fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #5099 ]

[ SECRET POST #5099 ]

⌈ Secret Post #5099 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 31 secrets from Secret Submission Post #730.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Where pronunciation is influenced by where somebody came from and the people around them? Where college professors with doctorates sometimes say wanna and gonna? And so many people don't pronounce the 't' in often? Would you have made John F. Kennedy go back and do his famous 'We choose to go to the moon' speech over again because of the way he pronounced decade?

This is what Merriam-Webster has to say about the pronunciation of library:
How do you pronounce library?: Usage Guide
While the pronunciation \ˈlī-ˌbrer-ē\ is the most frequent variant in the U.S., the other variants are not uncommon. The contraction \ˈlī-brē\ and the dissimilated form \ˈlī-ˌber-ē\ result from the relative difficulty of repeating \r\ in the same syllable or successive syllables; our files contain citations for these variants from educated speakers, including college presidents and professors, as well as with somewhat greater frequency from less educated speakers.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/library

Wanna (want to) and gonna (going to) are just easier, lazier ways of speaking. And that is okay. :)

So is liberry.

And if the character wouldn't talk like that, it's wrong.

If the character is from a place where people have this regional quirk and it fits them, great, but a character with a standard American accent who's supposed to be educated/upper middle class probably won't say "liberry." A sheriff, sure. A doctor, probably not.

Depends on where they're from and who they're talking to. That's a common pronunciation in several different American dialects. If they're talking to an audience of people who also speak that same dialect, why would they need to code-switch?

The allegedly-neutral "educated" upper-middle-class voice is not the only correct one. It's been recognized for decades that regional and ethnic dialects are not incorrect or a mispronunciation but simply a variant and perfectly legitimate in its own right.

Now, there are stigmas and stereotypes attached still. Which this secret is perpetuating unthinkingly. (At least I hope it's unthinkingly and not deliberate)

Once and AGAIN, OP is talking about characters who would be expected to be speak with that educated accent. Not sure what is so hard to grasp. Wait, I am. PP want to pile on to accuse OP of something they are not doing.

DA - yep. In my neck of the woods, it is common for your ma to take some meat out of the icebox to unthaw so she can fry it up with some taters for dinner (that's the midday meal, not to be confused with supper). Thankfully, my teachers learned me right quick that I wouldn't be taken seriously if I went through life talkin' like a dumb hick, so when my parents borrowed me some money to go to college in the big city, I wasn't laughed outta town.

Look, regional dialects and accents are fun and interesting, and yes, it certainly can be elitist to suggest one is "better" than the other. But it is NOT elitist or inaccurate to say that there are actual correct and incorrect ways of saying, spelling, and using different words in the English language. More importantly, and to the OP's point, it is incredibly unrealistic and poor characterization if certain characters sound like the Beverly Hillbillies in particular contexts.

It is elitist though, you're just buying into it.

THERE ARE RULES TO LANGUAGE. Do those rules change? Yes, they do. Does that mean that every possible variation is an equally correct change? No, it does not. This is not elitism. Is it elite to say there are rules to math? To engineering? To science? Why is it elitism to say there are rules to other fields of knowledge?

But everything you just described is way worse than what OP is talking about, which also makes me cringe.

Wanna and gonna are way worse than "lieberry"?! What?!

...we're supposed to pronounce t in often? Somebody should have told my teachers, then :D

MW also lists no-t often as the first pronunciation, so please don't use them as support for one ~variant common enough to have become acceptable while simultaneously suggesting people who use the preferred pronunciation for a different example are wrong.

ayrt

I don't think any of the pronunciations are wrong. And I listed often because it has a letter in it that is no longer pronounced, but used to be. And pronouncing that letter is a subject of dispute - this is what Merriam-Webster says about that:
Often has a medial /t/ that, like similar words such has "hasten" and "soften," was once pronounced and is now typically silent. Unlike the similar words, pronouncing the "t" in "often" has returned in some modern usage. This pronunciation is still scrutinized heavily and there is a divide between whether this is an educated or uneducated way of speaking.

Also, the reason I included what Merriam-Webster said about library above was specifically to call out this: our files contain citations for these variants from educated speakers, including college presidents and professors. Since the secret says educated people wouldn't pronounce it like that.

But you still suggest that the silent t is the one that is or should be perceived as wrong or uneducated, based on how you list it with other examples, and by your own ~proof, it is the opposite. If you're going to use MW as some sort of definitive guide, you should be consistent.

I also note that you've conveniently forgotten to mention that MW explicitly says "lieberry" is a nonstandard pronunciation, after it lists the multiple standard US and British variants. Nonstandard is a little more germane to this argument than "not uncommon". Something can be common and still wrong. Which is why it is found in "greater frequency from less educated speakers".

ayrt

I am not saying that Merriam-Webster is the absolute bastion of everything English. I am saying that they have citations that people who are educated pronounce library that way. That's it, that's my point. It is a point that directly speaks to and contradicts what the secret implies. I apologize for including 'often' in my list of things people pronounce differently, since that seems important to you.

Your point is taken - it has been observed that some educated people use the pronunciation the OP finds objectionable. The same exact source, however, says that is less frequent or common for that to be the case, which would explain why the OP is annoyed by situations where they hear it - entirely because of its association with education. My point (having nothing to do with "often", although I do admit I hate being ~corrected when I say it perfectly correctly) is that you are using a source to make one argument while ignoring the other points in the same exact source that don't support your claims and instead support the OP's.

ayrt

Okay, I am not arguing that fewer people use the pronunciation and I am not arguing that it is a standard way. I am saying that the secret maker implies that an educated person would never say it like that, that it is always wrong for the character if they are well-educated and well-spoken, and that just isn't true. I'm saying that some, not all, well-educated people will have that particular speech habit.

Fair enough, I will agree with that. For what it's worth, I think that the OP is right in saying that there certain pronunciations are associated with education levels, but I don't think that that is right, or that policing of language in academia or whatever is right, either. Ought =/= is.

ayrt

I appreciate that. Sorry that I was short with you earlier. I guess I'm a little more sensitive to this than I realized. My mom, who has a Master's degree, is from the South and very consciously suppressed her accent in college because of the perceptions surrounding it. But even though she doesn't usually speak with a Southern accent now unless she's been talking to family from there or is telling stories about growing up, it still influences her speech in other ways.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ SECRET POST #5099 ]

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