# Why do some people pronounce "ask" as "aks"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 19, 2010, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177 "2010-11-19T02:25:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Enderw24](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba9def/32.png) [@Enderw24](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enderw24)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2010, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/81 "2010-11-19T22:55:01Z")
“African-American Neighborhood Terrorized By Ask Murderer” ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2010, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/82 "2010-11-19T23:03:22Z")
> [@SeldomSeen](#): > > No, not sure at all. Texas-talk was where I heard it first, but it certainly could come from another source…probably did in fact. It’s interesting that in the rural Ozark region (which is pretty close to Texas, geographically and culturally) linguists in the 1930’s identified dialects that were remarkably close to Elizabethan English. They theorized that these places were so isolated that the language of the earliest settlers had stayed fairly “pure”. Sorry, but that sort of stuff is what I’d call “folk-science”. It may be true that some aspects of earlier English dialects have been preserved, but to call them “pure” would be patently false. Same goes for the folks on Tangier Island in the Chesapeake area. No Elizabethan English dialects survived into the 20th century. ETA: I often pronounce “asked” as “ast”, especially if I’m speaking fast. Probably a bit more like “asst”, just to be clear. And when I’m back in Boston , it’s “ahst”. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2010, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/83 "2010-11-19T23:19:33Z")
> [@Wheelz](#): > > “ZEE-bruh” > > How did people say it 150 years ago? “Zebber.” ---
**Author:** ![CookingWithGas](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cookingwithgas/32/485_2.png) [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2010, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/84 "2010-11-20T00:21:57Z")
> [@statsman1982](#): > > How strange, as it’s the opposite situation for me. I grew up with “cue-pon”. > [@Leaffan](#): > > Cue-pon > Chube (tube) > Chuesday > > Scottish 101. > [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > I have heard lots of people pronounce it both ways (“koo-pon” and “kyoo-pon”), but the “kyoo-pon” pronunciation has always struck me as strange: I wonder where it came from, since there’s nothing in the word’s spelling that would give rise to a “kyoo” sound. The koo pronunciation is pendantically correct because that’s how it’s pronounced in the original French, but lots of Americans do pronounce it kyoo-pon (or queue-pon, or what-have-you). I do not know for sure why but I did a search on English words matching cou\* and sounds include: couch, council, count (many more) cough could course, court cousin, couple Found _only two_ with a koo sound: cougar, coupon So probably people hear a koo in a word of foreign origin and just aren’t sure how to handle it, so pick the nearest approximation based on sound alone, not spelling. cue ball =\> cue pon cube on =\> cue pon ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2010, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/85 "2010-11-20T02:59:44Z")
> [@Wheelz](#): > > I’d say that’s quite possible, even probable. > > I’m sitting here talking to myself too, and realizing that saying the full _k_ sound immediately followed by the full _d_ sound feels clumsy and cumbersome, and virtually nobody does it. > That said, I’m not dropping the _k_ altogether; more like I’m sort of giving up on it halfway through before moving on to the _d_. > > This all assumes, of course, that the _e_ is silent. _Asked_ would be more easily pronounced if it weren’t, like in _pointed_, for instance. Yet it sounds funny only because we don’t traditionally say it that way. Are there any dialects that do so? There’s actually a term for this, but I can’t find it right now. It’s part of the natural evolution of a language. The original pronunciation is elided by the phoneme not being completely formed, which is then heard as an elongation of the previous phoneme or a pause, which is then heard as if the phoneme doesn’t exist. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2010, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/86 "2010-11-20T16:32:24Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > Certainly not entirely, since it’s also found in some British dialects. :dubious: Really? I’m reading this thread while drinking an expresso. ---
**Author:** ![Keeve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/87 "2010-11-21T02:15:36Z")
I had major problems with one of my employers because I had not realized that Bayer was one of our clients. My boss kept talking about Behr, and for weeks I never realized I was misunderstanding her. Who in NJ pronounces “Bayer” with just one syllable? ---
**Author:** ![Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8491ac/32.png) [@Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fake_Tales_of_San_Francisco)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/88 "2010-11-21T02:37:16Z")
> [@jjimm](#): > > :dubious: Really? > > I’m reading this thread while drinking an expresso. Yeah. In Britain I often hear /njuː/ (nyoo) rather than /nuː/ (noo) for new. Definitely not a Texas/southwestern ‘innovation’ Pronouncing ‘ask’ as /æst/ (ast) would definitely depend on the context. I just went through a few phrases out loud, and when saying "I asked him to’ within conversational speech, I said /aɪ jæst ɪm tə/ (I ast 'im to) at least once. It’s easier to move to the next vowel from the alveolar position (hitting your tongue against the ridge just before your teeth) than from the velar (back of tongue, back of mouth). That’s probably why some of you are getting a little confused. Pronunciation depends highly on context. You will not pronounce a word the same way every single time you say it. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/89 "2010-11-21T02:47:02Z")
