I wrote a trivia quiz on the elements on a trivia site. One of my questions was: ‘[Name] One of four one-syllable element names.’ The possible answers are gold, tin, zinc, and lead.
But in a feedback message from someone who took it, he said I forgot ‘iron’. Now, the only way I can see that is if he had a real heavy Texan accent and says it ‘arn’. (Like a Texan girl I knew who said ‘oil’ like ‘all’.) I told him that it was pronounced ‘i earn’; two syllables.
But I was wondering. Is there a way to say ‘iron’ with only one that doesn’t sound like you’re right off of the ‘all’ fields?
IMHO (I’m an editor, so I’ve dealt with the written word, but not so much with the oral word), it only has one syllable, no matter where you’re from. Sure, the person might have been from Texas or another awl-producin’ state, but I believe if you check your Webster’s (as I did, MW’s Collegiate Dictionary, 10th Ed.), you won’t find any derivative pronunciations. Of course, what’s accepted in formal writing and what’s practiced in real life often differ, which is why we never say that someone’s wrong, just that they’re using a colloquialism.
Mayhap this person was yankin’ yer chain, trying to squeeze out some extra credit?
Or, maybe, you went aht and for an Imp and Arn somewhere on the Sahside. (At least back in my day, the Dahntahn places fancied themselves too sophisticated to serve Arn, let alone Imp and Arn.)
“arn”, which apparently a lot of us thought of when reading the subject, is the usual Pittsburgh pronunciation of “iron”. A brand of beer called “Iron City” is brewed there, usually reffered to as an “arn”. The “jine iggle” is the usual pronunciation of the “Giant Eagle” supermarket. As I think about what I wrote, you wouldn’t pick up your “arns” there. This being PA, you would have to go to the beverage distributor, buy a case of them, and swing by the “iggle” for the snacks. I offer as an excuse that I haven’t lived in PA for many years. “imp” is Imperial whiskey, so an “imp 'n arn” is a specific form of the prototypical Pittsburgh “shot anna beer”.
Merriam-Webster be damned, I was under the impression that iron was monosyllabic, but in a pain-in-the-ass gestalt kind of way.
To illustrate, take the prefix “psych”: one syllable, right? Not so fast. When you articulate the word, you will notice that you are actually saying “suh-eye-kuh” …after a fashion. But still it’s one syllable.
So I suppose regionalisms do come into play: I met someone once from the Deep South who got a whole 3 syllables out of the word “oil”. Pronounced it “oy-yuh-uuhl,” complete with drawl (it’s difficult to write it phonetically).
But then again, Iraq and Iran (properly pronounced ur-ron) are two syllables. I give up.
Yinz jaggoffs woutent no nuttin abaht no one sillabull words or no two sillabull words if Dawnie Iris himself came dahn and told yinz.
What yinz shood do is go dahn SahSide and see if Joe Greshecky an da hahserawkers are playin dahn at Nicks Fat City. Ol’ Joe’d never steer yinz wrowng about no two siilabulls.
My Primary School teachers kept trying to tell me “whale”, “snail” etc are one syllable. I keep trying to see how they do it, but “way-ell”, “snay-ell” are the only ways I can pronounce them. Lousy teachers. Trying to corrupt my good English.
