Author Topic: Pronunciation that makes you cringe  (Read 147306 times)

T42

  • Apprentice geezer
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #650 on: 16 June, 2020, 10:47:40 am »
Shame: GE&H is magnificent.
I've dusted off all those old bottles and set them up straight

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #651 on: 16 June, 2020, 11:56:30 am »
Mary Anne Hobbs frequently has me shouting at the radio for her mangling of words, but she hit new heights last week when reading the title of a piece as "in E B minor".

I like Mary Anne Hobbs. She plays a good selection of music, and she has a good voice for radio. But she's just not very bright.
Was the next piece in D hash major?
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #652 on: 16 June, 2020, 01:05:37 pm »
Mrs Pcolbeck once had a new teacher in the class she is TA for that was straight out of college and was from the Home Counties.
He was trying to teach the kids spelling and pronunciation of new words by matching them with other words that rhymed.
The thing was that almost every pair of words he came up with may have rhymed in Surrey but in North Yorkshire they certainly didn't. Mrs Pcolbeck was crying laughing.
I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that.

nicknack

  • Hornblower
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #653 on: 16 June, 2020, 01:16:36 pm »
Mary Anne Hobbs frequently has me shouting at the radio for her mangling of words, but she hit new heights last week when reading the title of a piece as "in E B minor".

I like Mary Anne Hobbs. She plays a good selection of music, and she has a good voice for radio. But she's just not very bright.
Was the next piece in D hash major?
Unlikely. That would be 9 'hashes' for 7 notes.
There's no vibrations, but wait.

Tim Hall

  • Victoria is my queen
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #654 on: 16 June, 2020, 01:23:11 pm »
Mary Anne Hobbs frequently has me shouting at the radio for her mangling of words, but she hit new heights last week when reading the title of a piece as "in E B minor".

I like Mary Anne Hobbs. She plays a good selection of music, and she has a good voice for radio. But she's just not very bright.
Mitchell and Webb. F hashtag minor.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p01mv2zh

(Interestingly (FSVO interstingly...) typing "F hastag minor" into google returned answers for F sharp)
There are two ways you can get exercise out of a bicycle: you can
"overhaul" it, or you can ride it.  (Jerome K Jerome)

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #655 on: 16 June, 2020, 01:47:23 pm »
Mrs Pcolbeck once had a new teacher in the class she is TA for that was straight out of college and was from the Home Counties.
He was trying to teach the kids spelling and pronunciation of new words by matching them with other words that rhymed.
The thing was that almost every pair of words he came up with may have rhymed in Surrey but in North Yorkshire they certainly didn't. Mrs Pcolbeck was crying laughing.
I once read a story of a teacher in similar circumstances whose class informed her that the opposite of "appear" was "down there"...

ian

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #656 on: 16 June, 2020, 02:16:45 pm »
One of those things about growing up a bit pikey in the part of the UK that speaks a dialect that only resembles English to someone who's had an ear candling mishap is that you spend a life being corrected on pronunciation and other little details. Don't you mean?, they'll say, pedantically. As a child, I learned most everything from books so pronunciation often had to be guessed at using the peculiarly tuned phonetics of the region. It wasn't like I could ask my mum how to pronounce 'Achilles' or 'diplodocus' or somesuch and it was before the time you could hit a button and have the computer tell you. Or 'chorizo,' though that had yet to become a menu item, the most exotic thing in the early 1980's East Midlands still came in a box labelled Vesta (not that I was allowed, as it would 'make the house smell', presumably of something other than cigarette smoke and perpetual overcooking, the madeleines of my childhood).

People still do it today, especially with foreign words (and I think often they're making them up, or adding that signature English theatrical flourish). Generally, I smile tolerantly, wait till they turn their backs and murder them. OK, I wouldn't have have done the 'E B minor' – though all I remember from music lessons at my school was the xylophone didn't have a full complement of keys and the C was quite an important omission – but mostly because I used to attempt to play the guitar (I suspect less down to a deep, abiding love for music, but more because my misguided brain thought a series of badly played chords would somehow feature as an aphrodisiac for female company, but anyway, I could play all the notes flat).

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #657 on: 16 June, 2020, 02:21:29 pm »
anyway, I could play all the notes flat).
If you play all the notes flat, you're making a hash of them.


Sorry.


Okay, I'm not really.
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #658 on: 16 June, 2020, 06:27:02 pm »
"A Scientist" on the anbaric distascope referring to those dangly things found in caves as "sta-LAGG-tites".  Get in the sea.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Davef

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #659 on: 16 June, 2020, 06:58:03 pm »
One of those things about growing up a bit pikey in the part of the UK that speaks a dialect that only resembles English to someone who's had an ear candling mishap is that you spend a life being corrected on pronunciation and other little details. Don't you mean?, they'll say, pedantically. As a child, I learned most everything from books so pronunciation often had to be guessed at using the peculiarly tuned phonetics of the region. It wasn't like I could ask my mum how to pronounce 'Achilles' or 'diplodocus' or somesuch and it was before the time you could hit a button and have the computer tell you. Or 'chorizo,' though that had yet to become a menu item, the most exotic thing in the early 1980's East Midlands still came in a box labelled Vesta (not that I was allowed, as it would 'make the house smell', presumably of something other than cigarette smoke and perpetual overcooking, the madeleines of my childhood).

