The "How Do You Pronounce X" Thread

[Travis B.]

I'm surprised by so many people retaining the voiced plurals - it comes across as very old-fashioned and upper-class to me. I have devoicing in all of them except 'clothes'.

Although, come to think of it, in more idiomatic uses where the link to the singular has been broken, I can have the voiced version. So devoiced literal "mouths" (more than one oral orifice), but voiced metaphorical "mouths" (in metonymous expressions like "a lot of mouths to feed"). And devoiced "truths" in a logical sense (things that are true), but possibly voiced in fixed expressions like "home truths".

For me, mouths ends in /ðz/ or /z/ (albeit devoiced when not before a vowel, with vowel lengthening) while truths ends in /θs/.

[Pabappa]

I grew up with /θs/ in baths, paths, truths, moths etc but someone I admired said [tru:z] for truths and over the years I eventually started imitating him. Although for me it's /ðz/, not just /z/. Im not sure there's much of a geographical distribution to it in the USA .... this person was in Vermont, but I dont think it's particularly characteristic of Vermont or even of New England since I hadnt heard it much when I was growing up. Moths with /ðz/ was used on Seinfeld, however.

[Travis B.]

Paths and moths are also /ðz/~/z/ words for me..

[Nortaneous]

ðz is hard to pronounce

Interesting, I don't find it that difficult.

Do you have [ð] in "clothes"? I don't. I think the [ð] can be restored across an obvious morpheme boundary.

"Moths" definitely has /θs/ for me. I'm not sure about the rest. (I'm a little surprised that "moth" goes back to PGmc - I never really thought about it much, but sort of figured it was a loan from Algonquian or something.)

[äreo]

“Moths” is the only “-ths” plural I can think of that I might actually pronounce /θs/, and even then I’m not sure now. “Paths,” “truths,” “mouths,” and “baths” are all definitely /ðz/ for me.

[Xwtek]

How do you pronounce "is it" in "what time is it". Because I'm pretty sure that "it" is a clitic. But according to this video, it is wrong: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CktAc3ufVP4

[Salmoneus]

In the question "what time is it?" in isolation, generally /IzIt/. (the /t/ can be a glottal stop, depending on register, but is notably less likely to be so than many other final /t/s - I think the /I/ helps preserve it?)

However, in questions like "what time is it coming?", when neither 'is' nor 'it' is emphasised, it's normally /zIt/. (i.e. "what time's it coming?", though I wouldn't normally write it like that). (and in that case, the /t/ is at the least unreleased and glottalised, if not fully glottal).

"It" isn't normally reduce for me, if that's what you're asking, other than in initial position. It comes closest to being reduced when it's immediately after something stressed - "I don't know what time it'll come" could come close to having /mt/, I think? But certainly after something like 'is', I wouldn't expect 'it' to be reduced. English has quite a strong rhythmic pattern. Although one fascinating thing is that the colloquial abbreviations of a few centuries ago commonly used entirely different reduction patterns - so, even though we think those sound changes had actually happened in common parlance, they were all reversed and then a new set applied instead, which emphasises that people probably had the "correct" construction as an entry in their lexicon, even when they didn't commonly use it.

So a few centuries ago, 'twould indeed be true that 'it' was reduced all over the place, but 'tis false now, is't not?

[anteallach]

I'm surprised by so many people retaining the voiced plurals - it comes across as very old-fashioned and upper-class to me. I have devoicing in all of them except 'clothes'.

Although, come to think of it, in more idiomatic uses where the link to the singular has been broken, I can have the voiced version. So devoiced literal "mouths" (more than one oral orifice), but voiced metaphorical "mouths" (in metonymous expressions like "a lot of mouths to feed"). And devoiced "truths" in a logical sense (things that are true), but possibly voiced in fixed expressions like "home truths".

I think I tend to have /ðz/ after a long vowel or diphthong, but always /θs/ after a short vowel. So baths, paths and moths definitely have /θs/; my feeling is that /ðz/ in the first two is more likely (but certainly not universal) among TRAP-BATH splitters, who have a long vowel there. (Maybe people who have /mɔːθ/, if there are any left in the UK, are also more likely to end the plural with /ðz/?)

[Nortaneous]

There's ðz > z but θs > θs, but another example of cluster reduction applying asymmetrically wrt voicing is Ptʃ > Pʃ, Bdʒ > Bdʒ. (e.g. capture /kæpʃər/, object /ɑbdʒekt/)

[Ares Land]

All that talk of ðz is hurting my tongue. Please think of the poor L2 speakers!

[Linguoboy]

I had to double-check the pronunciation of Devin Nunes' surname. Some people I know have been pronouncing it as if it were "Núñez", but it's not Spanish, it's Portuguese.

[Pabappa]

I grew up with a friend with that last name, who pronounced it /nu:nz/, and other Portuguese people I met seemed to lean towards Anglicized pronunciations as well, like /sorz/ for Soares, and possibly even /lo:ps/ for Lopes (but Im not sure if that person was Portuguese). So I thought it was that way for everyone and I still mentally read his name as /nu:nz/.

