As a non-native english speaker (french), I was pronouncing those words wrong I guess: debt, doubt, plumber, subtle, indict, and island
How were you saying "indict"?
Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
41–50 of 338 posts
Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
#42Oh this is the place where I can finally rant about _aesthetic_, the favourite word for most music/art/movie content creators I've watched in the 2020s, one everybody mispronounces and reads it as "asthetic" which annoys me to no end, because it is totally WRONG. And I keep hearing it daily, which is maddening. "Ae" is supposed to be one sound, like the vowel sound in "egg". The "a" is silent. I'm terribly afraid eve…
Do you pronounce it ayesthetic?
To my ears it's the most beautiful when you replace "ae" with the "e" sound from "meh".
Eh-stetic
Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
#43Merriam Webster is blaming old school prescriptivists? But I have some doubts. You have the closely related word 'debit' in several languages where you do pronounce the 'b'. I'm surprised they're saying that old english 'dette' is of no relation, but ok then. In the case of 'subtle', the dutch cognate 'subtiel' definitely does pronounce the 'b'.
Seems a bit of a mish-mash. "Subtle" is definitely of latin origin, and most romance languages still pronounce the b - per the article, "debt" is actually in the same ballpark. "Island" however is of proto-germanic origins (ieg, iegland) and the coincidence with latin "insula" which later gave French "isle" and from there English "isle" is accidental. [0] https://www.etymonline.com/word/island Edit: note about debt t…
Minor correction: it's also "subtil" in Portuguese.
Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
Seems a bit of a mish-mash. "Subtle" is definitely of latin origin, and most romance languages still pronounce the b - per the article, "debt" is actually in the same ballpark. "Island" however is of proto-germanic origins (ieg, iegland) and the coincidence with latin "insula" which later gave French "isle" and from there English "isle" is accidental. [0] https://www.etymonline.com/word/island Edit: note about debt t…
Minor correction: it's also "subtil" in Portuguese.
Google translate must have failed me here... It claims "sutil".
Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you pronounce it ayesthetic?
To my ears it's the most beautiful when you replace "ae" with the "e" sound from "meh". Eh-stetic
It's not just a matter of beautiful, it is correct.
Ah-stetic on the other hand is wrong, widespread and the reason of my crusade.
Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
#46Oh this is the place where I can finally rant about _aesthetic_, the favourite word for most music/art/movie content creators I've watched in the 2020s, one everybody mispronounces and reads it as "asthetic" which annoys me to no end, because it is totally WRONG. And I keep hearing it daily, which is maddening. "Ae" is supposed to be one sound, like the vowel sound in "egg". The "a" is silent. I'm terribly afraid eve…
>I'm terribly afraid everybody will learn the wrong way of saying it, and the correct way will go extinct. Is that really so bad?
My life is pretty boring at the moment, we all need something to pass the time.
Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
There very much is a 't' sound in 'often,' but it depends on how you talk (whether or not there was before, language changes). If you're saying native speakers are saying it wrong, then I don't know what to tell you.
I would only pronounce the t when emphasizing the word.
That and if you need to hit the back of an auditorium without a mic.
Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
#48Oh this is the place where I can finally rant about _aesthetic_, the favourite word for most music/art/movie content creators I've watched in the 2020s, one everybody mispronounces and reads it as "asthetic" which annoys me to no end, because it is totally WRONG. And I keep hearing it daily, which is maddening. "Ae" is supposed to be one sound, like the vowel sound in "egg". The "a" is silent. I'm terribly afraid eve…
In American English, unlike British English, œ and æ have mostly been collapsed into e. Compare encyclopaedia, foetus, faeces, diarrhoea, oestrogen. (But exceptions spelt the same way in both dialects: phoenix, oeconomics). If you'd like to encourage what you consider the correct pronunciation, I'd suggest favouring the spelling esthetic , which I do see but less commonly.
If they've collapsed, neither AmE nor BrE speakers got the memo, as I've heard it mispronounced by both. Non-native speakers on the other hand tend to pronounce it correctly, as it's a common diphthong in other languages, such as French.
Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
#49Nobody in some nobodyland. Majority in the world would. It is safer to pronounce English as it written and just modify on well-known cases. Especially when two non-natives speak two each other. "Fancy" pronunciation can make things impossible, as only native speakers can understand where you are aiming at.
This is true to the bone. It's hilarious how many native speakers ignore this - even knowingly. It also goes beyond pronunciation into local slang and choice of vocabulary.
In my experience "Native Speakers" often don't understand each other correctly (of course random ones, from different parts of world) - plenty of tiny misunderstandings due to the tempo of conversation. 5 random non-native speakers may have all bad accents but they speak freely. When a native speaker joins the room the other 5 suddenly say they can't keep up and native speaker doesn't know how to fix that. I'm not even generalizing - seen it in practice many times.
I find it very true in daily technical conversations with other companies, conferences and on any type of trainings (online courses as well). Non native speakers tend to get to the point more easily. It's easier for themselves. Then don't try to dazzle you with funny wordplay and jokes that make no sense outside of speakers country. It takes a lot of skill for a native speaker to be pleasant for foreigners.
Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'
#50English is spoken by more non-native speakers than native, and often they pronounce those letters since they don't know about it. With that in mind, I wonder if the language will eventually evolve to a point where the "b" of "debt" and other silent letters are no longer considered silent.
Interesting question, which will correct spelling or pronunciation... Coming from language that has almost perfect mapping between the two English never made any sense to me. And I think it is clearly field that should be fixed in either way.