I give you the full etymology of “ask” from the OED. > [@](#): > > Common Teut.: OE. _áscian_ was cogn. w. OFris. _âskia_, OS. _êscôn_, _êscan_, OHG. _eiscôn_, MHG. _eischen_, Ger. _heischen_, OTeut. \*_aiskôjan_: cf. Skr. _ish_ to seek, _ichchhā_ wish. The original long _á_ gave regularly the ME. (Kentish) _ōxi_; but elsewhere was shortened before the two consonants, giving ME. _a_, and, in some dialects, _e_. The result of these vowel changes, and of the OE. metathesis _asc-_, _acs-_, was that ME. had the types _ōx_, _ax_, _ex_, _ask_, _esk_, _ash_, _esh_, _ass_, _ess_. The true representative of the orig. _áscian_ was the s.w. and w.midl. _ash_, _esh_, also written _esse_ (cf. _æsce_ **ASH** , _wæsc_(_e_)_an_ **WASH** ), now quite lost. _Acsian_, _axian_, survived in _ax_, down to nearly 1600 the regular literary form, and still used everywhere in midl. and south. dialects, though supplanted in standard English by _ask_, originally the northern form. Already in 15th c. the latter was reduced dialectally to _asse_, pa. tense _ast_, still current dialectally. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/90 "2010-11-21T04:22:53Z")
> [@abel29a](#): > > Is it just me or is the term African > American English very cumbersome, and somewhat schizophrenic? You are correct: it is off topic. The issue has come up in other threads, (for example, [here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=6662252#post6662252)). > [@BwanaBob](#): > > The word spelled a-s-k has only only one pronuciation. Not true in any sense. It has had more than one pronunciation in English since the time that English was spoken only in England–as noted in multiple posts in this thread. > [@Ruminator](#): > > Give it 150 years and probably _everybody_ will pronounce it as ax. It requires less effort to pronounce. The human race is lazy. Pronouncing “ask” like ass-kuh is almost blurting out 2 separate syllables. That’s too much work. While this may sound logical, it fails on the fact that both pronunciations have already each endured for hundreds of years with neither one overwhelming or replacing the other. > [@Balthisar](#): > > What bugs me about “aks” is when someone is otherwise speaking standard English (meaning, standard for my area in my demographic), and out comes “aks.” It’s almost race baiting, akin to using “niggardly” in a conversation. If used in a mocking way, I could see that, but the usage is actually much broader than the “Southern” or “black dialect” usages to which several posters have alluded. It is relatively common in one of the New York boroughs, (I don’t recall which one at the moment), dating to the period when that borough was overwhelmingly white, and I know a number of whites in Michigan and Ohio who employ the same pronunciation. > [@Ruminator](#): > > I used “lazy” as a placeholder to describe expenditure of calories and not morality. If it takes 0.002 calories to say “ax” but it takes 0.003 calories to say “ask”, I think civilization will evolve to pronounce it as ax. > [@Ruminator](#): > > Because the laziness evolution doesn’t effect every word in every group in every geography equally. It takes a long time. Sean Connery’s may say “shtreet” but his great great grandchildren may pronounce “street” and their great great grandchildren may pronounce it as “stree” “Lazy,” of course, is always unfortunate choice as a descriptor of language pronunciation or usage. It brings in an immediate value judgment, (tending toward condemnation), that no legitimate linguist would countenance. It is also nearly always incorrect in that assessments of what might require more or less effort are frequently in error, often concentrating on a single phoneme while missing the effort required to insert that phoneme into a string. And, as noted, neither /ask/ nor /aks/ have actually replaced the other, universally, in several hundred years, so I suspect that predicting when a particular pronunciation will die out, (short of carefully working out the current theories expanded from the Grimm brothers’ first efforts), is an exercise in futility. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/91 "2010-11-21T05:47:14Z")
African American Vernacular English (AAVE) is the most common term for the dialect. African American English, Black English, Black Vernacular, Black English Vernacular, and Black Vernacular English are also used. No linguist would use the term Ebonics: > **[African-American Vernacular English](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_American_Vernacular_English)** > > African-American Vernacular English\[a\] (AAVE) is the variety of English natively spoken, particularly in urban communities, by most working- and middle-class African Americans and some Black Canadians. > Having its own unique grammatical, vocabulary, and accent features, AAVE is employed by middle-class Black Americans as the more informal and casual end of a sociolinguistic continuum. However, in formal speaking contexts, speakers tend to switch to more standard English grammar and vocabulary... ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/92 "2010-11-21T07:59:05Z")
> [@Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](#): > > Yeah. In Britain I often hear /njuː/ (nyoo) rather than /nuː/ (noo) for new. Definitely not a Texas/southwestern ‘innovation’ A getcha. I thought you were referring specifically to KYU-pon, which I have never ever heard in the UK and to me is specifically American. I do say NYOO for ‘new’, KYUbe for ‘cube’, TYOOb for ‘tube’, and TYU-nә for ‘tuna’. But KOO-pon for ‘coupon’. There’s a class divide too sometimes: e.g. ‘posh’ people in England often say SYOOt for ‘suit’, the rest of us say SOOt. The weirdest ones I’ve heard are people in Ireland saying KIE-osk for ‘kiosk’ and ‘COL-yoom’ for ‘column’. ---
