Phrases/words that set your teeth on edge.

[ahinton]

Don't be so damned pedantic, ahinton ...

Pedantic I am not; damned, however, I'm sure I have been, long ago!

[Lat-Literal]

I've always read and pronounced it like "emotive" and "icon", with the short "i" (the same stress and rhythm as "a motor car").

I like the reference to 'a motor car'. That works for me 'musically' and helps me to feel more comfortable with its rhythm.

Astonished that yours is a 'moat' rather than a 'mott' - I doubt most people's are but it does make more sense to me.

Oh for the halcyon days when life was more simple!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Astonished that yours is a 'moat' rather than a 'mott' - I doubt most people's are but it does make more sense to me.

It's the association with "emotion", "motion" "devotion" etc that does it for me - and the "guideline" behind this that a single consonant (the "t") between two vowels (the "o" and the "i") lengthens the vowel sound; for "mott", it'd need a double "t" (as in "bottle"). Not that the guideline is a "rule", as the Vatican will tell you.

(But that's both a proper noun AND foreign! - in most English, it should be "Vattican", as Terence Rattigan would concur.)

[Lat-Literal]

It's the association with "emotion", "motion" "devotion" etc that does it for me - and the "guideline" behind this that a single consonant (the "t") between two vowels (the "o" and the "i") lengthens the vowel sound; for "mott", it'd need a double "t" (as in "bottle"). Not that the guideline is a "rule", as the Vatican will tell you.

(But that's both a proper noun AND foreign! - in most English, it should be "Vattican", as Terence Rattigan would concur.)

Ah yes, very good indeed, fhg. I am increasingly persuaded by 'emoatikon'.

Of course, neither 'Vatican' nor 'Rattigan' have an 'o' and then another 'o' so as to encourage the unsuspecting to pronounce each in the same way!

A female friend once stayed in the same hotel as the football commentator John Motson or 'Motty' as he is referred to affectionately. As coincidence would have it, she shared a lift with him on the way up and the way down. On the third occasion they were to collide at what the Americans would call the elevator doors, she hid diplomatically behind a pot plant in the foyer. She still felt that she was standing out as if thrown onto a screen above the reception desk by a stereopticon but then she is something of a magic lantern in herself.

[french frank]

The 'icon' point is more difficult because there is a computer-linked meaning for 'icon' and it is very close to an 'emoticon' so I think the 'icon' in the latter is Greek, yet I'm willing to bet hardly anyone pronounces it 'emoteyekon'.

The computer meaning is the same as the Greek in having the idea of 'image'. But this is all to do with the stress (and English is heavily stressed, so it matters more in English).

Once you make a single word - emoticon, the single, primary stress will be on a long vowel: in emoticon the stress is on the long o - emóticon. Unstressed vowels in English always tend to get 'swallowed', especially those between the primary and secondary stress ('intertonic' vowels). So if the o is the long stressed vowel, the i can't also be stressed/long if it's part of the same word. I'd say the final o has a slight secondary stress and tends to the sound of an o though not invariably, and the initial e is so short as to become i: immOHticon. The syllables divide as i-MO-ti-con, with the word 'icon' virtually lost. (I think syllables normally divide with Consonant + Vowel).

Soupçon is quite different because it's a French word derived from Latin suspición(em) and carries the Latin stress on the same syllable, the o.

[Lat-Literal]

The computer meaning is the same as the Greek in having the idea of 'image'. But this is all to do with the stress (and English is heavily stressed, so it matters more in English).

Once you make a single word - emoticon, the single, primary stress will be on a long vowel: in emoticon the stress is on the long o - emóticon. Unstressed vowels in English always tend to get 'swallowed', especially those between the primary and secondary stress ('intertonic' vowels). So if the o is the long stressed vowel, the i can't also be stressed/long if it's part of the same word. I'd say the final o has a slight secondary stress and tends to the sound of an o though not invariably, and the initial e is so short as to become i: immOHticon. The syllables divide as i-MO-ti-con, with the word 'icon' virtually lost. (I think syllables normally divide with Consonant + Vowel).

Soupçon is quite different because it's a French word derived from Latin suspición(em) and carries the Latin stress on the same syllable, the o.

Yes, this is very through, many thanks, and I prefer that reading but with 'stereopticon' I am assuming that the 'o' of 'stereo' shortens which is unfortunate.

I guess, though, it could be said that if there is only a place for one long vowel it has to be the second 'e' even if that 'e' is slightly shortened to an 'i' sound?

(The above anecdote is true, incidentally - it happened in the centre of Leeds)

[french frank]

Yes, this is very through, many thanks, and I prefer that reading but with 'stereopticon' I am assuming that the 'o' of 'stereo' shortens which is unfortunate.

The OED gives the derivation as Greek στερεός solid + ὀπτικόν, neuter of ὀπτικός optic, so is not related to the noun εἰκών.

The 'long' vowel here is the ὀπτ (something stirs here about Latin versification, where a vowel followed by consonantal group is counted as 'long'?). The two o's have coalesced, both being o-micron (short o). But I babble garbledly somewhat here

[Serial_Apologist]

The OED gives the derivation as Greek στερεός solid + ὀπτικόν, neuter of ὀπτικός optic, so is not related to the noun εἰκών.

The 'long' vowel here is the ὀπτ (something stirs here about Latin versification, where a vowel followed by consonantal group is counted as 'long'?). The two o's have coalesced, both being o-micron (short o). But I babble garbledly somewhat here

Don't worry frenchie - it's all Greek to me.

[Lat-Literal]

The OED gives the derivation as Greek στερεός solid + ὀπτικόν, neuter of ὀπτικός optic, so is not related to the noun εἰκών.

The 'long' vowel here is the ὀπτ (something stirs here about Latin versification, where a vowel followed by consonantal group is counted as 'long'?). The two o's have coalesced, both being o-micron (short o). But I babble garbledly somewhat here

Well, I think that answers it nicely. Also, the emoticons on this forum are by far the most more attractive ones I have seen.

Thank you to all con-tree-bewt-ers as newsreaders say in commercial radio. You're my dream come true......My consolation.

[ahinton]

I believe that it was Hugh MacDiarmid who said that talent is the worst enemy of genius and someone else whose name I cannot now call to mind said, perhaps mindful of MacDiarmid's observation, that sentimentality is the worst enemy of emotion; I don't doubt the former but, in the latter, sentimentality might well have been overtaken by emoticons in recent times...

[french frank]

Well, I think that answers it nicely. Also, the emoticons on this forum are by far the most more attractive ones I have seen.

'Appen - but you saw most of them somewhere else before here!

[P. G. Tipps]

'Kate' ... when one is rudely and most disrespectfully referring to Her Royal Highness Catherine, The Duchess of Cambridge & Countess of Strathearn.

[Pabmusic]

'Kate' ... when one is rudely and most disrespectfully referring to Her Royal Highness Catherine, The Duchess of Cambridge & Countess of Strathearn.

Where's the WTF? emoticon... (not really good enough)

[cloughie]

I dislike the expression 'just shy of' . What's wrong with 'just under'?

[antongould]

'Kate' ... when one is rudely and most disrespectfully referring to Her Royal Highness Catherine, The Duchess of Cambridge & Countess of Strathearn.

Oh come on Scotty ......