You can change the spelling of one word in the English language to match how they are pronounced. What word do you pick?
I'm picking "Colonel" needs to be respelled to match how it's pronounced.
Try to pick a word no one else has picked. What word are you respelling?
In this thread, a lot of folks who would use their one wish to make the language better.
But I would change "their" to be spelled "the're" and pronounced "all'y'all's".
I hope I do grow up to be more like the rest of you, and make better choices, in the future.
People like you being in charge is how English got to this position in the first place!
Your rite, and I regret my choices.
twitch
I would expect nothing less, MajorHavoc 🫡
Nesscary
...Neccisary
.......Neseccary
Fuck it, it's now "Nesisary"
"Needed"
Do the needful.
Required
English is a second language to me, and at this point it's probably the only commonly used word I consistently mess up. It usually ends up something like 'nessecairy'
Totally understandable, one of a handful of English words that I both know are spelled “wrongL and also have to put conscious thought into spelling before I write it.
Can never remember how to spell this absolute fuckery of a word. I concur.
Necessary is literally spelt how it's pronounced though.
I'm not sure you meant this as a joke but it is funny.
Learning yet another irregular pronunciation because some N-hundred years ago their majesty Shithead von Cunt wanted to sound fancy and everyone just played along is not funny.
cries, not knowing how to properly pronounce most English words
That’s a bit unesesary
Necessary? I would have never thought of any of those weird spellings. It's spelled like it's said lol.
wait was it nesisary or nesusary.
nesesary? nesasary? nesysary?
English orthography is awful. Hard "c" AND soft "c"? Are you crazy? How about that "k" that is already the hard c sound? It should be "kat" and "kar". And it only goes downhill from there (or their?!?).
We should clean it up someday. But we'll probably end up with LOL-WTF-speak.
Some of the low hanging fruit would just be to pick one pronunciation of "oo" and stick with it:
The problem is that English has far more vowel sounds than vowels. And that's without even having certain sounds that are common in other languages like "ü".
Linguistics would teach that it is the orthography that is flawed. The English language has many vowel sounds, more than most languages. But as you demonstrate, the orthography "lumps" many of them together. Which, again, is why I think English orthography is awful.
There's a great article at Wikipedia, scroll down to the "Vowels" section: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English\_phonology
There's a link the the article above to this page, which I don't suggest viewing on your phone. It has a great effort to document vowels across dialects of English, scroll down again to the huge table: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International\_Phonetic\_Alphabet\_chart\_for\_English\_dialects
Be careful, the linguistics "rabbit hole" is deep (but fascinating)!
Thanks, I really like the IPA and I wish it were something that was taught in high school. It would be great if people were competent at reading it and could maybe use it to explain how something sounds. It's hard enough that English has such flawed orthography. Then you add the fact that there are dozens of English dialects and it only makes things more complicated.
Do you know about Dr. Geoff Lindsey's YouTube channel?
https://www.youtube.com/@DrGeoffLindsey
It's not all bad. The varied spellings of English help with visual pattern recognition and increased reading speed.
That must have already happened and we got the Geordie accent from it!
Macabre. Why do you need two silent letters?
Just change the entire french language while you're at it
Blame the French.
Please wait in the queue with four unpronounced letters
I always pronounce this "quayway"
British English voices those letters in most accents. I think the two silent letters is just a North American thing.
Similar to herb.
Not saying you're wrong at all, it's not exactly a common word to hear said out loud. But I've never heard anyone do this and the very idea of it blows my mind.
(NE England, here)
The last syllable is usually pretty subtle, like the br- in bread, but very quietly voiced. I'd say I hear it maybe 75% of the time I hear the word. Currently in Yorkshire, via SW England, London and NW England. The syllable is a lot less subtle in a West Yorks accent!
Did you learn French at GCSE level? Possibly there's a relationship between that and pronouncing the re like that in French-derived words. Cadre is another example. If it is related to learning French, then it's probably on the decline as French teaching is on the decline and foreign languages are no longer compulsory at GCSE.
