I'd never seen it written down until I read it, and couldn't process the spelling.

As for "draught" and "row", there are many different pronounciations for words, and I base the "correctness" on the origin of the word. To me, draught and row are British words, so I pronounce them accordingly. However, when I lived in England, I asked someone what kind of car he drove, and he said "a se-LEE-kah". It took me a minute, and I said "oh, a SELL-i-kah". It's a japanese company. Which pronounciation is correct?

just the other day, i heard someone say "drawt"

yeah, that was me. :)

i don't know if there's ever been any sort of study made of different groups, much-readers vs. not-so-much-readers

if there has been, i'd love to see the results! it's always been a pet theory of mine that there's a huge split between my reading and speaking vocabularies, but i know the dangers of armchair academia....

i remember the tremendous trouble i had with cygnet as a child -- i was utterly convinced that it was pronounced "sin-get", even with the spelling right in front of me, because i knew what "signet" meant and it didn't have anything to do with swans. of course, i didn't get "diagon alley" until someone told me, but i got the "mirror of erised" right away, for what that's worth.

I really think there's a link between reading (receptive) vocabulary and expressive. So much of how we pronounce words are based on our exposure to them and our knowledge of the rules. I remember being in elementary school, passing a home depot and saying, oh, "home de-POT." My mother laughed and I asked her what was so funny. She said it's pronounced "de-POE" and me being the stubborn kid I was, said, "but it's spelled with a T on the end! And that was when I learned that was one of the exceptions to the English pronunciation rules.

Now, that may be a 5-cent word, but it's a good representation of how our brain processes words we have not heard [often]. Also, we should remember that English is one f***'d up language when it comes to borrowing words from other languages and either keeping the original pronunciation or changing it to "fit" English rules. Other languages, such as Spanish or French or Arabic or what-have-you have definite rules with no exceptions (except for foreign words, and even that can vary slightly, based on someone's comment above about the Celica).

We use our abilities and knowledge to process internalized pronunciation of new words. I don't think too many Americans would have gotten, for example, that Hermione is pronounced "her-MY-uh(oh)-nee" (with some slight regional accent variation) unless they looked in one of the online HP "dictionaries" or saw the movie.

Just my two cents.

I made my mother hysterical once by pronouncing "grand prix" the way it's written. And a friend of mine in high school pronounced "psuedo" as "suede-o" all the time.

I was talking to a british friend, who pronounced it correctly, so I did a quick informal survey of some american HP readers on the first book, and everyone pronounced it HERM-ee-ohn. I think that we all followed american prounounciaton when faced with an unfamiliar word. I think that Brits tend to emphasize the second syllable, while 'merikuns emphasize the first.

Hi. :-) I haven't introduced myself before.

As a non-native English speaker, I can say English is a very difficult language to pronounce when you haven't heard the words before. I knew a lot of English (and their pronounciation) before I ever had a class in highschool, but my classmates would forever mispronounce words the first time they read them (not once they knew how to say it properly). I've been reading English books for three or four years now (my vocabulary has expanded because of that) but there are words I definitely don't know how to pronounce them without actually hearing them spoken. I can't really see any rules in the pronounciation of English words. I'm also quite surprised when I hear the actual words spoken. My response most of the time is : "Why would anyone pronounce it like that? It just doesn't make sense".

Written French is very easy to read. Lots of hints on how words are pronounced and once you have the basic rules down, it's almost impossible to mispronounce words. The rules aren't difficult and it's easy to find them even when they're not pointed out by a teacher. Dutch (my native language), I suspect, is more difficult to learn. A few years back, I was pretty well-read in Dutch but I don't remember having any trouble pronouncing the words. The only problem I had, was that the words were written by Dutch authors and not Flemish authors, so I was forever using words not frequently used in Belgium and people thought I was from the Netherlands if it weren't for my obvious dialect.

Hey, I'm with your dad...I also pronounce "donkey" to rhyme with "monkey." Of course, I also insist on pronouncing "February" as "Feb-you-airy," so what do I know? *G*

I had a student who did a presentation on food and drink in the Middle Ages last semester who pronounced "mead" to rhyme with "said." It wouldn't have been so distressing if she hadn't used the word eight times in a five minute presentation. :)

My guess is that they're people who simply have no ear for language.

