Pronunciation of words

[Yellow Fang]

There are a bit on Radio 4 Today programme about evolving pronunciation of words. Examples of word pronunciation that seem to be changing include 'says', 'ate', 'harass', 'garage', 'mischievous' and the letter H. There was some chap from the British Library or somewhere who wanted to tape people reading from a Mr Men book, so as to study the change. So, how do you say them?

says or sez
eight ot et
harass or harass
garage or garage
mischevous or mischievious
aitch or haitch

 

[Andy in Sig]

If you're interested in this kind of thing there are a couple of websites where you can click on ares of the UK and here bits of the relevant dialects. It's particularly interesting to click on your own area and here a recording made some years ago of an already old person and see how much pronunciation has changed.

 

[philipbh]

Aitch can never be haitch though...can it ?

Since it doesn't have an H at the beginning of the word (silent or otherwise)

 

[XmisterIS]

"sez", "et", "har'ss", "garridge", "missch'v'ss", "aitch".

Anything else is simply vulgar!

There are a few pronunciations/phrases that do really irritate me:

E.g. "At this moment in time" ... didn't that used to just be, "at the moment" or "right now"??!

The other ones that are my pet hates are firstly, the confused use of "few" and "less" and secondly, the inappropriate use of the apostrophe-S.

 

[Aperitif]

ped antics...not for cyclists.

 

[upsidedown]

I remember reading in a Bill Bryson book that the pronunciation of bath or barth changes every 30 miles going North from London.

 

[threebikesmcginty]

Had an alarm repair chappie in at work the other day, said he needed to do some "rem-eh-deal" work. Took me a minute to cotton on it was remedial work.

 

[swee'pea99]

"sez", "et", "har'ss", "garridge", "missch'v'ss", "aitch".

Anything else is simply vulgar!

There are a few pronunciations/phrases that do really irritate me:

E.g. "At this moment in time" ... didn't that used to just be, "at the moment" or "right now"??!

The other ones that are my pet hates are firstly, the confused use of "few" and "less" and secondly, the inappropriate use of the apostrophe-S.

"sez", "et", "har'ss", "garridge", "missch'v'ss", "aitch".


My mum used to get mad at people who used 'firstly' ('The word doesn't exist!') 

I saw a thing on the telly recently that said until recently - ie, within the last 100 years or so - dropping the H on certain words was not only acceptable but positively required if you didn't want to be considered common. 'Herb' (still pronounced 'erb by well-educated WASPS on the US east coast) and hospital being just two examples. It was suggested that words like hospital gained the pronounced H precisely as a result of Victorian paranoia about H-dropping among the aspirant middle classes. (Truly posh people will still refer to 'an 'otel'.)

 

[radger]

sez
eight
harass
garridge
miss-ch'fss
aitch

 

[Arch]

Anyone see the BBC Breakfast News report on this, this morning? They did vox pops in the street asking people how they said these words, and there were a couple of lads, presumably mates, who differed on every word, and the way they contradicted each other, politely but increasingly exasperately, made me think they'd make a great comedy double act.

 

[Hilldodger]

My pet hate is when southerns say 'carsul' when they mean castle and grarse for grass.

 

[potsy]

My pet hate is southerns.

Corrected for accuracy

 

[Kestevan]

The ones that get me are

DrawRing for drawing.
Bockle for bottle

Ones lazy, the others just daft.

 

[Arch]

The ones that get me are

DrawRing for drawing.
Bockle for bottle

Ones lazy, the others just daft.

I wonder how much the 'bockle' one is down to the way children learn to speak. We have family words that we tend to mispronounce on purpose, because either I or my sister did so as little children. I wonder if in some cases, it's such a common mistake that it enters the national lexicon? I'm thinking of skellington for skeleton, as another example.

 

[threebikesmcginty]

Corrected for accuracy

Let's not make this a North Vs South thing, potsy, you common northern git.