Pronunciation watch

[french frank]

I’d say that what we normally call ‘good English’ is an unwritten codification of what most reasonably educated people say and write in normal circumstances at a particular period.

Indeed. Though you include the phrase 'at a particular period'. Your definition also excludes, obviously, outrageous departures from a norm (as would I). But the fact that it is unwritten introduces an element of uncertainty and militates against the 'fixed rules' notion.

Registers: yes, education too - as in 'educated people' - is nowadays (lovely word!) more widely spread among people of all backgrounds, so that a 'norm' of educated, middle-class, white people, speaking impeccable RP is no longer the 'norm' or aspiration for many. Perhaps, retrospectively, some people will consider the 19th-20th centuries as a 'highpoint' of good English, from which it is rapidly falling back into chaos and anarchy, mumbling incoherence ... hmmm, language would not be the only thing. As with culture, the new generation takes possession and asserts itself. And the older ones resist. The Querelle des anciens et des modernes had wider application than on literature: it was whole way of looking at the world. And grammarians and linguists can be 'descriptive' or 'prescriptive'.

[JFLL]

Indeed....

I think I agree with all that, ff. 'Educated’ at once introduces the notion of prescriptivism – most of us (educated people ) are tempted to say, ‘I was always taught that you should say …’. And if teachers are now unwilling to prescribe, the whole idea of a ‘standard’ may break down. Of course, the absence of a standard wouldn’t be anything new – compare the emergence of the Romance languages after the fall of the Roman Empire, and the emergence of Middle English after the Norman Conquest.

[vinteuil]

OK. Suit would rhyme with boot, coot, hoot, moot, shoot, toot; rather than foot, soot.
But "syooot". Never!

... an earlier generation wd have pronounced 'lute' and 'flute' to rhyme with 'cute' rather than 'coot'; I suspect they pronounced 'suit' similarly. Certainly my great-aunts said 'sioot'


Many decades ago I knew various (now long since dead... ) lutenists who saw their instruments as liuts rather than loots : I suspect the younger generation see themselves as lootanists. Perhaps Richd: Tarleton can advise?

[MrGongGong]

Of course. But when language was largely spoken rather than written, and communication between different regions was more limited, this was inevitable. Now there is less excuse for changes brought about by sloppiness.

I find your insistence that we should all aim to speak exactly the same rather hilarious and doomed to failure and disappointment.

[Beef Oven]

Well it all got norsed-up when the BBC decided to get rid of BBC English and champion regional accents. That was the beginning of the end of regional accents. Sometimes Leveller policies turn out to be flatteners instead

[kernelbogey]

Of course much (most?) 'written' language is now composed on either a QWERTY keyboard or a twelve-button phone-pad. The influence of texting and tweeting brings in a whole new standard. This results in common abbreviations like B4, msg, txt etc drifting into written language. So 4=four is now seen in trademarks, shop signs et al. (And how many under 18s could explain etc and et al?) So there's the elegant hard-wired argument; but there's also the influence of technology - of which we have but seen, BTW, only the beginnings, IMHO .)

[vinteuil]

OK. Suit would rhyme with boot, coot, hoot, moot, shoot, toot; rather than foot, soot.
But "syooot". Never!

... an earlier generation wd have pronounced 'lute' and 'flute' to rhyme with 'cute' rather than 'coot'; I suspect they pronounced 'suit' similarly. Certainly my great-aunts said 'sioot'

... checking in my old OED I see that "sioot" is the only pronunciation they recognize.

Clearly it's all these "lazy, sloppy" speakers who have 'simplified' the modern pronunciation to "sooot"

[arancie33]

... checking in my old OED I see that "sioot" is the only pronunciation they recognize.

Clearly it's all these "lazy, sloppy" speakers who have 'simplified' the modern pronunciation to "sooot"

I have no idea of the possible historic reasons but do recall that in the USA Tuesday is pronounced as "Toosday" while Houston is "Hyooston", both the reverse of our (well, my) pronounciation.

[french frank]

I have no idea of the possible historic reasons but do recall that in the USA Tuesday is pronounced as "Toosday" while Houston is "Hyooston", both the reverse of our (well, my) pronounciation.

Now, I would say Hyooston. And I'm definitely undecided about suitable, or does that suit you? I can hear myself saying syoot...

Ed: Online OED hedges its bets with /s(j)uːt/ - helpfully suggesting that (j) is as in nuclear ...

[Pabmusic]

Form John Humphrys' "Lost for Words":-

'I shall probably not go as far as the little boy who, it is said, disliked a book about Australia that his mother was fond of reading to him at bedtime and finally demanded, "What have you brought that book I don't like being read to out of about Down Under up for?"'

Yes, I know; I've quoted it before, but it's a classic.

I know it, but...it is.

[vinteuil]

as in nuclear ...

... you mean it's not 'nucular'? I could have sworn that both Geo: W: Bush and Homer Simpson - both experts in the matter - always said 'nucular' ... . .

[Pabmusic]

Alps: BTW - speaking as one pedant to another - shouldn't it be John Humphreys's?

I'll add my two penn'orth here. It depends on how it's to be pronounced. John Humphrys's should be 'Humphrys-is', which would be unidiomatic.

[amateur51]

... you mean it's not 'nucular'? I could have sworn that both Geo: W: Bush and Homer Simpson - both experts in the matter - always said 'nucular' ... . .

Who wants to tackle 'alumin[i]um'?

[Pabmusic]

Who wants to tackle 'alumin[i]um'?

How about me, Ams? Humphrey Davy christened it alumium, in line with other elements he'd isolated (potassium, sodium, magnesium, calcium, and strontium). Then he changed his mind and called it aluminium - I don't know why (the ore was called alum, so his original seems correct). Noah Webster, as usual not liking the British version, included it in his 1828 dictionary as alumium. This wasn't popular with American scientists, who continued to use aluminium into the 1890s. But gradually alumium took hold and is now the standard American word.

However, in 1990, the International Convention for Making Up Chemical Names* decided aluminium was the one, but noted that aluminum was an acceptable alternative. No-one has resurrected alumium.

*[This isn't their real name - doesn't that surprise you? - but I can't recall the real one.]

[amateur51]

How about me, Ams? Humphrey Davy christened it alumium, in line with other elements he'd isolated (potassium, sodium, magnesium, calcium, and strontium). Then he changed his mind and called it aluminium - I don't know why (the ore was called alum, so his original seems correct). Noah Webster, as usual not liking the British version, included it in his 1828 dictionary as alumium. This wasn't popular with American scientists, who continued to use aluminium into the 1890s. But gradually alumium took hold and is now the standard American word.

However, in 1990, the International Convention for Making Up Chemical Names* decided aluminium was the one, but noted that alumium was an acceptable alternative. No-one has resurrected alumium.

*[This isn't their real name - doesn't that surprise you? - but I can't recall the real one.]

Oh silly me, I thought the Americans called it aluminum (aloo-minum) and we mocked them and we wuz wrong