How do you pronounce “herbivore,” with or without the “h” sound at the beginning?
I know this sounds odd, but I had to think about it… anyway, I think I say it without the h.
Not sounding the h is an insult to both Athena and Thor.
“Veggivore”
Just kidding- I pronounce it with a partial “h”, if that makes any sense. Not so much “herbivore” like you’d say the man’s name “Herb”, but more than “'erb”, sort of “herbivore”.
I eat chicken with erbs and spices. It’s an erbivore.
Its a herbivore, with a “h” at the beginning!
(I frequently have this argument with a good friend of mine, who keeps attempting to correct my pronunciation of both “herb” and “schedule”!)
Interesting: I try to grow “erbs” in the garden, but they always get eaten by “herbivores”.
“You say ‘erbs’, and we say ‘herbs’, because there’s a fucking ‘H’ in it!” - Eddie Izzard
What was the other response? Somebody who pronounces it herbee-vorree?
I knew making results public would be a good idea.
Exactly!!
You’re just trying to cheat at scrabble.
Herbivores eat erbs.
I…can’t tell.
I’m saying it aloud. And I can’t figure out which version I get naturally…
“Herb” is borrowed from the French, so we have to use their dumb pronunciation. “Herbivore” was made in the good ol’ US of A so we pronounce our h’s.
Nah, actually I made all that up. Here’s a cite.
And he’s got quite a leg to stand on, considering all the "r"s the English have dropped, ie, all of them.
This kind of superiority thing really really rubs me the wrong way.
And then you have Ricky Gervais’ “summat”. I don’t know how widespread that one is.
You do know that Eddie Izzard is a stand up comic who then goes on to side with the Yanks in spelling thru, because through ‘is just trying to cheat at scrabble,’ don’t you?
Come to think of it, I probably use both pronunciations interchangeably. Pronunciation polls really ought to have separate “either” and “neither” options.
I pronounce the h in “herb” and “herbal”, too, or at least I consider I ought’a (one of the things I get worse at when I’ve been speaking in Spanish is losing my aitches).
Goddamn. It’s "the goddamn French.
Yep.