# Canadian word? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 17, 2005, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863 "2005-07-17T07:24:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/21 "2005-07-17T21:38:23Z")
Perhaps because sleight’s not all that uncommon for me. OTOH, keif (kyfe, kife, or whatever spelling you desire) does seem to be very uncommon. ---
**Author:** ![ladydisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@ladydisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ladydisco)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2005, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/22 "2005-07-17T21:45:18Z")
Another Ontarian here - I’ve heard it to mean “shit” or “nasty”. I’ve also heard it to mean something like “bullshit”. As in, “They didn’t give you a raise? That’s kife.” (or however the devil you want to spell it). And it rhymes with “knife”. ---
**Author:** ![Grim\_Jaa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@Grim\_Jaa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grim_Jaa)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 10:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/23 "2005-07-18T10:53:25Z")
I would agree with ladydisco. And yeah, “Kife” would be the best spelling. Its a single syllable. I haven’t heard it since highschool (+10 years) ago. Although there was a girl I knew who insisted she invented the word. Which clearly is not the case. > [@](#): > > Yep, they’re both from Ontario; however, they pronounce it with only one syllable. What “certain people” would use it there? Also, is it considered a curse word? The people who always used it had that complex where they thought they always had to be wacky and original just to prove they were non-conformist. And no, its not considered a curse at all. I would rate it at the same level as “crap”. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/24 "2005-07-18T12:34:27Z")
> [@](#): > > And no, its not considered a curse at all. I would rate it at the same level as “crap”. Even using that word around my mother would guarantee punishment–very swift punishment–from her. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/25 "2005-07-18T14:37:01Z")
I’m from Ontario. Never heard it before. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/26 "2005-07-18T15:25:22Z")
In an effort to smooth over ever-so-slightly ruffled feathers … in this thread, **Monty** and **Wendell** are speaing past one another, coming in with very different assumptions about things. I have been in many linguistics-related threads with **Wendell**. He is apparently of a linguistic bent himself, being either a professional in the field or a very well studied amateur. I myself am only at the well-studied amateur level of linguistics (but it was my minor in college), so I like to think that I have some insight into why **Wendell** is posting what he’s posting in this thread. For someone thinking linguistically, you can’t _write_\* that “Word A sounds like Word B”. That sounds crazy and cunterintuitive, I realize. But as an example, think about how often this kind of thing comes up in the “caught/cot” pronunciation threads. A Southerner patiently explains to an Oregonian that the vowel in “caught” sounds just like the one in “Dawn”, and the one in “cot” sounds like the one in “Don”. Easy, right? Hardly – the Oregonian is likely to pronounce all four words with the exact same vowel. Same here with “sleight”. When **Monty** writes "it sounds like ‘sleight’ ", for **Wendell** a question is begged – just how does **Monty** pronounce “sleight”? Just consult the dictionary, you say? Not so fast. When studying phonetics, you learn quickly that dictionaries, despite their best efforts, never list all the dialect-variant pronunciations of a given word. What this means is that dictionaries are specifically dismissed as an authoritative source for the pronunciation of a word by an individual. Yep, that sounds crazy, too … but many misleading assumptions are avoided in phonetics by insisting on the authority of spoken pronunciation samples over written pronunciation descriptions using non-standard phonetic scripts (as in a dictionary). So, **Monty** , when you write "it sounds like ‘sleight’, like the dictionary pronunciation ", there is _still_ a question of just what that sound actually is. Sure, **Wendell** knows how he pronounces “sleight”, but there’s no guarantee he pronounces it like you. What the dictionary shows as a “long i” can come out differently in different dialects of English (recall the “caught/cot” quandary). _[sub]_ - note that much of the difficulty here vanishes in spoken discourse.[/sub]\* ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/27 "2005-07-18T15:32:59Z")
Linguistics was my major at university. ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/28 "2005-07-18T16:18:25Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > It’s the same as the digraph in _sleight_. “Sleight” doesn’t have a digraph. It’s got a quadragraph, and “eigh” can represent several different sounds. “ei” on its own is pretty rare in English and there’s no guessing what it could possibly represent in a new word. Are you saying it’s pronounced /kajf/ (rhymes with “knife”)? I don’t get why you’re being so mysterious about this. It’s not going to make it easier to find an answer. > [@Monty](#): > > May I suggest that you find a dictionary (yes, I checked a few before asking the question in the OP) and look at the pronunciation guide therein, then look at the pronunciation for the word sleight, the definition of the word digraph, and then post the answer to “What’s your problem?” Yes, do go look up what a “digraph” is, and then count the number of letters in the vowel sound in “sleight”. (Note that in words like, for instance, “light”, the “gh” is an orthographically essential part of the word, and it clues the reader in to use the so-called long-I rather than short-I pronunciation.) Then go examine **Wagner** ’s posting history if you’re under the impression that he’s not quite familiar with the linguistic terms you’re abusing here. If you’re asking a question, I simply don’t understand why you would choose not to be clear in what you’re asking. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/29 "2005-07-18T17:31:47Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > Linguistics was my major at university. What specialty (though doubtlessly your coursework at least touched on phonetics)? Maybe the friction between you and **Wendell** here is just a matter of you dropping academic precision for the sake of making a point, and **Wendell** not agreeing to dropping same? ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2005, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863/30 "2005-07-18T22:17:41Z")
Didn’t bother to read the definition, did you, Ex? I’m not being mysterious. Quit reading extra stuff into what I’ve typed and you’ll probably figure out that what I typed had all the information needed for an answer. As I’ve gotten several on point and “non-mysterious” answers, that’s pretty evident. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canadian-word/312863.md?page=1)