[Salmoneus]

I could have sworn I'd heard that he himself says /nu:nz/ (or /nju:nz/). But wikipedia says otherwise, and appears to be correct.

I'm not sure Wikipedia is entirely correct, though - they have /E/ for the second vowel, but hearing him say it, I can only hear schwa.

It doesn't help that the guide he and others give out is "new-ness". Because for one thing, -ness has a schwa for me but seemingly at least some people think that's wrong, but also because for a lot of people 'new' has a yod, and for some it doesn't. Telling me that the first syllable is neither "noon" nor "nyoon" but rather "new" is not helpful, people! [plus, why emphasise so much that the /n/ is onset and not coda, because I can barely tell the difference anyway!]

[Travis B.]

I could have sworn I'd heard that he himself says /nu:nz/ (or /nju:nz/). But wikipedia says otherwise, and appears to be correct.

I'm not sure Wikipedia is entirely correct, though - they have /E/ for the second vowel, but hearing him say it, I can only hear schwa.

It doesn't help that the guide he and others give out is "new-ness". Because for one thing, -ness has a schwa for me but seemingly at least some people think that's wrong, but also because for a lot of people 'new' has a yod, and for some it doesn't. Telling me that the first syllable is neither "noon" nor "nyoon" but rather "new" is not helpful, people! [plus, why emphasise so much that the /n/ is onset and not coda, because I can barely tell the difference anyway!]

Clasically in NAE new does not have a yod. However, I have heard people who (re)insert a yod before /u/ when it follows a coronal, effectively resulting in the restoration of /nju/, but also adding yods where none ever existed before.

[Linguoboy]

Clasically in NAE new does not have a yod. However, I have heard people who (re)insert a yod before /u/ when it follows a coronal, effectively resulting in the restoration of /nju/, but also adding yods where none ever existed before.

One of my professors' examples of hypercorrection was hearing /njuːn/ from an announcer on the local Classical music station.

[Travis B.]

Clasically in NAE new does not have a yod. However, I have heard people who (re)insert a yod before /u/ when it follows a coronal, effectively resulting in the restoration of /nju/, but also adding yods where none ever existed before.

One of my professors' examples of hypercorrection was hearing /njuːn/ from an announcer on the local Classical music station.

I am not sure that is hypercorrection as much as phonologically-conditioned breaking of /u/; mind you that many people also centralize the /u/ in the same environment, resulting in [jʉ].

[äreo]

Here in Texas many people retain yod after coronals, or at least after /t d n/. Part of it is that traditionally it was never lost in these parts, and part of it is that even L1 English speakers whose parents are Spanish speakers seem to analogize it to instances of tiV, diV, and ñV in Spanish.

[Linguoboy]

Flaubertian
Goethean
Wagnerian
Wittgensteinian

[Salmoneus]

Flaubertian
Goethean
Wagnerian
Wittgensteinian

/floUbE:ti@n/
/g3:ti@n/ (with possible additional rounding)
/vAgnE:ri@n/ (but -i:ri@n is an alternative, and the more mainstream/traditional pronounciation)
/vItgnStaIni@n/

But only the last two are words I'd use on a regular basis.

[Estav]

I haven't heard or said any of these, so my responses are just how I would pronounce them based on the spelling and the pronunciation of the bases and of other suffixed words. For context, I'll also give my pronunciations of the unsuffixed names.

Flaubert : /floˈber/ (goat vowel and square vowel). Flaubertian : my first instinct was /floˈbertiən/, but upon inspection, I don't like it much. None of the alternatives appeal to me either, though: using /ʃiən/ or /ʃən/ sounds silly, using /riən/ feels impossible. I would try to avoid using this word.
Goethe : /ˈgərtə/, I guess (although I am not comfortable with using any pronunciation of this name in English). Goethean: I wouldn't attempt to pronounce it. If forced to, maybe I would resort to /ˈgərtiən/.
Wagner : /ˈwægnər~ˈvægnər~ˈvɑgnər/. Wagnerian : /ˌwæg-~ˌvæg-~ˌvɑgˈniriən/ (with the near vowel, which I identify with the fleece vowel). Phonemic compression of /ri/ to /rj/ is only possible for me in artificial contexts (e.g. poetry).
Wittgenstein : /ˈwɪtgənˌstaın~ˈvɪtgənˌstaın/. Probably not /ˈvɪtgənʃtaın/, although it's within the bounds of possibility. I think that the last syllable has secondary stress, but that isn't or is only barely contrastive with total lack of stress for syllables in this position with /aı/ as the nucleus. Wittgensteinian : /ˌwɪtgən-~ˌvɪtgənˈstaıniən/. Phonemic compression of /ni/ to /nj/ is probably possible, but doesn't feel very natural to me compared to the use of syllabic /ni/. The shift of primary stress to the first syllable before the prefix -ian feels very regular to me.