**Author:** ![jebert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ec9cab/32.png) [@jebert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jebert)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/93 "2010-11-21T15:55:21Z")
> [@jebert](#): > > I have heard people using more or less standard English except for this one word. What’s up? Separating the wheat from chaff in this thread, I conclude that some people who use a non-standard vernacular in some circumstances and standard English in others might at times let a word from one slip into the other. No one has said that a person might be incapable of pronouncing the word as /ask/. Although it might cause no problem for most people, perhaps it is a problem for a few. Johnny Carson had a famously difficult time pronouncing “linoleum” (or maybe it was “aluminum”). ---
**Author:** ![Fridgemagnet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/22d042/32.png) [@Fridgemagnet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fridgemagnet)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/94 "2010-11-21T20:42:14Z")
In Britain I generally hear the more Jamaican influenced pronunciation “arks”; there is no finer illustration than in this [Peter Serafinowicz clip](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAeprWIOQqQ), where his slightly camp estate agent (realtor) breaks into a menacing Yardie growl whenever hubby says something to threaten his sale. Did I arks you? \ See also [Kali](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdrf7G0BTRk) the pigeon for a slightly less gangsta interpretation of the accent. She also says “arks”, but not in this clip. ---
**Author:** ![phaemon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/977dab/32.png) [@phaemon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phaemon)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2010, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/95 "2010-11-22T15:23:00Z")
I used to work in IT at a university in London and would be childishly amused by students (presumably from the West Indies?) coming up and complaining, “Ma floppy diks is no workin’!” I always assumed there was some other language they spoke that had the “ks” sound at the end of words, but not a “sk” sound, so they tended to reverse it. ---
**Author:** ![BwanaBob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bwanabob/32/2985_2.png) [@BwanaBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BwanaBob)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2010, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/96 "2010-11-22T16:30:36Z")
> [@Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](#): > > No, it really doesn’t! > > Take the vowel at the beginning. Is it æ, or ɑː? Both are equally valid. You know damn well what I mean - vowels sounds float with regions. sk != ks in pronunciation unless you have a speech impediment. ---
**Author:** ![BwanaBob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bwanabob/32/2985_2.png) [@BwanaBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BwanaBob)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2010, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/97 "2010-11-22T16:31:40Z")
> [@Ruminator](#): > > How do you pronounce “knee”? Is it kuh-nee or nee? > > “Wednesday”? Is it Woden’s-day or wenzday? > > “February”? febyouary? > It’s not a negative decay. It’s just evolution. > > “Wednesday” –\> wenzday > …same type of transformation as… > “ask” –\> ax > > Give it 150 years and probably _everybody_ will pronounce it as ax. It requires less effort to pronounce. The human race is lazy. Pronouncing “ask” like ass-kuh is almost blurting out 2 separate syllables. That’s too much work. Ask is 1 syllable. If you have to make it two then you too have a speech impediment. ---
**Author:** ![BwanaBob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bwanabob/32/2985_2.png) [@BwanaBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BwanaBob)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2010, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/98 "2010-11-22T16:44:28Z")
> [@iamthewalrus\_3](#): > > You seem to be arguing that “cou-” has a standard pronunciation, and that “cue” isn’t it. > > But your examples don’t support that at all. There are at least six different pronunciations there (in my dialect at least) > > cough: caw > council, counter: cow > coup, coupe: coo > couple, couplet, cousin: cuh > courage: cur > court, course: coar > > So, why couldn’t “cue” also be a valid pronunciation for that spelling? Clearly there’s nothing in the spelling that suggests a standard pronunciation. Coupon comes from the French verb “couper, to cut” (sounds like “coo-pay” to English ears), same as coup and coupe. It stands to reason that they’d be pronounced similarly. Do you say kyoop for coupe? ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2010, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/99 "2010-11-22T16:45:17Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > Shtreet is easier to pronounce than street. (Sh is a lot more like the following sound, which is _not_ in most dialects a ‘t’ sound but rather a ‘ch’ sound.) Really? I thought most people pronounce the ‘t’ in “street” as the plain ‘t’ sound. I pronounce “train” as “chrain” so I see what you’re getting at, but when you put the ‘s’ in front of “tr” it makes it easier to say them with the ‘s’ and ‘t’ sounds. I thought everyone said it this way, but that seems to be the case with almost every pronunciation variation. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2010, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177/100 "2010-11-22T16:51:11Z")
This kind of thing happens in other languages too. For example, in standard Bengali, “box” is “baksho,” but in some regional accents, it is pronounced “basko” or “bashko.” The “sk” sequence can be difficult word-initially, as well. The English word “school” has been adopted into standard Bengali as “ishkul,” but is sometimes pronounced “askul” or “sakul.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-some-people-pronounce-ask-as-aks/561177.md?page=6)