I'm not convinced. I have the pronunciation problem that Fox is talking about, but my pronunciation of French and German is pretty good, considering I'm nowhere near fluent in either at this point. I can, for instance, hear the difference between "dessous" and "dessus," and "attendre" and "entendre." But in English I know most of my vocabulary comes from reading, and if I haven't heard a word spoken, I'm really bad at guessing how it's pronounced.

And just for completeness, I'm very, very left-brained, and I have a good understanding of grammar rules; I don't go by how things sound. Make of all that what you will.

I have a friend who grew up in Hawaii. She claims the educational system there is utter crap but she has always read a lot. She says she's had this problem frequently. Also, she has a friend who still lives in Hawaii whom she has helped with this problem. And my friend knows all the places to go on the Web to hear pronunciations.

well, yeah, as a non-native speaker, forget it. :-)

there are rules to english pronunciations, really there are. just like there are arbitrary rules to pronouncing other languages -- just that their arbitrary rules are more consistent. in french, for instance, eau is always pronounced "oh", x is always silent, ll is pronounced "y" (or "j", if you prefer [g]) following i but "l" following any other vowel, etc. in english, spelling has been frozen at so many different stages of the language development -- including so many borrowings from so many other languages -- that there's no way in a lot of cases to know which of the many rules applies. which, in turn, looks like there are no rules at all.

this certainly contributes to the issue with native speakers' assumptions about pronunciation. if there were only one way to pronounce the sequence ea, there'd be no problem distinguishing between lead (verb) and lead (mineral), between read (present) and read (past), or knowing that neither of these options is correct for the vowel in break. but while making the wrong choice from among a variety of correct pronunciations can be a problem for english speakers reading things out loud and unaware of context, what i'm interested in is native speakers who see a word they ostensibly "know" and pronounce it in a way they've certainly never heard anyone who actually knows the word pronounce it. (failure to realize that someone else is pronouncing the word wrong can obviously complicate the whole thing.) which is why proper names are less interesting.

it's actually more likely a question of the social habits of kids learning language than anything else. maybe. [goes to think about it more]

I guess that this, like most other complex questions, has more than one answer. But the folks I know who have a consistent problem have heard these words more than once. Frex: One of my dear friends pronounces Jerusalem as Jeruzelham, and I know it's not a problem with never having heard the correct pronounciation.

Oh, like the nuke-yoo-ler thing. I think we were talking about two different problems. Mine is specifically with words I've never heard; I hadn't thought about those people who continually mispronounce relatively common words. Probably should have, though; one of my college friends had a boyfriend who drove me nuts by pronouncing "unique" UH-nih-cue. He wasn't very bright. To put it mildly.

Right, exactly. I'll make mistakes on words I've never heard pronounced, but once I hear it, I have it. But I know people who aren't stupid by any stretch, but cannot seem to get certain words no matter how many times they hear them.

my personal blunders include:

chipotle (i pronounced it chip otel rhymes with yodel)

segue (i always thought it was seguoo, wasn't until that big roller thing came out that i reconciled the word and the pronunciation)

My ex-wife's grandmother was a pretty well educated woman. She had a Masters in history and worked for years as a teacher in high schools and did some college teaching as well.

For this reason I almost wet myself when at dinner one day she said she "had been misled" about something. It came out as "Myzled" (I guess that is the way to spell it, the beginning sounded like miser)

She had said it that way her entire life and never knew any better...

Oh yeah. Totally a reader thing.

To this day, I remember the humiliation when primary school teachers cracked up at my pronunciation of 'PEA-sant' and - in front of the entire grade - 'stagglemites and staggletites.'

(Hey, I might have mispronounced them, but I was the only one in fourth grade who knew what they were, damnit, so I didn't appreciate being laughed at.)

And even now, my brain tends to think 'ma-ROON' instead of 'ma-RONE'.

8^-

I think you're really on to something here, and you've got the makings of a great hypothesis. I don't know of any studies like this, either (which doesn't mean it hasn't been done, but there's a good chance it hasn't been done well). You'd probably have to work with school-age children to minimize the influence of other variables, but it could be done.

Hee! Fox doing applied linguistics. Colour me amused. ;-)

-J

I can tell you studied languages. *g*

it's actually more likely a question of the social habits of kids learning language than anything else. maybe. [goes to think about it more]

Maybe that phenomenon will manifest itself more in children from underprivileged families who are nonetheless smart and read plenty. They wouldn't have heard the difficult words spoken out loud, but might have read them in books (and perhaps subsequently pronounce them wrong).

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