Which sounds more correct to your ears, “learnt” or “learned”? A cursory Google search indicates that both might be considered to be correct. To me, “learnt” sounds rather archaic unless spoken by a hillbilly, e.g., “I would’ve learnt him how to tie his own shoes but he didn’t have any.”
0 voters
Both sound correct. I grew up in New England, and my elders said “learnt”. I adopted “learned” to fit in when we moved west.
“Learnt” is more often heard by UK speakers, and since I watch a lot of UK tv, it still sounds natural to my ear.
Learned.
Assuming we’re talking about the past tense of "learn’ rather than the adjective, then I would say “learnt”
I don’t know if I’ve ever heard “learnt.” It feels like a silly overcorrection by someone who believes that “dreamt” is correct over “dreamed.” Dreamt seems just slightly silly to me, but it follows normal English patterns of making a word easier to say, (leaped → leapt) while learnt is harder to say than learned.
I opt for “learned”, but only if it’s pronounced as TWO syllables, as in ‘learn ed’. That sounds sophisticated. The one syllable version of “learned” is pedestrian to my ears, and I prefer “learnt” in that case, sounding more classically british upper class.
I pronounce it with two syllables only when it’s an adjective, or referring to the actress who played Olivia Walton.
Agreed. I say “My learn-ed friend” when counsel on the other side of the file has a QC.
“Learnt” for the past participle of the verb.
I agree on the Jeb Clampett aspect of “learnt”.
Are people really saying “I learnt how to write good in the schoolhouse”? And thinking that sounds upper-crust British? There must be a completely different usage I’m missing…
(Ah din’t never learnt thet hoggledyswollop.)
Whereas my New England relatives never in their lives said learnt…
Also “spoiled” and “spoilt.”
No. it’s used the same way learned is. “I learnt to write when I was five years old.” And it’s not an affectation. My grandparents and older aunts and uncles also said “tisn’t” and “shan’t” and “peckish” among others. A lot of dialects have shadows of their origin.
For a phrase like, “I learned to play the guitar,” for me, it’s one syllable, but the final sound is definitely a “d” sound, and definitely not a “t” sound. More like “learnd,” and rhymes with words like “earned” or “yearned.”
I thought it was clear from the context that the poll was about the one syllable past tense forms of the verb learn and not the two syllable adjective learned. Once again, thinking has failed me.
Speaking of thoughts and thinking, I just had a thought. Has anyone nounified the verb learn in business-speak as in, “What’s the learn here?”
Learnt isn’t even a word. If you want to show your lack of education or social status, go ahead and keep using it.
I assume you are joking
To gain the language
’Tis needful that the most immodest word
Be look’d upon and learntFrom a quick googling:
Oxford:
Merriam-Webster:
Lexico:
grammar-monster:
Perhaps this could have been better phrased as “I reckon I would’ve learnt him how to tie his own shoes but he ain’t got none.”