"Drouth"

[Laurence Horn]

At 8:48 AM -0500 11/7/07, Charles Doyle wrote:
>Some 35 years ago a friend--a learned linguist who has since become
>eminent in the field--heard me pronounce "height" with a theta at
>the end. He hypothesized that mine was a "misspelling
>pronunciation"--that I had visualized the word with the final "h"
>and "t" interchanged, and then pronounced it accordingly.
>
>In fact, of course, the /-T/ form of "height," like the /-T/ form of
>"drought," has alternated with the /-t/ form for many centuries (in
>both pronunciation and spelling). But I have, ever since that
>conversation, been intrigued by the concept of "misspelling
>pronunciations." What might real examples be? With most of the words
>that our students ubiquitously misspell, like "occurrence" and
>"separate," pronunciation would not be affected (or, rather, the
>misspelling is based on the phonology).
>
>--Charlie

Wouldn't the /T/ in "author" be one?  And the one in "Anthony" (U.S.
pronunciation) be another?

LH

>_____________________________________________________________
>
>
>
>---- Original message ----
>>Date: Tue, 6 Nov 2007 09:23:37 -0500
>>From: Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>>
>>"Drouth" doesn't look odd, Charlie!. It looks like an old friend!
>>It's the same with "height." We spell it "height," but we pronounce
>>it "high-th." That's pure-dee East-Texan! "Drought" is like some
>>weird pronunciation-spelling.
>>
>>-Wilson
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org