Dip-thong

[Victoria Neufeldt]

There's also 'diphtheria' -- same pattern of pronunciation.  (Although for
this word, the M-W Collegiate shows the "division" symbol with the -p- pron,
to indicate disputed usage.  But then we all know that linguistic attitudes
are not based on logic.)  I haven't checked our pron files for the backing
for the treatment of these prons; I'll do that if I have time later.

Victoria
Merriam-Webster, Inc. P.O. Box 281
Springfield, MA 01102
Tel: 413-734-3134  ext 124
Fax: 413-827-7262

> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU]On Behalf
> Of Rudolph C Troike
> Sent: Friday, May 19, 2000 12:42 AM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Dip-thong
>
>
> Unlike Larry, whenever and wherever I first picked up the word, it was
> solely with /p/, and I suspect that I probably even spelled it that way
> until forced by comparison with "monoph-thong" to notice the -ph- . Unless
> I am being very careful in lecture, I usually still pronounce it with /p/.
>         Similarly, I learned "amphitheater" with /p/ as well, and it was
> not until I was living in Turkey and discovered that it was written with
> -f- that I noticed the -ph- in the spelling. Interesting that M-W 10th
> also gives the pronunciation with -p- as second, indicating that in both
> cases it must be fairly common.
>         I suspect that there must be a connection between these two,
> neither of which has anything to do with the rampant folk-etymologizing
> (are linguists "folk"?) on this list. Given the learned nature of both
> words, they are not routinely collected in Linguistic Atlas interviews, so
> there is probably no regional-distribution information available. --Rudy
>