Examples of English Words With Common Spelling Pronunciations
- often, pronounced with /t/, which is in fact a reversion to the 15th century pronunciation, though the pronunciation without /t/ is still preferred by 73% of British speakers and 78% of American speakers. Older dictionaries do not list the pronunciation with /t/, though the 2nd edition of the OED does (and the first edition notes the pronunciation with the comment that it is prevalent in the south of England and "often used in singing"; see the Dictionary of American Regional English for contemporaneous citations discussing the status of the competing pronunciations). The sporadic nature of such shifts is apparent upon examination of examples such as whistle, listen, and soften, where the t remains largely unpronounced.
- forehead once rhymed with horrid, but is now pronounced with the second syllable as /hɛd/ by 85% of Americans and 65% of people in Britain. This is in fact a reversion to its original pronunciation.
- clothes was historically pronounced the same way as the verb close ("Whenas in silks my Julia goes/.../The liquefaction of her clothes"—Herrick), but many speakers now insert a /ð/, pronouncing a voiced th. This is in fact a reversion to its 15th century pronunciation.
- salmon, occasionally pronounced with /l/.
- falcon is now nearly always pronounced with /l/, and just 3% of speakers have no /l/. The /l/ was lacking in the old pronunciation: compare French faucon and the older English spellings faucon and fawcon. This may suggest either analogical change or the reborrowing of the original Latin.
- alm, balm, psalm; often now pronounced with /l/ in some parts the United States. In most of the United Kingdom, the traditional /ɑːm/ pronunciation continues to prevail.
- comptroller, often pronounced with /mp/; accepted pronunciation is "controller" (the mp spelling is based on the mistaken idea that the word has something to do with comp(u)tare "count, compute", but it comes from contre-roll "file copy", both the verb and its agent noun meaning "compare originals and file copies").
- ye the article, pronounced as if spelled with a y instead of the printer's mark for Þ, the letter thorn.
- taking the insular flat-topped g of northern scripts as a z- in names like Mackenzie, Menzies, Dalziel (in the last with the value of /j/ originally).
- tortilla and other words from Spanish with the double-L pronounced /l/ instead of /j/ (the latter being the closest approximation to the sound in Spanish); similarly the Italian-sourced maraschino (cherry) with /ʃ/ instead of /sk/.
- victuals "vitals" whose -c- (for a consonant lost long before the word was borrowed from French) was reintroduced on etymological grounds, and sometimes pronounced with /kt/.
- The pronunciation of waistcoat as waist-coat is now more common than the previous pronunciation weskit.
- conduit, historically pronounced /ˈkɒndɪt/ or /ˈkʌndɪt/, is now nearly always /ˈkɒndjuːɪt/, /ˈkɑndwɪt/ or /ˈkɑnduwɪt/ in most of the United States.
- covert, historically pronounced /ˈkʌvɚt/ (reflecting its link with the verb cover) is now usually /ˈkoʊvɚt/, by analogy to overt.
- medicine, historically pronounced with two syllables but now quite often with three (some speakers use two when they mean medicaments and three when they mean medical knowledge; the pronunciation with three syllables is standard in the United States).
- Bartholomew, formerly pronounced /ˈbartəlmi/, is now /barˈθɒləmju/.
- Anthony (< Lat. Antonius), now (in the US) /ˈænθəni/.
- Numerous place-names with traditional ("old-fashioned") pronunciations have been displaced by ones influenced by the spelling: St. Louis, formerly /sænt ˈluːwiː/ now /seɪnt ˈluːɪs/, Papillion (Nebraska), formerly /pæpijoʊ/ now /pəˈpiljən/, Beatrice (Nebraska) formerly and still somewhat currently /biˈjætrəs/, now /ˈbijətrəs/. Montpelier, the capital of Vermont, is now pronounced /mɒntˈpiːliər/ instead of the French-influenced /mõpelie/.
- Sir George Everest's surname is pronounced /ˈiːvrɨst/. The mountain named after him – Mount Everest – is generally pronounced /ˈɛvᵊrɨst/ or /ˈɛvrɨst/.
- Interjections such as tsk tsk! or tut tut! (a pair of dental clicks), now commonly /ˈtɪsk ˈtɪsk/ and /ˈtʌt ˈtʌt/.
- The words Arctic, Antarctic, and Antarctica were originally pronounced without /k/, but the spelling pronunciation has become very common. The "c" was originally added to the spelling for etymological reasons and was then misunderstood as not being silent.
Read more about this topic: Spelling Pronunciation
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