# hWhy do they say W's with a soft **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 18, 2000, 9:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845 "2000-05-18T09:15:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![choosybeggar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8c91f0/32.png) [@choosybeggar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/choosybeggar)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 9:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/1 "2000-05-18T09:15:29Z")
I have heard trained speakers and just plain old folk who speak well do this. When they say words like “what” or “when” or “why” (there are probably many more–those spring to mind), they pronounce the word as if it were preceded by a soft h sound. I’ve met someone who said that in elementary school, that was how her teacher said these words were correctly pronounced. Another friend said that his choir instructor said that the addition of the soft h would make these words more clearly heard. Maybe…I dunno. Any linguists out there? ---
**Author:** ![GaWd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f08c70/32.png) [@GaWd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GaWd)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 10:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/2 "2000-05-18T10:03:48Z")
Isn’t that more of an east coast thing? I’ve heard it, but it mainly comes from elder transplants to California, of people straight off of the boat from the east coast/midwest. I even heard it pronounced so “roughly”(probably a bad word to try and describe it), that the soft H sounds more like “fWhy, fWhat?, fWhere?”, Etc… -Sam ---
**Author:** ![Yeah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/dbc845/32.png) [@Yeah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yeah)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/3 "2000-05-18T10:45:54Z")
I attended elementary school in California where I was taught to pronounce “what” as “hwhat,” “where” as “hwhere,” “why” as “hwhy,” and “when” as “hwhen” (and “often” as “off en” if you’re interested). Maybe my teachers were Easterners, or from the Midwest, or educated. (This was long ago.) According to the Encyclopedia Brittanica, CD-ROM edition, “Another outcome of the Norman Conquest was to change the writing of English from the clear and easily readable insular hand of Irish origin to the delicate Carolingian script then in use on the Continent. With the change in appearance came a change in spelling.” “Old English cw was changed to qu; hw to wh, qu, or quh; c to ch or tch; sc to sh; -cg- to -gg-; and -ht to ght. So Old English cwen appeared as queen; hwaet as what, quat, or quhat; dic as ditch; scip as ship; secge as segge; and miht as might.” Apparently, hwhat, hwhen, and hwhere are just the traditional pronunciations. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/4 "2000-05-18T13:27:18Z")
Actually, originally I think that all the words cited (as well as a bunch of others starting with “wh-”) were spelled “hw-” or “hv-”. So, only the spelling was reversed, not the pronunciation. ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/5 "2000-05-18T13:33:02Z")
Can you explain what you mean when you say they sound like they’re preceded with a soft ‘h’ sound? AFAIK, the ‘w’ sound and the ‘h’ sound occur simultaneously in these words, so it’s arbitrary whether they’re spelled “wh” or “hw”. I _have_ heard speakers, from the East I believe, who pronounce the words without an ‘h’ sound at all, so “what” comes out like “wat”. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/6 "2000-05-18T15:30:49Z")
From [http://www.merriamwebster.com](http://www.merriamwebster.com) Main Entry: what Pronunciation: 'hwät, 'hw&t, 'wät, 'w&t Looks like either way is correct. ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/7 "2000-05-18T16:08:44Z")
> [@](#): > > Lance Turbo wrote: > Looks like either way is correct. It’s not usually the role of a dictionary to tell you what’s correct. They just tell you what is being said and written. Occasionally, you’ll find a usage note, but these are exceptions. Generally, if it’s in the dictionary, then it’s acceptable in some dialect or region, but maybe not in others. ---
**Author:** ![Geenius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f475e1/32.png) [@Geenius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geenius)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/8 "2000-05-18T16:17:36Z")
Any other _Star Trek_ fans notice that Michael Dorn (Worf) always said “hweapons”? ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/9 "2000-05-18T20:16:13Z")
CurtC- I don’t quite understand how you pronounce “wh” simultaneously. Seems to me if you pronounce “wh” you get either “hwuht” or “wuht,” but I’m not quite clear on what “whuht” would be. Seems to me you need a vowel between the “w” and “h.” Secondly, is it possible to pronounce two consonants simulataneously? Anyhow, I too was taught in elementary school in Chicago to say “hWhat,” “hWhy,” etc, but nobody I knew ever talked like that, so I never caught on to it. ---
**Author:** ![Wood\_Thrush](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/b38774/32.png) [@Wood\_Thrush](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wood_Thrush)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/10 "2000-05-18T20:29:31Z")
This is a dialect thing, i believe. Since we are all writing, and not speaking, it is hard to tell how WE say it. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/11 "2000-05-18T20:50:46Z")
CurtC, I was under the impression that the dictionary was a good place to look for the correct pronunciation of words. Everyone else, In other news, this whole thing may be related to the “w” is a semi-vowel thing. There is no way I’ll be able covey this info clearly, but I’ll give it a shot. what - could be pronounced hoo (like the sound an owl makes)- ut (like the end of butt) “Big deal,” you say. I say the phonetic spelling hoo - ut (kind of glide the vowel sounds together, or put on your dipthong) does not contain the letter “w”. Somehow in my mind this backs up the “w” as a semi-vowel point of view. Most people already phonetically spell “who” without a “w”. Hoo - ut the hell am I talking about? ---
**Author:** ![MrDeath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/22d042/32.png) [@MrDeath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDeath)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2000, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hwhy-do-they-say-ws-with-a-soft/19845/12 "2000-05-18T20:55:18Z")
Is someone looking for a linguist? Here’s hwat is actually happening in dialects hwere it sounds like someone is pronouncing ‘hw’ instead of ‘w’ in these cases. The speaker is typically not adding an ‘h’ phoneme, but making the ‘w’ sound unvoiced. Just try it; try saying a ‘w’ but leave out the vocal cord vibration. Not everyone can do it. It sounds subtly different from actually adding an ‘h’ sound in front. Using the International Phonetic Alphabet, the symbol for a voiceless velar glide (the technical term for a ‘w’ sound) is an upside-down w. There are hundreds of distinct possible phonemes, and if there’s a sound you can make with your mouth, there’s probably a language somewhere that uses it. As for hwat’s the accepted pronunciation, it’s hwatever you pronounce it as, so long as the person with hwom you’re talking understands it. – MrDeath O Lord please don’t buuuuurn us, don’t grill or roast your flock…