# Post Something Interesting About English **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 23, 2017, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836 "2017-03-23T15:46:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Miss\_Mapp](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miss_mapp/32/369_2.png) [@Miss\_Mapp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Mapp)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/161 "2017-03-28T15:54:23Z")
> [@Sir\_T-Cups](#): > > It took 4 pages and wading through a sea of rhyming nonsense before I finally found something I didn’t actually know. It makes so much sense now! There’s also a nice, old-fashioned word you don’t see used much anymore: sennight. That is, seven nights, or a week. ---
**Author:** ![zimaane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a3d4f5/32.png) [@zimaane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zimaane)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/162 "2017-03-28T16:02:10Z")
> [@](#): > > The word “bear”, meaning the animal, comes from the Old High German word for brown. The bear is literally, The Brown One. It is thought that this happened because it became taboo to say the old word for ‘bear’, so the “brown one” euphemism emerged. Something similar may have happened in Russian, where the word for bear is Medved, i.e. honey eater. Russian Med (honey) may be a cognate for English mead. ---
**Author:** ![zimaane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a3d4f5/32.png) [@zimaane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zimaane)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/163 "2017-03-28T16:05:33Z")
The origin of ‘dog’ is also a mystery: > **[dog | Etymology, origin and meaning of dog by etymonline](https://www.etymonline.com/word/dog)** > > DOG Meaning: "quadruped of the genus Canis," Old English docga, a late, rare word, used in at least one Middle… See origin and meaning of dog. The letter ‘r’ tends to slide around. That’s why we have ‘three’ but ‘third’ and ‘thirty’. “Will Will Smith smith?” is a valid sentence ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/164 "2017-03-28T16:33:19Z")
I have read that “set” is the word that has the broadest range of varied meanings, as a verb, as a noun and as an adjective. English words have a lot of flexibility due to the minimal morphology in the language. “Kill” started out as a verb but also has become a noun. “Bug” seems to have gone the opposite direction. I am unclear on the development of “zero” – perhaps it is one of those words that is a convergence of two similar roots. Most amusing, I think, is “process”, which has become a verb drawn from a noun based on an Old French word that derived from a Latin participle of a verb; so, like, full circle (was “circle” a noun first or a verb first?). ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/165 "2017-03-28T17:04:20Z")
The woman who wrote [Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries](https://www.amazon.com/Word-Secret-Life-Dictionaries/dp/110187094X) has said she worked longest on “take.” ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/166 "2017-03-28T17:39:19Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > I’ll make this one last post, then drop this extreme thread hijacking (sorry, OP!) OP asked for something interesting. And I think that one of the interesting things about English is how we all speak it differently. But nailing down pronunciation is difficult, even for those of us with some training. It’s especially hard when we’re thinking about how we say a word, as opposed to just as a part of natural speech. We can’t sit you down in a sound booth and run a [formant](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formant#Formants_and_phonetics)analysis on your vowels. So you see the contortions this leads to. ---
**Author:** ![lucid-nonsense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/2acd7d/32.png) [@lucid-nonsense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lucid-nonsense)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/167 "2017-03-28T17:51:46Z")
_Ghoti_ is pronounced like _fish_: gh, pronounced [f] as in enough or tough [tʌf]; o, pronounced [ɪ] as in women; and ti, pronounced [ʃ] as in nation or motion. or it doesn’t make a sound: gh as in night o as in people t as in ballet i as in business. “Ough” can be pronounced 10 different ways in British English. ---
**Author:** ![Sangahyando](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f14d63/32.png) [@Sangahyando](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sangahyando)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/168 "2017-03-28T18:55:17Z")
> [@lucid-nonsense](#): > > “Ough” can be pronounced 10 different ways in British English. I’m British-English, and I can think of nine – including a slightly suspect couple, one of them the Irish “lough” = lake: pronounced “loch” with the throaty “ch”, like the related Scottish word. This has got me curious ! ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/169 "2017-03-28T19:12:25Z")
> [@Sangahyando](#): > > I’m British-English, and I can think of nine – including a slightly suspect couple, one of them the Irish “lough” = lake: pronounced “loch” with the throaty “ch”, like the related Scottish word. This has got me curious ! > **[Ough (orthography)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ough_(orthography))** > > Ough is a four-letter sequence, a tetragraph, used in English orthography and notorious for its unpredictable pronunciation. It has at least eight pronunciations in North American English and nine in British English, and no discernible patterns exist for choosing among them. > In Middle English, ough was regularly pronounced with a back rounded vowel and a velar fricative (e.g., \[oːx\], \[oːɣ\], \[uːx\] or \[uːɣ\]).\[citation needed\] > Slough has three pronunciations, depending on its meaning: > The town of... I suspect the one you missed is one I didn’t know about: /ɒk/ in hough. “More commonly spelled “hock” from the 20th century onwards.” ---
**Author:** ![Sangahyando](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f14d63/32.png) [@Sangahyando](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sangahyando)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/170 "2017-03-28T20:35:43Z")
> [@Ruken](#): > > [Ough (orthography) - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ough_(orthography)) > > I suspect the one you missed is one I didn’t know about: /ɒk/ in hough. “More commonly spelled “hock” from the 20th century onwards.” Your link seems to lead to “Wiki does not have an article…” 😕 I thought of (don’t know IPA, I’m afraid): oo as in _through_ off as in _cough_ oh as in _though_ uff as in _rough_ up as in _hiccough_ ow as in _plough_ uh or “schwa”, as in _thorough, borough_ ock as in _hough_, as you cite – one of my “dodgy” ones (occurs in the Old Testament) och as in Irish _lough_, as in my previous – my other “dodgy” one And a “maybe”, which I’ve thought of subsequently: “slough” – marshy ground, or creature shedding its skin – is a possible pronunciation of that, “slew”? How well does this list compare with what you’ve got? ---
