reservwah (was: paraplegic)

[Mark A. Mandel]

"ANNE V. GILBERT" <avgilbert at PRODIGY.NET> writes:

>>>>>
All I can say here is, I can't tell you how many people who are supposed to
be "educated" do much the same thing.  "Nucular" is a popular pronunication
for "nuclear", even among people who will use "reservwah"(a sort of French
pronunciation) to suggest their education.  This is just an observation on
my part.  And I'm not trying to be snobby either.
<<<<<

My wife, like some other people I've heard, often drops final written "r"
in French words (not "reservoir", which for us is fully adopted into
English), even where it is not dropped in French. I call it "French final
consonant deletion": the overgeneralization of the rule that final
consonants in written French are silent.

My first French teacher -- bless her for this, even if I hated her then! --
taught us the mnemonic "CaReFuL" for the written consonants that are NOT
silent when final, noting the exception (there are always exceptions, as
fractal smaller fleas) of final "-er".

   Mark A. Mandel : Dragon Systems, a Lernout & Hauspie company
          Mark_Mandel at dragonsys.com : Senior Linguist
 320 Nevada St., Newton, MA 02460, USA : http://www.dragonsys.com