How about “err”? I’ve always pronounced it the same as “air”. But my father-in-law once informed me that that is wrong and it should be “urr”, like the beginning of “urge”. That surprised me since I’m pretty pedantic about pronunciation, but I’d never heard the latter version. Maybe because it’s a rather rare word. Dictionaries mostly seem to allow both pronunciations in US English, although only “urr” in British English.
I’m curious where you’re hearing this. I’m not disputing you, just wanting to find some examples.
I don’t hear it among Americans, but I also don’t consume much current British media content so have no idea what the language trends are over there.
I live just up from well-known Minnehaha Falls, alongside Minnehaha Creek.
And it is a creek – not a crick. Cricks are for hicks.
In a thread like this, you should all say where you grew up. “Crick” is standard in Philly where I grew up, but I don’t it is anywhere else. And we all said “offen” and “[n]eether”. In Canada, “often” and “[n]ayther” seem to be standard.
The cricks where I live contain no water, but they do have plenty of wooder.
The same way we get “i-urn” from “iron.”
My elementary school teachers were high priestesses of the Funk and Wagnalls. We had to look up every new word we came across. Plantain was one of them, as was kiln. Plantain’s last syllable is the same as in mountain, and the N in kiln is silent. Also, there is NO i after the v in mischievous and so the only proper pronunciation of that word is mĭs’ chə vəs.
So said the dictionaries we had in fifth grade.
Hence JetBlue’s onetime slogan, “Air on the Side of Humanity.”
That’s interesting (for me), as (again, for me), those are completely different sounds. Words like ‘air,’ ‘fair,’ ‘pare,’ ‘tare,’ etc. I pronounce with a short a sound. Completely unaware that that pronunciation isn’t even listed. Exception to the rule is “care” and its derivatives.
For me ‘err’ would be pronounced (as written) with a short e sound.
I guess the origin of that question on the regional accents quizzes about ‘Mary,’ ‘marry,’ and ‘merry.’
I watch a lot of coverage of the Premier League (football), and their presenters say it all the time. I also noticed it recently while watching the GBBO (don’t remember what series or episode).
Which you can use to warsh up.
.. in the warshroom.
Hubby’s from the greater Philadelphia area and he says “sickth”. He also has some interesting ideas about how to pronounce water, towel, and eagles.
You don’t. If you carefully pronounce it, it is “Wōden’s Day.”.
I say Wed-nes-day. And ka-nif-ee for knife and is-land for island, and so forth. But only around certain people.
And a long time ago I was watching the Tonight Show and Tony Randall (I think) was on. He mentioned that err should be err, not air. So, based on that I now say "err”. But, since then I’ve heard that air is acceptable.
Here’s one I thought of that’s always bothered me. Almost everyone I know pronounces ‘comfortable’ KUMF-ter-bull. It drives me nuts.
Metathesis happens!
Yes and it infuriates me. Asterix, nucular, and ax are all pronunciations (come to think of it we can add pernounce to the list) that cause me to immediately dislike someone.
[Johnny Carson] I did not know that. [/Johnny Carson] So “kill,” then? If so: how is the plural pronounced? I’m thinking of the C.S. Lewis house in Oxford, The Kilns.
Speaking of Inklings, “crick” may be a bit rustic but it stopped bothering me when I encountered Crickhollow.
People who say “Mischevious” are plumb ignorant IMO, and sound so. (Militant descriptivists, do your worst.)
A creek may be a kill, I believe.