Embarking on and embracing this next chapter of my life where I start the great adventure of becoming a grandmother.
Friday, January 5, 2018
Pet Peeves and Channeling my Grandmother
With having Fibromyalgia, I find it really hard to sleep at night so I watch a lot of cooking shows on PBS along with other home improvement type shows. I set the timer on my TV and I pray that I will drift off to sleep while the show is on. Having someone talking in the background helps to calm my mind and "occupy it" so that my mind is not racing with my own thoughts. Most of the time I am relaxing and all is well until someone mispronounces a simple word and then I am wide awake again. I have found this to be true with certain YouTubers who do cooking videos also.
Maybe it is because I am NOT feeling well that I have finally reached my "fed up" point when it comes to this. I mean how hard is it to pronounce ONION or ASK? Now I understand why my grandmother would get so upset with us for mispronouncing things...yes, we used to refer to her as the Grammar Police, but the older I get, the more I understand where she was coming from. She used to say that someone who was able to speak correctly just sounded more intelligent than someone who repeatedly mispronounces things even after they have been gently corrected. Employers do take note of these things. So, to help out, I have links to how to properly pronounce these words in this post. Maybe some of those American born and raised and English as their first language food show experts on PBS should take note...just saying. 😉 Why is it that people from other countries who come here and learn to speak English frequently pay more attention to how to correctly pronounce words than those who are native speakers of the English language?
So here is the deal...ONION is pronounced "un yin". https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/pronunciation/english/onion It is not "ung yun" Do you see a g in the word onion? Nope, not there.
How about the word ASK? It is not pronounced "acks". https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/pronunciation/english/ask There is no X sound in there...none.
Now before someone goes biting my head off, I do realize that there are some words that can be hard to pronounce like worcestershire because of the silent letters in it. For the record, I looked that up too because I had trouble with it for the longest time. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/pronunciation/english/worcestershire-sauce For full disclosure, I also speak Pidgen English (it is widely spoken in Hawaii and combines word from many different languages along with some of its own), which has officially been recognized as a foreign language. I am very careful to make sure to pronounce those words correctly when I am speaking with others who are speaking Pidgen English so that we can understand each other. I also appreciate it when someone gently corrects me if I am not pronouncing something correctly. I realize that there may be regional dialects in play, but onion and ask are not words that commonly have different pronounciations like pecan, tomato, potato for example.
Blame it on the Fibro pain, blame it on my stuffy head that feels like it is in a vice today, blame it on my severe lack of sleep, blame it on whatever...but darn it, how hard is it to pronounce those two simple words? I can just see my Grandmother cringing every time someone does this.
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I was raised first generation Swedish. My mother's English was fluent, she even spoke without an accent. As a teacher she constantly corrected us with "speak the Kings's English" My father however who spoke 6 languages was almost impossible to understand.
ReplyDeleteMy grandmother was a teacher also, as was my great grandfather, my mother and then me. ;)
DeleteOh I agree. There are some words that drive me nuts. The ask - ax thing makes me crazy. And the store name is Walmart - not Walmarts!! Some people put an S at the end of all kinds of words and not for possession as we were taught in school!
ReplyDeleteThat is one of my pet peeves as well.
Haha! Love the Walmarts comment. I have heard it referred to as "The Walmart" as in "We are going to The Walmart". That drives me nuts too!
DeleteI will always be grateful to my English teacher, Ms Veazey. I can still hear her saying " It is pillow, window not piller or winder--do you see er at the end of those words-- my eyes see ow." I cringe when I hear those words mispronounced. Thank you Ms Veazey, I was listening.
ReplyDeleteMy father once caused all kinds of confusion for my sons when he asked for a "wench" meaning a wrench. My mother and I cracked up laughing at the looks on the faces of my sons and had to explain to them that Grandpa forgets to pronounce his r letters in some words and just randomly throws them in to other like instead of saying washer he says warsher. My mother says it must be an "Ohio" thing because lots of people there do that and that is where dad was raised. :)
DeleteAt our house, it makes us CRAZY when people end their sentences with at. Where are you at? Grrrr...It makes me crazy to even write it! I also refuse to use shorthand when I text. You is not spelled u. See, you got me going! My hairs on fire!
