Noah Webster at 250

[Paul Johnston]

Brian Clough, the late football (sorry, soccer) manager was "Cluff",
but it gets confusing.  The name "Gough" in British English, anyway,
is "Goff" not "Guff" (and this gets carried over to their
pronunciation of "Van Gogh"="Van Goff"; you don't even want to KNOW
the original if you're an English speaker).  There's also a common
Scottish name "Gow", usually spelled that way, but I wouldn't be
surprised if many American "Goughs" are "Gows".  Charlie Hough, the
former Dodger pitcher, was "Huff", and so is the neighborhood on the
East side of Cleveland (and the Brits would agree).  All of these
except the Scottish Gows contained /x/ in earlier English, and the
development of that is extremely variable, of course.

As far as plow is concerned, I think I've seen (probably in the UK,
not here) plow as the verb, and plough as the noun, thus preserving
the OE distinction of plogan v. (with a voiced velar fricative, which
lenites to a vowel) and ploh n. (with /x/ > /f/ or zero). And there
are dialects (trad. Yorkshire for one) which have "pluff" and "plee-
uff" for the noun.

Paul Johnston
On Oct 22, 2008, at 12:56 AM, Douglas G. Wilson wrote:

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> Subject:      Re: Noah Webster at 250
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> Wilson Gray wrote:
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>> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject:      Re: Noah Webster at 250
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>> Dennis Baron writes:
>>
>> "...plow, not plough ..."
>>
>> Back in the 'Forties, there was a soap-operatic, cartoon-serial
>> entitled _The Gumps_. One day, the Gumps were expecting as dinner
>> guest an English gentleman named "Plough." Confusion reigned as to
>> how
>> this name might be pronounced, so that introductions would not
>> pose an
>> embarrassing problem. Various solutions were proposed. I went with
>> "Pluff," myself. It seemed obvious.
>>
>> When Mr. Plough arrived and was forced to explain to his American
>> hosts that his name was pronounced "Plow," exactly as spelled,
>> millions of Americans, including your humble correspondent, were
>> taken
>> completely by surprise. My WAG is that not ten percent of the strip's
>> readers had any idea as to what what the point of this was. I didn't
>> even believe that "Plough" could be pronounced "Plow." Hence, I had
>> not the slightest idea WTF the strip's point was, until perhaps a
>> dekkid later.
> -
>
> Here ...
>
> http://www.sff.net/people/Brenda/
>
> ... is a science-fiction author named "Clough", whose books I read
> years
> ago. (Perhaps like some kindred spirits subscribing to this list?)
> Back
> when, I would have had no idea how to pronounce the surname. Now,
> thanks
> to the Internet, I am apprised of the 'correct' pronunciation, "cluff"
> (hope it's not another Internet lie). Some others with the same name
> orthographically are called "clow", I think.
>
> -- Doug Wilson
>
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