**Author:** ![Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulf_the_Unwashed)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/171 "2017-03-28T20:40:40Z")
There are sloughs (shallow lakes) in Illinois, but the ough part is pronounced identically to the ough part of through–which is already on your list. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/172 "2017-03-28T20:40:42Z")
The right parenthesis was left off. Just click the link next to the lightbulb, Wikipedia fixes it for you. > [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](#): > > There are sloughs (shallow lakes) in Illinois, but the ough part is pronounced identically to the ough part of through–which is already on your list. At least out west, it also refers to river branches that are usually marshy or slow-moving. If you want to be Ulf the Washed, I wouldn’t recommend a slough, you might come out dirtier. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/173 "2017-03-28T20:53:37Z")
> [@Sangahyando](#): > > Your link seems to lead to “Wiki does not have an article…” 😕 > > I thought of (don’t know IPA, I’m afraid): > oo as in _through_ > > off as in _cough_ > > oh as in _though_ > > uff as in _rough_ > > up as in _hiccough_ > > ow as in _plough_ > > uh or “schwa”, as in _thorough, borough_ > > ock as in _hough_, as you cite – one of my “dodgy” ones (occurs in the Old Testament) > > och as in Irish _lough_, as in my previous – my other “dodgy” one > > And a “maybe”, which I’ve thought of subsequently: “slough” – marshy ground, or creature shedding its skin – is a possible pronunciation of that, “slew”? > How well does this list compare with what you’ve got? Sorry I asked a mod to fix, but as mentioned I left off the right paren. [Ough (orthography) - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ough_(orthography)) Do you have /ɔː/ bought, brought, ought, sought, thought, wrought? They do mention slough: > [@](#): > > /sluː/ (as in, “slogging through a slough of mud”)[1] > /slʌf/ (as in “to slough off”) > /slaʊ/ the town of Slough in the Thames Valley of England or the Slough of Despond ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/174 "2017-03-28T21:02:29Z")
If you spill Old English Malt Liquor on your old English furniture, you can get the stains out using Old English Furniture Polish. ---
**Author:** ![lucid-nonsense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/2acd7d/32.png) [@lucid-nonsense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lucid-nonsense)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/175 "2017-03-28T21:11:38Z")
Yeah, slough can be pronounced slew when it’s referring to a marsh. A bit dodgy I agree. Nine still isn’t bad. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/176 "2017-03-28T21:26:43Z")
> [@lucid-nonsense](#): > > Yeah, slough can be pronounced slew when it’s referring to a marsh. A bit dodgy I agree. Nine still isn’t bad. There’s a town in Sacramento County called Sloughhouse, the first syllable pronounced like slew. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/177 "2017-03-28T21:34:14Z")
> [@lucid-nonsense](#): > > Yeah, slough can be pronounced slew when it’s referring to a marsh. A bit dodgy I agree. Nine still isn’t bad. Hardly dodgy, as the sound is already covered by “oo as in through” (/u/) And damn that link. “[Ough (orthography) - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ough_(orthography))” This time I actually previewed and checked. ---
**Author:** ![Sangahyando](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f14d63/32.png) [@Sangahyando](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sangahyando)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/178 "2017-03-28T23:30:03Z")
> [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](#): > > There are sloughs (shallow lakes) in Illinois, but the ough part is pronounced identically to the ough part of through–which is already on your list. **Ulf** , and **Ruken** : I suspect that here, we hit a difference between US, and British, pronunciation conventions. The one where, as with the word “news” = tidings: you tend to pronounce it “nooz”; we, “nyooz”. Likewise with “slough” as here. Despite your given thoughts: in my experience, in Britain we almost always pronounce that word, in no matter what sense, to rhyme with either “rough”, or “plough” – but as we’re looking for another candidate: in the case of the spelling “slew” (past tense of “slay” / at an angle / a large quantity of something [“a whole slew of…”] ) – we’re liable to pronounce that not your way, “sloo” (thus rhyming with “through”); but “slyoo” (one syllable). With our seeking more “recruits”: I’m more than willing to reckon that Brits sometimes say – in the “slough of mud” sense – “slyoo”. (It’s late at night here – hope that all this makes sense.) > [@Ruken](#): > > Do you have /ɔː/ bought, brought, ought, sought, thought, wrought? I completely overlooked those ! What an idiot ☹ … > [@Ruken](#): > > Hardly dodgy, as the sound is already covered by “oo as in through” (/u/) So anyway, it seems we’re now up to eleven “possibles” – though a few of them are maybe pushing the envelope a bit. ---
**Author:** ![Ignatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/3be4f8/32.png) [@Ignatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ignatz)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2017, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/179 "2017-03-28T23:52:01Z")
So why is English a spinning motion given to a bowling or billiard or other ball? (Please pardon if this was covered in earlier pages some of which I have not read.) ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2017, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836/180 "2017-03-29T01:19:32Z")
> [@Sangahyando](#): > > So anyway, it seems we’re now up to eleven “possibles” – though a few of them are maybe pushing the envelope a bit. So let’s make a coherent sentence out of as many of them as we can. **The tough cough and hiccough as they plough through the borough’s dough.** A measly 7 used there. Let’s see what others can come up with. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-something-interesting-about-english/782836.md?page=10)