Delay in expected change from "Two Thousand and..." pronunciation: Why?

Factual Questions
1

Back in late 2009 and early 2010 there was a lot of talk about the fact that the pattern of pronunciation of year names (in English-speaking areas, anyway) was probably about to change. Here are excerpts from a couple of representative articles:

How Do You Say 2010? : NPR

2010: Twenty-Ten, Not Two-Thousand-And-Ten | HuffPost Life

Since 2010, the topic doesn’t have much of an Internet presence. (I did a solid 45 minutes of searching on this board before posting this, by the way. I couldn’t find anything from 2011-on.)

In the USA, anyway, plenty of public figures are still saying “two thousand fourteen” instead of “twenty fourteen.” This puzzles me because most of those speaking grew up with the “two-digit-number, two-digit-number” convention. Throughout their childhood, adolescence, and adulthood, all they ever heard was “nineteen eighty-four” and “eighteen sixty” and “seventeen seventy-six”. For all of us older than fourteen, that was the norm until “two thousand” when the pattern, logically, had to change.

Obviously the “nineteen ninety” pronunciation pattern made no sense in the years 2000 through 2009: using that pattern would have given us “twenty nothing” and then “twenty one” for 2001, “twenty two” for 2002, and so on. That would have been ridiculously confusing. So it was natural that we went to the “two thousand one” pattern, instead–though of course we COULD have used “aught” as was apparently common in the first decade of the twentieth century: “twenty aught one” for 2001, etc. But we chose the “two thousand” pattern, instead, probably because having actually reached that second millennium was so momentous.
Now, however, the chance for confusion is past. “Twenty fourteen” is four syllables, whereas “two thousand fourteen” is five. Americans, at least, are infamous for going for brevity; yet some very large percentage of the population is sticking with the longer version.

More surprising to me, though, is that the lifelong habit (for all of us over 14) of using the “two digit number, two digit number” pattern hasn’t returned in force. Newscasters and public speakers of all kinds continue to use the “two thousand” version, despite its greater length and variance from what we’ve heard most of our lives.

Beyond mere questions of “habit,” (formed in the decade from 2000 to 2009), what might be the reasons for this? Fashion? Perceived greater status inherent in the “two thousand” construction? Continued fascination with the fact that we’re in a new millennium?

(I’d thought of making a poll, but I didn’t want the focus to be on people feeling commended or criticized for their particular choice. Usage is usage–there’s no right or wrong. But the difference in choice of usage–and the reasons behind that difference–merit examination.)

2

Brevity isn’t a driving force, because where it does matter (like Twitter), everyone’s going to use the digits. Nobody will tweet “two thousand fourteen” nor “twenty fourteen”, because they’re going to tweet “2014”.

3

Or “7DE” even.

4

Meh. I have determined that the years for this century should be called by the last two digits only- '14, '15, … '98, and so on. No one should have to be told the first two (20) by now.

5

This practice has led to some rather well publicized problems in the past. :wink:

6

I think people will enjoy saying “twenty twenty” (like twenty twenty vision) and the habit will stick from that point on.

7

You know, I think this is the answer. I still say two thousand fourteen, and reference years up to 2020 that way. But when I talk about 2020 and later years, I always say twenty-something. I think the predictions were just off about when the switch would take place. I can’t image saying two thousand twenty five, that will just be twenty twenty-five. I don’t know exactly why 2020 feels like the switch point, but it definitely is in my mind (and vocabulary).

And now the word twenty looks completely wrong to me.

8

Here’s an interesting tidbit: in Germany, we also say twothousand something, where before we used nineteen hundred ninety, or sometimes just nineteen ninety. What’s interesting about that is that we would otherwise almost never use “hundred” for numbers greater than 1000, unlike English speaking people. You would never say “fifteen hundred euros”, it’s “one thousand five hundred”. Don’t know why year names are the only exception to this rule. On topic, I don’t see us using “twenty eighteen” any time soon.

9

We could also have gone with twenty-o-three. 2007 should definitely have been two-double-o-seven. Missed opportunity there.

But using the o would’ve made sense, it’s what we did for nineteen-o-five.

As to why most people say two thousand, I think perhaps it’s to do with the excitement over the millennium? In the years leading up to 2000, we kept talking about it with this sense of awe: The Year Two THOUSAND! So perhaps because of that, two thousand stuck?

