{"id":56370,"date":"2015-05-31T00:09:38","date_gmt":"2015-05-31T07:09:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/?p=56370"},"modified":"2015-05-31T00:09:38","modified_gmt":"2015-05-31T07:09:38","slug":"say-what","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/56370","title":{"rendered":"Say what?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\tMispronounced words?<\/p>\n<p>Where? (aka, Who me?)<\/p>\n<p>You might be surprised.<\/p>\n<p>To-MAH-to, po-TAH-to.<\/p>\n<p>Don&#8217;t you wanna know?<\/p>\n<p>Seriously, though \u2026<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s quite a queue of words that we&#8217;re likely to mispronounce on any given day.<\/p>\n<p>(A sandwich spread or a prodigal poet\u2014you might mispronounce and not even know it.)<\/p>\n<p>Persnickety, you say?<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_56371\" style=\"width: 370px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-56371\" class=\"wp-image-56371\" src=\"http:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Chinchilla_cat_5833713404.jpg\" alt=\"Chinchilla_cat_(5833713404)\" width=\"360\" height=\"241\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-56371\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo by allen watkin via Wikimedia Commons<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Although you should know that it&#8217;s technically <a href=\"http:\/\/www.merriam-webster.com\/dictionary\/pernickety\"><u>pernickety<\/u><\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Well, it is.<\/p>\n<p>Anyway, if you want to feel just a little bit smarter than you did when you woke up this morning, here&#8217;s an easy means to that end:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Affluent<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Don&#8217;t say: a-FLU-ent<\/p>\n<p>Do say: AFF-lu-ent<\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\nEither (Neither)?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Well, just watch:<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/EsZs1pwxpOI\" width=\"500\" height=\"410\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/center><strong><br \/>\nMayonnaise<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Don&#8217;t say: mannaize<\/p>\n<p>Do say: MAY-o-naize<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Miniature<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Don&#8217;t say: minichur<\/p>\n<p>Do say: miniachur (yup &#8211; the short &#8220;a&#8221; sound should be heard)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Potable<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Don&#8217;t say: pottable<\/p>\n<p>Do say: potable (long &#8220;o&#8221; is the way to go)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Prestigious<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Don&#8217;t say: pre-STEE-jus<\/p>\n<p>Do say: pre-STI-jus (short &#8220;i&#8221;)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Respite<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Don&#8217;t say: respite (rhymes with despite)<\/p>\n<p>Do say: respit<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Seuss<\/strong> (as in, the good doctor of children&#8217;s literature)<\/p>\n<p>Theodore Geisel, aka Dr. Seuss, adopted his pen name from his German mother&#8217;s maiden name, which was properly pronounced in the native tongue as &#8220;Soice&#8221; (rhymes with voice). But, the American inclination to say &#8220;Soose&#8221; stuck, and Geisel gave in, realizing that it was potentially profitable to rhyme with another famous name in children&#8217;s lit\u2014Mother Goose.<\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\nSilicone<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Don&#8217;t say: silicone<\/p>\n<p>Do say: silicon<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>The <\/strong>(nope, not kidding)<\/p>\n<p>Technically speaking, there are some instances when one should say &#8220;thuh&#8221; and others when this word&#8217;s pronunciation should be &#8220;thee.&#8221; According to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.quickanddirtytips.com\/grammar-girl\"><u>Grammar Girl Mignon Fogarty<\/u><\/a>, pronunciation of &#8220;the&#8221; depends on how you pronounce the word that follows it. If the following word begins with a consonant sound, you say &#8220;thuh&#8221; (as in, &#8220;thuh&#8221; farmhouse). But if the following word starts with a vowel sound, you say &#8220;thee&#8221; (as in, &#8220;thee&#8221; egg).<\/p>\n<p>Thee egg and me, prestigious. Pass the mayo please.\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mispronounced words? Where? (aka, Who me?) You might be surprised. To-MAH-to, po-TAH-to. Don&#8217;t you wanna know? Seriously, though \u2026 There&#8217;s quite a queue of words that we&#8217;re likely to mispronounce on any given day. (A sandwich spread or a prodigal &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/56370\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/56370\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-56370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gleaming_word"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56370\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}