Clearly I need to work this word into more conversations with people and listen closely! That said I only just found out recently that most of the country pronounces the middle weekday as "Wensday" so contrary to stereotypes I think we might be the ones talking properly up here 😉
(schools around me were generally an even split between French and German for GCSE, dunno how that affects your theory, also I had no idea languages were going away from school and this makes me sad to learn)
"queue", 4/5 letters are silent.
Ma-carb, much better
Comfterble
Kumfirtubble
But saying "com-fidi-ble" is so much more fun
Might start an argument but:
GIF -> GHIF
It’s actually pronounced “JIF”
It stands for the Jraphics Interchange Format
Giraffics? 🦒
JIF is peanut butter
Jif is a surface cleaner.
“It’s a floor wax.”
“It’s a dessert topping.”
“It’s a floor wax.”
“It’s a dessert topping.”
Linux is a detergent.
so is Barf
I'd rather use Linux than Barf on my clothes!
Jolly Image Format
https://youtu.be/Nrk8sqZfsgI?si=20rIrWuZbuPPeJua
GH as in "laugh"? People'd start flame wars over whether "FIF" is the intended pronunciation...
It's aluminium you stupid Americans.
Only cuz y'all changed it to that
The global sciences community decided on a name change, only one country decided to be contrary.
only one country decided to stay true to the discoverer's chosen name
Ftfy
Platinium too?
I only know that you say it that way because Jonny Ive talked about the design of a laptop more than a decade ago. Frankly, I think you're right.
The American spelling matches the American pronunciation, and it was one of the original variations of the word. Americans didn't pick it out of nowhere.
That's more akin to saying "it's spelled aubergine, not eggplant, you stupid Americans".
Arkinsaw
"Arkansas" and "Kansas" are both from the Osage language, but the former passed through French on its way to English.
i'm from somewhere in europe and always wondered why you guys would pronounce those two so different!
America has a lot of place names that come from Native American / First Nations languages; but they also come via different European languages.
And some of those names are actually words that refer to a different Native group. "Arkansas" and "Kansas" are from the Osage word for the Quapaw people. The name of the Snake River between Oregon and Idaho is a translation of the name that Plains people used to refer to the Shoshone: they were the "snake people" and that wasn't a compliment.
I've heard that, but "Ar Kan Saw" is nothing like how a French person would pronounce "Arkansas"
That is interesting. Do you have a source?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkansas
Since Queue has already been posted: Quay. Now spelled Kee.
You and I pronounce 'quay' very differently.
How do you pronounce it? I had some American tourists ask me for directions to the "kway" before. Only time I've ever heard a different pronunciation.
I've always heard it pronounced kway... Is that wrong?
I can't say really. Where I live (Ireland) it's definitely pronounced "kee" but where you live "kway" might be correct. Fascinating stuff!
That's wrong, even in the US.
It's pronounced kway in a Pavement song.
It's pronounced "kaye" in a Pogues song, but songs aren't a good indication of pronunciation...poetic license reigns.
Hell, "reigns" is another candidate word.
In my dictionary spelling is [ki:] so like "kee"
kɛɪ 🤷
Worcestershire
Got any wash yer sister sauce?
Wustersherr
I just wish we spelled things in a more German-'esk' fashion. They use K more appropriately. Examples such as "panik" and "akkordeon" for accordion. I find their spelling to be more straightforward and sensical.
German has the awesome ability to just shove words together to make new words and the language accepts it. It's unambiguous (so I understand).
This is another great opportunity to promote a book that I enjoyed as a fan of language:
Highly Irregular: Why Tough, Through, and Dough Don't Rhyme―And Other Oddities of the English Language
Interview with the author here (got me to buy the book):
In 1920, a Dutch writer named Gerard Nolst Trenité published a poem in English titled The Chaos, designed to draw attention to English spelling and pronunciation — and all the confusion its absurdities have let loose upon the world. It begins “Dearest creature in creation; Studying English pronunciation; I will teach you in my verse; Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse” and ends: “Hiccough has the sound of ‘cup’…. My advice is—give it up!”
