Just heard it again. Another politican on TV talking about the threat of “nucular” war.
Can’t they read? There is no “u” after the “c” in the word. I mean, where did this start? I swear I hear the word mis-pronounced “nucular” almost as much as I hear it said right.
Grr, argh, I can’t stand that! Makes me want to [insert rant here] . . . .
You say tomato I say tomato. Let’s just hope they get their facts straight.
I would just like to say that the media should not even talk about a nuclear threat.
The only reason they do it is for ratings. They may achieve ratings however at the cost of scaring the public. What idiots!
But it’s not the same. Those are different pronunciations of a word, but with all the letters in the same place.
In mis-pronouncing nuclear as “nucular”, they are mangling the word’s spelling as well as its pronunciation. Again, can’t they read?
But you know what they are saying…so in the long run does it really matter?
They are invoking the spirit of John Kennedy. It’s like quoting Lincoln.
If the worst thing you can say about your politicians is that they mispronounce a word, then I’d venture to say that we’ve got some damn fine leaders.
I think Dan Quayle pronounced it more like “New-clear” or
“Nuke Lear” (as in King Lear").
He had a way of getting rid of inconvenient e’s, only to add them where they were not needed on words like “potato”. Very effecient fellow, that Quayle.
http://www.mbcnet.org/debateweb/html/history/1988/video.htm
Includes “You’re no Jack Kennedy” line, and Quayle words like “Pres’dent” and “'sperience”…
My uncle was an engineer at a nuclear plant. On his desk, there was a sign that said:
“People who say Nucular not allowed beyond this point”
Jimmy Carter used it all the time- drove me nuts! Might be why I became a libertarian.
b.
Don’t you wish it were that easy.
“I’m goin’ down to the lie-bare-y to see a fil-um about nucular war”
I know a PhD in Nuclear Engineering who pronounces it “nuke-u-ler”. It amazes me that no one corrected him in 8 years of schooling…
Can we have that in english?
He knows what he means, you know what he means, Semantic mission accomplished!
Bibliophage’s quote suggests that people regularise. If most words follw the circle/circular form some people will be tempted to apply it to “nuc”.
A similar thing happens with the economist Keynes and the types of economics named after him Keynesian economics. People are much less likely these days to read a book by Keynes, so they only come accross the word Keynesian. More and more people are pronouncing it like Indonesian. And yes, it sends me birko.
Key-Knee-Zee-En?
What the bloody blue f**k is the world coming to?
According to Robert A. Heinlein, the mispronouncing of “nuclear” began with the Eisenhower administration. IIRC, his Secretary of Defense was the one responsible for butchering the word. Naturally, the rest of America has to follow.
“You say Potato, I say Poatoto” would perhaps be a closer analogy 