People still do it today, especially with foreign words (and I think often they're making them up, or adding that signature English theatrical flourish). Generally, I smile tolerantly, wait till they turn their backs and murder them. OK, I wouldn't have have done the 'E B minor' – though all I remember from music lessons at my school was the xylophone didn't have a full complement of keys and the C was quite an important omission – but mostly because I used to attempt to play the guitar (I suspect less down to a deep, abiding love for music, but more because my misguided brain thought a series of badly played chords would somehow feature as an aphrodisiac for female company, but anyway, I could play all the notes flat).
Vesta is still available in pretty much the same options as the 80s. As ready meals, by modern standards, they aren’t very ready.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

ian

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #660 on: 16 June, 2020, 07:37:27 pm »
I never had one. I used to gaze at them wistfully in the supermarket only to be dragged away by my mother. To be honest, I was a bit scared too – I never had any kind of 'ethnic' food (not even pretend) till I got to university. We did have a Chinese takeaway when I was growing up (delightfully called the 'Chinky' by everyone, probably still is) though we never went. Obviously. Fish and chips once a week though.

My mother is a bit extreme, she lives entirely off cheese cobs and has done since about 1978 when she ate something she didn't like and decided why take another chance. She refuses to believe that olive oil is for anything but cleaning ears and the colour of curry sauce makes her physically sick. My fathers claimed aversion to garlic is only rivalled by Dracula. But Dracula, I feel sure, is never found halfway through noshing a table-sized family pizza.

T42

  • Apprentice geezer
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #661 on: 17 June, 2020, 09:09:34 am »
Mary Anne Hobbs frequently has me shouting at the radio for her mangling of words, but she hit new heights last week when reading the title of a piece as "in E B minor".

I like Mary Anne Hobbs. She plays a good selection of music, and she has a good voice for radio. But she's just not very bright.
Mitchell and Webb. F hashtag minor.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p01mv2zh

(Interestingly (FSVO interstingly...) typing "F hastag minor" into google returned answers for F sharp)

We had a couple at school we called F sharp major and B flat minor.
I've dusted off all those old bottles and set them up straight

Tim Hall

  • Victoria is my queen
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #662 on: 17 August, 2020, 11:39:36 pm »
Russell Davis, off of Radio 4, just said "di-atoms" when talking about the microscopic algae, known to everyone else as "dia-toms".
There are two ways you can get exercise out of a bicycle: you can
"overhaul" it, or you can ride it.  (Jerome K Jerome)

T42

  • Apprentice geezer
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #663 on: 21 September, 2020, 03:37:05 pm »
Just noticed that the US pronunciation of "futile" sounds almost like "feudal".
I've dusted off all those old bottles and set them up straight

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #664 on: 21 September, 2020, 04:08:13 pm »
The “English”-speaking announcer on the Champs-Elysée yesterday referred to “el-light” cyclists.  TV's are expensive, otherwise mine would have a coffee-mug-shaped hole in the screen.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #665 on: 22 September, 2020, 08:05:25 am »
Just noticed that the US pronunciation of "futile" sounds almost like "feudal".

A Texan saying 'Space Ghetto' sounds exactly like a Glaswegian saying 'Spice Girl'...

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #666 on: 22 September, 2020, 02:51:54 pm »
Just noticed that the US pronunciation of "futile" sounds almost like "feudal".

See also phonetic similarities between a Scottish 'Pearl' and an American 'Petal'. Alveolar tap, innit.

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #667 on: 22 September, 2020, 03:39:41 pm »
... tries saying those with appropriate accent... repeats... improves... grasps!

Thanks Nuncio!

Tim Hall

  • Victoria is my queen
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #668 on: 23 September, 2020, 06:57:54 pm »
I'm getting a new front door. As I live in a leasehold flat the landlord has some say in the matter. It must be a 30 minute fire door, fitted with strips that swell when heated to seal it against smoke. What the door manufacturers and nearly everyone refers to as "intumescent strips". Exceptions to this are the person at the landlord and the Cheery Chippy who both call them "intermittent strips." A sort of part time sealant presumably.
There are two ways you can get exercise out of a bicycle: you can
"overhaul" it, or you can ride it.  (Jerome K Jerome)

Davef

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #669 on: 23 September, 2020, 09:53:04 pm »
Odd word that. I would have thought intumescent was the opposite of tumescent.

hellymedic

  • Just do it!
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #670 on: 23 September, 2020, 09:57:16 pm »
Inflammable is not the opposite of flammable...

Kim

  • Timelord
    • Fediverse
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #671 on: 24 September, 2020, 12:28:22 am »
Exceptions to this are the person at the landlord and the Cheery Chippy who both call them "intermittent strips." A sort of part time sealant presumably.

That's the stuff they use for sealing around shower tiles.

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #672 on: 24 September, 2020, 09:04:16 am »
Inflammable is not the opposite of flammable...
Prompted me to check Merriam-Webster. I'm not sure how representative it is of the President's English, but they list inflame and inflammatory but not "flammatory". Although they do, logically, have flammation. They also say:
Quote
In the early 20th century, firefighters worried that people might think inflammable meant "not able to catch fire," so they adopted flammable and nonflammable as official safety labels and encouraged their use to prevent confusion. In general use, flammable is now the preferred term for describing things that can catch fire, but inflammable is still occasionally used with that meaning as well.
Firefighters, bold in action but worried about words.
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

T42

  • Apprentice geezer
Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #673 on: 24 September, 2020, 10:46:56 am »
Odd word that. I would have thought intumescent was the opposite of tumescent.

It's a different in-, as in information, which isn't the opposite of formation.
I've dusted off all those old bottles and set them up straight

Re: Pronunciation that makes you cringe
« Reply #674 on: 24 September, 2020, 10:58:38 am »
I'm not sure that this is the best thread for this, but anyway: my husband made a cake and informed me that he had used up the last of the "dissected" coconut to do so.