Thou shalt spell the word "Pheonix" P-H-E-O-N-I-X, not P-H-O-E-N-I-X, regardless of what the Oxford English Dictionary tells you.
feenicks
Fenix, like the dude from StarCraft?
Dan Le Sac - sweet reference.
Oasis, just a band
The Beach Boys? Just a band.
Nirvana?
Wednesday to Windsday or Wensday.
Totally not me having problems spelling that word at 29.
What IS that D doing THERE?
Wait you don't pronounce the D? You just say wennesday?
Most people that say the d flip the n and d to wendsday
Or closer to the founding fathers' intent: Wotan's Day
Odinsday
Though shall now be spelled: Tho.
to rhyme with Pho?
No, it doesn't rhyme with "Duh?"
Y tho?
Idk my bff jill?
Aisle should become something like ile.
Ressepee
I like this one because I instantly knew what word it was despite it having a brand new spelling. Almost like letters should have meanings.
I was wondering if Reese pee was liquid peanut butter for a moment.
English isn't my native language. I thought for years (and I'm talking of 10+) it would be pronounced "ree-sipe".
I think the main issue with this is that pronunciation changes over time, in addition to varying by area. So if we keep changing the spelling, written works will became unreadable faster.
But I would suggest that any band names that use umlauts/foreign letters should be pronounced accordingly.
Motörhead still kind of works.
Oh boy, a word wouldn't be enough.
I would make English as consistent as Spanish is regarding phonetical consistency, or even more.
Oh, you have never seen this word ever before and you don't know how to pronounce it? No worries, these universal rules will allow you just get it right, because letters always sound the same!
“Spanish regarding phonetical consistency”
Checking in from Oaxaca
I dunno, Oaxaca seems pretty straightforward. oa is pronounced kinda like "ua", I guess, but midword x is usually a "hh" sound anyway so that's the only slightly weird thing.
The only one they changed is the double l. ll to sounds like a y. But in some circles they consider that a seperate letter to the Spanish alphabet. Overall it is fairly consistent.
Even better, Spanish words are typically broken into two (or is it to or too) letter syllables.
All those words that are pronounce the same but have completely different meanings. Particularly the common words.
To two too
No know
Their there
By buy bye
Then there there ones spelt the same but two different meanings and silent letters to even be better.
Go right, you're right.
Didn't know how messed up English spelling/pronunciation is till I started to learn Spanish and nearly every word is pronounced exactly as spelled.
N'SYNC intensifies
Not knot naught
Highpurrbolley.
I pronounced it hyper-bowl in my head for a loooong time until I had to say it out loud one time and got laughed at.
As someone who read a lot as a child I still find myself saying hyperbowl. I'd certainly heard the correct pronunciation but it wasn't until very late that I made the connection to the word I'd learned by reading.
I was it my 30s before I found how to say it properly. It really doesn’t help that hyperbolic is spoken properly. Hy-per-bol-ic. Damn you written words.
Jraphics
I can't help but pronounce this like Jurassic
Segue
I always trip over that one and start reading it as French.
I just learned last month I've been doing the same thing and mispronouncing it for over three decades. But it's Italian!
In the uncut version of Romeo and Juliet, there was a vague segue to a Montague tongue.
tongue, there's another fucker, I tells ya
Problem is that when you write it as pronounced, it becomes segway. Which just makes me think of those two-wheeled scooter thingies.
Seg-Yoo
That's how my coworkers were pronouncing it, til I pointed out... Who knew how long that was going for, lol
The now-defunct electric scooter company spelled it as it should be, Segway.
Gif
The gargantuan giraffe gallops his gigantic body to the gutter.
It is a G. It isn't that hard.
A soft-G gif believer! Heretic!
February. (US pronunciation)
Wednesday
Ghoti
Diarrhea.