ReplyDeleteDebbie
LOL! Now go pour some water on that beautiful hair and put the fire out! ;)
DeleteLately I have been hearing the words wander and wonder used as if the definition was the same for both of them. I've also noticed the words then and than used incorrectly. I am not sure if this is something that has just started happening recently, or if I have just begun noticing it more.
ReplyDeleteI think in the age of computers and smart phones that kids just assume that whatever they write down will be corrected so they don't even put the time of effort into learning the differences between the meanings of the words anymore.
DeleteHi Debbie! :)
ReplyDeleteI don't like to hear mispronounced words either, it makes me cringe.
A few years ago, I had a co-worker that mispronounced some words and I tried to gently correct her, but she kept saying them wrong anyway.
And another one, said "Folodedeu" and when I asked her what that word meant and she told me, I realized that she meant FORT LAUDERDALE. When I told her the correct way to pronounce the word, she just yelled at me, saying that her way, was the right way. Ok then...
But I apologize in advance, for any mispronounced or misspelled words!
Have a great weekend and I hope you feel better today!
:)
Hi Paula...her pronunciation of Fort Lauderdale would have thrown me off too. ;) Sorry she yelled at you when you were just trying to help her. I frequently misspell words (part of my learning disability) but I do try to catch my mistakes and am really happy when people point them out to me if I have missed them. Sometimes in my Fibro Fog moments I will totally screw things up because I know what I want to say but it comes out all garbled both from my mouth and online here when I type it all out. ;)
DeleteHi, yes I do hate sloppy language but over here in the uk we do pronounce some word differently, ie onion is pronounced unyon and tomato is tomarto, but in Britain this can change depending on which part of the uk you come from. I worked with a girl fron Newcastle she said bus ,bous but I pronounce it bus. Language is a funny thing.
ReplyDeleteYou are right Chris, language is a funny thing. :)
DeleteLOL LOL Let me ax you a question is one of my pet peeves too. And it seems the younger generation is dropping all the t's from words such as : mountain, clinton, etc
ReplyDeleteI have noticed that too, but also with people in my generation.
DeleteI, too, have the tv on sleep mode to fall asleep. My favorite show is anything with Daniel Amon on PBS. Second best is the 'spa music' channel.
ReplyDeletePet peeves. Mine center on people on the food shows talking while they're tasting. Ick. I was taught not to talk with my mouth full. I was also taught how to hold a knife and fork 'properly' while eating. Seems no one is taught table manners any more. That's my soap box speech.
Hope you can get some rest and start feeling better.
SJ
LOL! I can't stand that either SJ! It drives me nuts when people hold their fork while making a "fist" and then stab their food. I understand if you are a young child or someone who has issues holding utensils, but most people are perfectly capable of holding utensils correctly.
DeleteThis entire generation thinks that being sloppy in dress, relationships, speaking, reading, writing is something to be proud of, and it is just so sad to see. You have brought up some great points Debbie, and your grandmother would surely roll over in her grave to see what goes on in the world today!
ReplyDeleteHI Marilyn. :) I really wish that common good manners were valued more in our society too. Be blessed!
DeleteLOL, Debbie; as a non-native speaker of English, I must admit that it is the misspelled words and poor grammar that are my pet peeves. I understand typos, but, I keep thinking, these are people who are born in this country and speak English as their first language, surely they know better than that? But, the only person I correct is my daughter.
ReplyDeleteBless, you have made my point my friend. You put more effort into learning, speaking and writing the English language than people who were born here. I noticed the same thing with my sister, who was born and raised in Tahiti. Sometimes she struggled with the way English placed the adjectives in front of the nouns (since French does it afterwards), but other than that, she was amazing!
DeleteLOL I don't like it when people ax me questions either. And since when does the word function require an ality after it? The word was functioning just fine. That one drives me nuts!
ReplyDelete:) You just made me giggle and it was much needed...thank you! :)
Delete