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Ghoti

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Re: Ghoti

#231

Post by Kim_Bruning »

petercooper wrote: post #156
egypturnash wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

American English speakers can have trouble understanding British English speakers too, fwiw. Mostly due to some dramatically different slang and pronunciation rather than use of more obscure words though.

I worked in California for a while and something that kept throwing people off was that I pronounce my "t"s in the English way rather than drop them to "d"s. So it's buTTer and not 'budder', thirTy not 'thirdy', etc. Once I started dropping them to "d"s too, things improved significantly, and I can see why a lot of British YouTubers and geeks develop this 'trans-Atlantic' affectation. Another funny one I ran into a f…

Oh wow, it actually is 8:30 in English. How interesting!

In dutch, half eight is 7:30 too.

7:40 is weird: "ten over half eight"

Re: Ghoti

#232

Post by AmIDev »

livealife wrote: post #170

This is because in English it's not always that you speak what you write. Pronunciation is different for the same letter in different cases. In some languages (mainly Indian) like Hindi, we speak what we write and we write what we speak i.e. Our letters have a definite and unique sounds.

While this is true, the pronunciations are not consistent across languages that use Devanagari script. ज्ञ is pronounced like "gy" in Hindi, but "ny" in Marathi. ज is pronounced like "jy"(with the य sound) in Hindi-ish languages, but without य in Marathi. Some sounds are completely missing/unused is some languages, like ळ and ण.

So non-native speakers with another Devanagari language as mothertongue still get pronunciations wrong.

Re: Ghoti

#233

Post by pinkfoot »

timthorn wrote: post #217
petercooper wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked in California for a while and something that kept throwing people off was that I pronounce my "t"s in the English way rather than drop them to "d"s. So it's buTTer and not 'budder', thirTy not 'thirdy', etc. Once I started dropping them to "d"s too, things improved significantly, and I can see why a lot of British YouTubers and geeks develop this 'trans-Atlantic' affectation. Another funny one I ran into a f…

I also had that problem with the "ew" sound. I'm never understood if I ask for a "Mountain Dew" - I have to translate to "Mountain Doo" even when the context of a drink is clear. The other one is asking for a cheese sandwich - that seems to throw Americans every time.

"Chips" gets them every time.

Re: Ghoti

#234

Post by maest »

082349872349872 wrote: post #224
fermienrico wrote: post #142

Nationalism is rampant and leaking through in this thread. “English” sucks, replace with ______ native tongue is better. Someone posted a thread about cost of their neighborhood road renovation project and immediately an Australian tells the thread that America feels like a third world country from a sample size of exactly 1. I am not even American. Everyone is getting tribal. Humanity is splitting apart with infight…

Nothing wrong with tribalism as long as we're all seeking to understand people from other tribes instead of imposing our own tribe's[1] ways upon them[2]. A little less "melting pot" and a little more "salad"[3] might go a long way towards whirled peas. [1] and even that "own tribe" has a fractal nature. Scratch a dialect and one finds a collection of idiolects. [2] my understanding of swiss german dialect history is…

Your point about the fractal structure of tribalism reminded me of this joke:

I was walking across a bridge one day, and I saw a man standing on the edge, about to jump. I ran over and said: "Stop. Don't do it."

"Why shouldn't I?" he asked.

"Well, there's so much to live for!"

"Like what?"

"Are you religious?"

He said: "Yes."

I said: "Me too. Are you Christian or Buddhist?"

"Christian."

"Me too. Are you Catholic or Protestant?"

"Protestant."

"Me too. Are you Episcopalian or Baptist?"

"Baptist."

"Wow. Me too. Are you Baptist Church of God or Baptist Church of the Lord?"

"Baptist Church of God."

"Me too. Are you original Baptist Church of God, or are you Reformed Baptist Church of God?"

"Reformed Baptist Church of God."

"Me too. Are you Reformed Baptist Church of God, Reformation of 1879, or Reformed Baptist Church of God, Reformation of 1915?"

He said: "Reformed Baptist Church of God, Reformation of 1915."

I said: "Die, heretic scum," and pushed him off.