10

It’s only Americans that leave out the “and” in numbers.

In UK and Commonwealth English people say “two thousand and fourteen”, “a hundred and twelve” and so on. The “and” is often reduced to a vestigal ‘n’ so Americans might miss it if they’re not listening closely, but leaving it out is very much an American-only thing.

(I’m saying “American” and not “United Statesian” because it’s possible that Canadians also leave out the “and” due to the US influence. But the rest of the Commonwealth always says the “and”.)

11

The whole thread is equally pointful with or without the “and”, though.

Personally, I usually say twenty-fourteen. Brevity FTW! Sooner or later the rest of the world will catch on…

12

Thinking back, I made the change around 2008. That is to say, I usually said (and still say) “two thousand and one,” “two thousand two” (occasionally with the “and”), “two thousand three”…“two thousand seven,” but then 2008 was a transition year – I said “twenty oh eight” maybe 60% of the time, and “two thousand eight” 40%. The following year was “twenty oh nine” about 80% of the time, and “two thousand nine” just 20%. Then came “twenty ten” almost always (though “two thousand ten” doesn’t sound awful), and since then it’s been “twenty eleven,” “twenty twelve”…

Why was 2008 the transition year? Not sure. Maybe it’s when I started to anticipate 2010 sometimes, to feel it coming, to start using it occasionally, like when discussing future plans, or remarking on when some movie being contemplated was expected to be released. It’s also when Obama’s second election meant we had to start blathering about the 2010 “midterms,” and when the Olympics meant we had to start talking about the World Cup two years later.

13

But not thirty and five? Four and twenty? Four score and seven?

14

I was actually taught in high school math that adding “and” was incorrect, and this particular teacher would mark incorrect any answer where a number was spelled out with “and” added. Teacher may have been wrong, but the practice took with me… I still write numbers “two thousand fourteen; one hundred twelve” etc.

15

No one I know says anything different to Twenty Fourteen. That also applies to the TV and Radio. Up to 09 it was always Two Thousand and Eight or O’ Eight, etc. Anyone referring back to the last century normally leaves off the 'Nineteen". “I was born in Forty Three” for example.

I note that the first decade is usually referred to as the Noughties now, but no one seems to know what to call this one. Teenies anyone?

16

Was that in the US or somewhere else?

I wouldn’t put much confidence in what high school teachers teach, I’ve met high school English teachers who were barely literate.

17

It was in the U.S. Actually, I think it,s kind of a moot point. The “and” is redundant; there is an implied comma between the “one hundred” and the “twelve” at any rate. (One hundred [,][+] twelve). We write the digits 112, not 1 and 12. From a mathematician’s, POV at least, it makes sense.

18

The reason “two thousand AND nine” is considered incorrect in math circles (or in math-teaching circles, anyway) is that the “and” is reserved to designate the decimal point.

For example, 203.7 would be spoken (in the USA) as “two hundred three and seven tenths,” NOT as “two hundred and three and seven tenths.”

I would guess that that’s where your math teacher was coming from. :slight_smile:

19

Somewhere, there must be at least one linguistics expert studying this stuff. What seems most interesting is that all these usages—American usage, German usage, etc.—are anything but internally consistent. Why the internal inconsistencies?

As an American, I will sometimes say, for example, “fifteen hundred cars were produced” instead of “one thousand five hundred cars were produced”…don’t know why. Most Americans, speaking of a quantity (instead of a year) would use “one thousand five hundred”…I think. But if we’re talking about the date in history 1500, I think most of us would say “in the year Fifteen Hundred.”

Of course, maybe I’m wrong in that assumption. When I started researching in preparation for making this thread, I looked for information mostly on the narrower question of pronouncing the current year. But there must be something in the field of linguistics on the rest of it…

20

I don’t know of any mathematician who makes that assertion. Anyway, it’s more of a linguistics issue than a mathematical one. But I have to agree that it is an American schoolteacher tradition. In my grade school, every teacher at some point or another said this (not just math teachers), but the irony is that when you caught them off-guard, they would say “two thousand and nine” just like everybody else. It was only when they were in pedantic mode that they would make this assertion.