The pronunciation already matches the spelling!
Starts like "diary" the journal, ends like "rhea" the bird.
Then consider the British-English version of the word, diarrhoea :)
Why the extra o?
@thelsim
when they were transcribing it, the man speaking gagged
Cha cha cha
Oooohhhh that took me back
Diary uh
Arkansaw.
IF KANSAS IS PRONOUNCED "KANSAS"
THEN WHY ISN'T ARKANSAS PRONOUNCED "ARKANSAS"
the article 'the' - ðə
Bah, I always forget eth is different in IPA than how it was used in Old English.
Yacht. Yot.
English really lacks some throat-fricative analogue to the Greek chi (χʼ). Shoud be yaχt in the graχt. imo.
queue
But that's already pronounced how it's spelled...
Ah yes good old queweyouwe
Okay, I'll grant you, the second ue could've been trimmed in editing. I always viewed it like the ue in monologue but it's clearly of a different sort.
I'll go downvote myself now.
No, it would just be 'q'. Right now, I would pronounce it kay-way maybe.
Cue-y-hue-y is what the current spelling suggests, tbh.
It only gets spelled correctly when it's a pseudo queue (>!sudoku!<).
Qway-Way
There were so many that bothered me but now, when called out, I can only think of a few...
Lingerie
Miscellaneous
Subpoena
Lawngeray definitely makes it less appealing.
Werk.
Work is not how people pronounce it.
Fish as Ghoti
What's the o from
women
Keesh
Easy: Bologna
What do you mean? It's already written the closest to pronunciation, there's no ń sound in English really, perhaps knee is the only example
I'm guessing they think it's pronounced balony
How so?
BECAUSE OSCAR MEYER HAS A WAY WITH B-O-L-O-G-N-A
Belownya
Skwirl because now one knows how to spell squirrel.thank you auto-correct.
If you ever have an opportunity, try to get German people to say Squirrel. It's why it was used as a shibboleth in WWII.
Oh man the various English' pronunciashuns ...
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SfhKldRKmo8
I failed to read the the poem properly.
This language is just... ugh.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/watch?v=N5NQa10XMn0
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source, check me out at GitHub.
Good Bod! Now see what thou doeth.
Queue.
So, Q?
Careful, Picard.
I’m honestly amazed “alot” hasn’t been made an acceptable spelling of “a lot” by now.
There's another word that British people would like to add aswell.
Mandatory Hyperbole And Half
Lieutenant (leftenant)
Add colonel to that. Like wtf, where are you getting the extra letters from?
Fun fact: Lieutenant literally means "placeholder."
https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/w/naval-traditions-names-of-rank/officer/lieutenant.html
Worcestershire sauce
That is already spelled how it's pronounced
Worce, ster, shire
Then just speed up the way you say it
No in the U.K. it ain’t.
Whoo-ster-sher.
I'm from the uk, and that is almost exactly what i put down, worce some like whuss
Woosta MA would beg to differ.
Lincoln
Pneumonia
OOF Pneumonia.
Like, what a cursed word. How would you even spell that? Nuhmownyuh?
Newmoanyuh
Epitome
Scythe
Jewelry
Iron
Cologne
Receipt
CHARCUTERIE, what a fucking stupid word
Realtor. My wife still says "Real-uh-ter"
Zealot (think "Zellers 🍁") I'm tired of people pronouncing my username as "Zee-Lot"
-I know there's more that piss me off, I'll be back
Charcuterie is French for charcuterie.
What's the French word for "entrepreneur" then smarty pants.
"le bweesnesshomme"
"Sure". For crying out loud. Who came up with this.
Sean would like a word..
Whenever I say Sean Bean I pronounce "Sean" like you would pronounce "Bean" and "Bean" like "Sean"
So I call him Seen Bawn and it's 100% grammatically correct
Sin Bon?
Have you seen Shawn?
Shawn!?!?
The same ones who did sugar.
Caulk.