Re: Ghoti

#235

Post by WickyNilliams »

darkerside wrote: post #166
petercooper wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked in California for a while and something that kept throwing people off was that I pronounce my "t"s in the English way rather than drop them to "d"s. So it's buTTer and not 'budder', thirTy not 'thirdy', etc. Once I started dropping them to "d"s too, things improved significantly, and I can see why a lot of British YouTubers and geeks develop this 'trans-Atlantic' affectation. Another funny one I ran into a f…

My favorite British-ism is, e.g., Monday week. A great simple way of referring to a week from Monday.

Monday week? We would say "a week Monday". Didn't realise this was a British thing! Though I'm Welsh, so perhaps my variation is a Welsh thing.

Re: Ghoti

#236

Post by 082349872349872 »

maest wrote: post #234
082349872349872 wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing wrong with tribalism as long as we're all seeking to understand people from other tribes instead of imposing our own tribe's[1] ways upon them[2]. A little less "melting pot" and a little more "salad"[3] might go a long way towards whirled peas. [1] and even that "own tribe" has a fractal nature. Scratch a dialect and one finds a collection of idiolects. [2] my understanding of swiss german dialect history is…

Your point about the fractal structure of tribalism reminded me of this joke: I was walking across a bridge one day, and I saw a man standing on the edge, about to jump. I ran over and said: "Stop. Don't do it." "Why shouldn't I?" he asked. "Well, there's so much to live for!" "Like what?" "Are you religious?" He said: "Yes." I said: "Me too. Are you Christian or Buddhist?" "Christian." "Me too. Are you Catholic or P…

TIL the great schism in baptism isn't between (a) the baptists who dance, and (o) the baptists who don't have sex standing up because that might lead to dancing. :-)

Here's a nice ecumenical baptist video, sadly (judging by YT views) hidden under a bushel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjLSo3cRh6g

(for HNers who have never lived in the southern US, 0:29 depicts a spit cup. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spittoon

As for myself, I'm with the Popular Front of Judea.)

Re: Ghoti

#237

Post by gholap »

AmIDev wrote: post #232
livealife wrote: post #170

This is because in English it's not always that you speak what you write. Pronunciation is different for the same letter in different cases. In some languages (mainly Indian) like Hindi, we speak what we write and we write what we speak i.e. Our letters have a definite and unique sounds.

While this is true, the pronunciations are not consistent across languages that use Devanagari script. ज्ञ is pronounced like "gy" in Hindi, but "ny" in Marathi. ज is pronounced like "jy"(with the य sound) in Hindi-ish languages, but without य in Marathi. Some sounds are completely missing/unused is some languages, like ळ and ण. So non-native speakers with another Devanagari language as mothertongue still get pronunc…

Also, even within Marathi, at least for the letters ज and च, how you pronounce them depends on the word. You have to know the correct pronunciation beforehand, as it can't really be guessed from the word.

जेजुरी is my favourite example. चिंच is a close second :)

Re: Ghoti

#238

Post by jesseb »

spoiler wrote: post #133

There was also a meme going around that one can spell "potato" like "Ghoughphtheightteeau" with the following explanation: - gh for P as in "hiccough" - ough for O as in "dough" - phth for T as in "phthisis" - eigh for A as in "neighbour" - tte for T as in "gazette" - eau for O as in "plateau" edit: formatting

> hiccough

I've never seen this word before! I've always seen it spelled "hiccup". Is it used in a particular region or do I just live under a rock?

Re: Ghoti

#239

Post by theandrewbailey »

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #230

Once upon a time, I figured out the reason why 'gh' is so inconsistent. It used to be its own sound, but that sound has vanished from the English language. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gh_(digraph)#English 'ti' pronounced as 'sh' is only in french loan words afaict. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Latin-script_digraphs#... I don't yet know how the 'o' in woman becomes an 'i'. When I do, I'll have finally crack…

I'm not an expert, but I suspect that it has something to do with wifmann, Old English for woman.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/wifmann

Re: Ghoti

#240

Post by thefringthing »

imglorp wrote: post #11

If this irritates anyone, you might be interested in the work of George Bernard Shaw and Kingsley Read to reform English spelling. They proposed a consistent, phonetic, spelling and writing system called Shavian and published a now-rare book using that system. The second iteration made some slight usability and efficiency improvements and called the new work Quikscript. Of course, in an alternate universe, this super…

https://www.shavian.info
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