The "How Do You Pronounce X" Thread

[Glass Half Baked]

How do you pronounce the semi-jocular plural of octopus, octopodes?
I am tempted to say ak.ta.po.diz, but I imagine some people might say ak.ta.po.diz, or even ak.ta.podz.

[bradrn]

How do you pronounce the semi-jocular plural of octopus, octopodes?
I am tempted to say ak.ta.po.diz, but I imagine some people might say ak.ta.po.diz, or even ak.ta.podz.

I would go with /ˌɔk.təˈpə͡ʉ.diːz/.

[Travis B.]

My pronunciation is similar to bradrn's ─ I would say /ˌɑktəˈpoʊdiz/ [ˌaʔktəˈpʰo̞ːɾiːs].

[WeepingElf]

How do you pronounce the semi-jocular plural of octopus, octopodes?

What is semi-jocular about octopodes? I'd rather call it high-brow, as it is the correct Latin plural. Not octopi, which is pseudo-Latin. But in English, I'd pluralize it simply as octopuses.

[Lērisama]

How do you pronounce the semi-jocular plural of octopus, octopodes?
I am tempted to say ak.ta.po.diz, but I imagine some people might say ak.ta.po.diz, or even ak.ta.podz.

I would go with the same as bradrn and Travis, minus predictable dialectical differences: /ˌɔk.təˈpəw.dijz/. Your preferred way looks wrong to me, but I think that's just because of the ⟨a⟩s; my mind will never get used to unrounded LOTs, no matter how often I hear them.

[jal]

I'd rather call it high-brow, as it is the correct Latin plural.

But it's Greek isn't it? So it'd be a Greek plural.

Anyway, here's a more thorough explenation.


JAL

[WeepingElf]

I'd rather call it high-brow, as it is the correct Latin plural.

But it's Greek isn't it? So it'd be a Greek plural.

Anyway, here's a more thorough explenation.

Yes, you are of course right; the word is originally Greek, and as far as I know, the Greek plural is the same as the Latin plural (more precisely, the nominative plural, of course). At any rate, octopi is wrong in both Greek and Latin, and one should IMHO rather use plain English octopuses when speaking or writing English.

But we are veering off the topic here. Glass Half Baked's question was on which syllable to stress octopodes, and my vote (as a non-native English speaker) is for the third syllable.

[anteallach]

How do you pronounce the semi-jocular plural of octopus, octopodes?
I am tempted to say ak.ta.po.diz, but I imagine some people might say ak.ta.po.diz, or even ak.ta.podz.

Second syllable stress, LOT, LOT, schwa, FLEECE.

[Travis B.]

How do you pronounce the semi-jocular plural of octopus, octopodes?
I am tempted to say ak.ta.po.diz, but I imagine some people might say ak.ta.po.diz, or even ak.ta.podz.

Second syllable stress, LOT, LOT, schwa, FLEECE.

Apparently you're prescriptively right (aside from that prescriptively the second syllable can also take GOAT).

[jal]

I caught my kids (one of which speaks English fairly well, and one of which is watching English language TikToks all day) saying "mullet" as rhyming with "bullet". They tried to convince me that's what people on TikTok say, and fair enough, there was this one TikTok presumably from the US that rhymed "mullet" with "bullet". So is this common? I'd say "mullet" with STRUT and "bullet" with FOOT.


JAL

[Travis B.]

I caught my kids (one of which speaks English fairly well, and one of which is watching English language TikToks all day) saying "mullet" as rhyming with "bullet". They tried to convince me that's what people on TikTok say, and fair enough, there was this one TikTok presumably from the US that rhymed "mullet" with "bullet". So is this common? I'd say "mullet" with STRUT and "bullet" with FOOT.

Mullet takes STRUT while bullet takes FOOT -- the only people who can legitimately pronounce the two with the same vowels are the people who don't have the split between STRUT and FOOT in the first place.

[Raphael]

Wait, are you telling me that there are still kids today who know what the word "mullet" means? (Sorry, couldn't resist.)

[Raphael]

Also, I didn't know that "bullet" is supposed to have FOOT. Are you sure it's not PUT?

[Travis B.]

Also, I didn't know that "bullet" is supposed to have FOOT. Are you sure it's not PUT?

PUT and FOOT are the same vowel in all varieties of English I am aware of.

[Raphael]

Also, I didn't know that "bullet" is supposed to have FOOT. Are you sure it's not PUT?

PUT and FOOT are the same vowel in all varieties of English I am aware of.

What? I could have sworn that PUT is short and FOOT is long.

[Travis B.]

Also, I didn't know that "bullet" is supposed to have FOOT. Are you sure it's not PUT?

PUT and FOOT are the same vowel in all varieties of English I am aware of.

What? I could have sworn that PUT is short and FOOT is long.

Traditionally FOOT is /ʊ/ while GOOSE is /uː/ -- there is no PUT versus FOOT.

[Lērisama]

Also, I didn't know that "bullet" is supposed to have FOOT. Are you sure it's not PUT?

As Travis said, ⟨put⟩ anď ⟨foot⟩ share the same vowel, but I will pedantically note that ⟨bullet⟩ has an actually back [ʊ], as opposed to a [ɵ] or fronter that is more usual for the FOOT vowel, because /l/s tend to back preceding vowels¹. In German terms, I say ⟨bullet⟩ rather than ⟨büllet⟩, and I'm mostly mentioning it because it is an utter pain in learning German, probably moreso than going the other way.

¹ I do have a phonemic GOAL from yhe same process, as evidanced by wholely vs. holy vs. holly which are [hɔwlɪj], [həwlɪj] and [hɔlɪj] respectively

[Raphael]

Ah, thank you!

[jcb]

I caught my kids (one of which speaks English fairly well, and one of which is watching English language TikToks all day) saying "mullet" as rhyming with "bullet". They tried to convince me that's what people on TikTok say, and fair enough, there was this one TikTok presumably from the US that rhymed "mullet" with "bullet". So is this common? I'd say "mullet" with STRUT and "bullet" with FOOT.

Mullet takes STRUT while bullet takes FOOT -- the only people who can legitimately pronounce the two with the same vowels are the people who don't have the split between STRUT and FOOT in the first place.

Another back vowel merger!? Where in the world does this one happen?

[Travis B.]

I caught my kids (one of which speaks English fairly well, and one of which is watching English language TikToks all day) saying "mullet" as rhyming with "bullet". They tried to convince me that's what people on TikTok say, and fair enough, there was this one TikTok presumably from the US that rhymed "mullet" with "bullet". So is this common? I'd say "mullet" with STRUT and "bullet" with FOOT.

Mullet takes STRUT while bullet takes FOOT -- the only people who can legitimately pronounce the two with the same vowels are the people who don't have the split between STRUT and FOOT in the first place.

Another back vowel merger!? Where in the world does this one happen?

It's not a merger, it's a non-split, and it happens in northern England.