You sick bastard I work at lowes
I'd spell cache as cache so Australians know it's pronounced like "cash" not like "kaysch".
I think autocorrect butchered that one, cousin.
Nope, cache should be spelled cache so people know it's pronounced as cache.
I refuse to pronounce it that way. But at least "kaysch" sounds better than "cash-ay"
I'm not sure it sounds any better than cayshe, but cash-ay is very wrong. There is also a French word "cachet" which gives us the English word "cachet" which is pronounced "cash-ay" similar to how the French word "cache" gives us the English word "cache", but there's no reason to pronounce cache as cachet.
I'll accept that, only as long as Americans learn that route is pronounced "root", not "rout".
... I pronounce route as root. But I pronounce rerouted like rout. Huh.
Psoriasis. Eczema. Emphysema.
You doing okay buddy?
He just had too many of those drug ads on his feed lately
Quinoa
This one has the correct pronunciation in Spanish, because quinoa is from South America. Despite having pronounced this incorrectly when I first heard about it, I'd like to keep this spelling, because Spanish spelling is so much more consistent than English.
keen wa
Salmon as Samon
My poor GF knows English as a second language and was very embarrassed when I pointed out the L was silent, because she had been saying it that way her entire life.
But mostly to her parents who also speak Spanish, so mostly she was embarrassed that I had to tell her XD In Spanish you pronounce the L, so she didn't even consider that the L was silent in English (Because why would it be).
The L shouldn’t even be there in the first place. Why is it there just talking up unnecessary space?
Because without it, It would need to be replaced with another m to sound the same. Otherwise it would sound like same-on
I pronounced sword as svord up until 11, from self-learning D&D from an early age.
Subtle
I am deffinetly picking this one.
Choir .. how would you spell it? Quier?
kwire
Kwyre
Koar... Koir... Koair... Koayre... Egh I'm not improving it am I
Tough though thought....and knife know etc
apparently » apparantly
and all other "parent" words, like transparent and so on
We should just omit those schwa letters like Apar'ntly.
Rendezvous. Get the fuck outta here, you look like rendezzvuss.
Randeyvoo?
I also think Colonel needs to be changed
I'd change "I" to "pxmipexokal" just to screw over everyone's typing speed.
We’d just abbreviate it like pxmilexokal
"next, what your gonna do is...."
NOW.
Also: "so what I'm going to do now is I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to X".
"I'm going to X".
Lasagna, now pronounced how it looks!
It already is. gn makes a "nnya" or "nnya" sound, as seen in other words like sfolgnino or gnocchi.
Oh, TIL!
It’s two, but I’m just gonna swap ‘sweat’ and ‘sweet’ spellings.
Restaurant.
Can't spell it without spell check
It should be restrant
Or restaront, depending on your accent
Cough
"separate" to "seperate"
Blood. Looks like wood but you would be wrong.
It's like how laughter and slaughter don't rhyme.
Might as well do food while you're at it.
In some of the accents around here, blood, wood and food do rhyme, more or less.
And, in the other direction : lose.
Fone
Manure
ma-newer
I feel like I would much prefer the ability to change the way a word is pronounced to match the way it is written.
Well which word would you pick for that?
Do I have an alphabet for you! Ever heard of the IPA No, it's not just a beer!
Wouldn't fuck with it. The road to hell is paved with good intentions
garunteed
Yosemite to Yos-e-mite.
Too shall now be spelled to
Lieutenant → Lefttennet
Laff
Seems like that absolute lot here are just American Vs British pronunciation, and for me, who learned the British version make 0 sense.
First of all, you want to replace the way "coronel" is pronounced to match the spelling, not the other way around.
Second, I'd do "bass" and kill two birds right there and then.
The fish can keep the spelling, but the low pitched sound needs to change.
Drop the bayz!
Knight just got the lulz
Lieutenant should be changed to Leftenant while we’re at it.
Lewtenant if you’re American.
Draught. Seems we've already respelt it as "draft".
Vehicle