pronounciation of common words

Haitch instead of aitch. Even my Kindle had to be forced to put the incorrect spelling. It's on television all the time, even adverts like HMV get it wrong. Don't they even know how to pronounce their own name! I suspect that when people hear a word on television they automatically think it must be correct. I can't help wondering what pronunciation children are taught at school, which is where we were taught the correct dictionary spelling and pronunciation of 'aitch'

I asked the headmaster of the catholic primary school my lads attended here in Queensland Australia , why they were being taught 'hatch'. He said it was imported by the Irish nuns and he was really trying to re-educate his teachers but they simply didn't believe him!! It was a Catholic primary school.

So, as an earlier poster said, it is a sort of Catholic v Protestant thing.

However, in Queensland people left state school at 13 right until the 1970s; only the Catholics and other religions provided further education. And only the Catholic high schools were affordable for ordinary working folk.

Hence the older tertiary educated class of Queensland is highly influenced by catholic education, so haitch has become mainstream.

But not my own lads - I put 'em straight!!

PS The local state primary school was so appallingly bad at the time, that even non-catholics sent their kids to St Francis Xavier primary.

Shtudent and Chewsday.

Yes, Spanishsue, as MamaCaz says, there is a stress accent on the a in 'MAD' in Benalmadena, so that is the syllable that is stressed. And, for the record, the rule is that the penultimate syllable is stressed only if the word ends in a vowel, an 'n' or an 's'. When a word ends in any other letter then the last syllable is stressed (unless there is a stress accent elsewhere in the word of course). Examples are feliz (happy), papel (paper) or libertad (freedom)

Dyslexia causes people to transpose letters which accounts for some mispronunciations, they are not just doing it to annoy us!

However, pacifically instead of specifically gets me going.

Oh, and I protest! I was brought up as a Roman Catholic, attended convent schools, taught by nuns, many of them Irish. And my father was Irish.

But I never said 'haitch'. NEVER! Neither did any of my teachers or schoolfriends.

So there

Talking of strawberries, I can't bear hearing TV presenters saying 'shtrawberries ' or 'shtreet'- unable to pronounce 'st ' properly.
It's the same with tissues or issues and mountain and fountain, they become tishues and ishues and mountins and fountins- it grates on my nerves!!
I fink its a big ishue!!!!!

Nobody EVER says enn haitch ess for NHS.

how to pronounce tissue

how to pronounce issue

how to pronounce mountain

how to pronounce fountain

English isn't always pronounced phonetically

The scone pronunciation is a funny one I say scone rhyming with cone and other say scone rhyming with gone. I found a website called 'howjsay' and, according to that, both are correct. The website also give the American pronunciation where applicable (as in schedule). One thing that annoys me these days is the change of emphasis in a word such as in subsidence and harassment.

I agree, Indinana. How many people actually say 'mountayn' or 'fountayn' anyway?

I am careful with pronunciations as I have lived away from the UK for so long that I'm not really up-to-date. I accept that several words have changed, but even on Radio 3, you get people pronouncing words oddly, as if they'd only ever read them but never heard them spoken (harbinger, indictment are two examples that spring to mind - both heard on Radio 3 pronounced as they're written - really!)

But what annoys me the most is, as was mentioned above, the misplacing of emphases. Distribute and contribute are in transition as I write. While Jenny Murray says the conventional con-TRI-bute, her younger interviewee will be using the new CON-tibute.

I hate to think what will happen when people start messing up the word "monotony".

And when I went to school, we had a couple of Northerners who said "haitch" - the rest of us said "aitch" but we never considered the one right and the other wrong.

hidge mentioned the omission of the letter T earlier in this thread. Sometimes it is difficult to pronounce it where two consonants meet at the end of one word and start of the next: for example "must do". I would definitely soften the t there or I would sound punctilious and over careful.

Agreed.
My very upper class English teacher of 50 years ago would constantly correct us if we dared to pronounce a word incorrectly (according to her) and our lengthy spelling lists all had to be learned both as the written and spoken word. I used to dread her lessons but soon learned she had taught me a very valuable lesson for life.
Today, incorrect spellings are not even acknowledged by teachers so how do we expect children to learn?

Breakfast: I grew up pronouncing it 'brekkfast', but I do hear others (a minority I think) pronouncing it 'brakefast'.

A friend from the north-east pronounces it 'brakefast'

I say 'brekkfast' with a sort of short 'a', a kind of of amalgam of brekkfust and brekkfest

Many years ago there was a mode of speech which was called "BBC English voice" It was very clear and proper so that it was easily understood by everyone especially those who were from other countries. The BBC News was used as a teaching aid to those learning English and also those learning Shorthand.
I hate a certain programme on BBC1 where the presenters talk of the comYUNal areas. I dont like Ashume either. I dont understand why people talk of Sarnies when they mean Sandwiches. There is no R in the word.
Where I stay we have a dialect and from the words and pronounciation of words people can tell which area you come from and whether you are catholic or protestants. Although I was born here and have been here most of my life there are people here whose dialect is so different I just hope that I am smiling and nodding in the correct places.
SPF

The pronunciation 'ar' of the 'a' in sarnies has nothing to do with whether or not there is an 'r' in sandwiches. It's just an accent thing.

Being a Southerner living in the North of England I get this said to me from time to time when I say father, rather, glass, grass etc etc 'There's no 'r' in 'glass' they say. Well, I pronounce the 'a' as 'ar' because that's how we say it in the south...it's too late to change the habits of a lifetime

And who'd want to call them 'sannies'?

Sarnie has become a word so needs the 'r'. If you abbreviate the word for your refrigerator, sugarpuffairy. I'm sure you call it fridge and not frig if you write it, so it takes a d in the shorter version? As for the short and long 'a' Maizie, it's just a regional thing, isn't it.

I cant stand when some say 'Hud' instead of 'hood' and 'fud' instead of food. this is not a regional thing its just trying to be posh.

A lot of scottish people pronounce 'food' as 'fud' - it's not being posh! To compensate they often pronounce 'foot' as 'fute' whereas the english say 'fut'.

Indinana regarding the 'haitch' issue in relation to RC education, I was explaining a distinction which seems quite peculiar to the N.I situation. And it is very consistent here. A sad but true reflection of the way our divided society works. Schooling still tends to be mainly segregated here.

I assume you were educated in ENGLISH convent schools where Irish nuns would have been required to adhere to English standards. Please don't protest. I was just explaining what happens here thinking some GNetters would be interested. I had no intention to offend.

That advert for the Co-op was annoying:

The Co-op is apparently 'Gud for fud'

NotTooOld, I just wanted to comment on your post about MOM. It's the American spelling - the way Americans say the short 'o' vowel, it sounds like the way we pronounce 'MUM' - doesn't it? It's what I've always thought, anyway.

Two pronunciations that irk me: kilOMetre when it should be KILometre. It's a measure, not the device that does the measuring. Also 'licquorice' pronounced 'lickerish', which is a completely different word.

Sandwich? I say 'samwidge'! (That does look odd!)

I'd never heard of Benal Madena either!

Judthepud I wasn't in the least offended - my comment was intended to be jokey, mock serious. Sorry, difficult to convey this without body language