6mo ago

And people who don't read make fun of you for it.

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As someone who has learned the English language primarily by reading thousands of books, I wholeheartedly agree. On the other hand, English pronounciation sucks big time.
- When the English tongue we speak.
  Why is break not rhymed with freak?
  Will you tell me why it's true
  We say sew but likewise few?
  And the maker of the verse,
  Cannot rhyme his horse with worse?
  Beard is not the same as heard
  Cord is different from word.
  Cow is cow but low is low
  Shoe is never rhymed with foe.
  Think of hose, dose,and lose
  And think of goose and yet with choose
  Think of comb, tomb and bomb,
  Doll and roll or home and some.
  Since pay is rhymed with say
  Why not paid with said I pray?
  Think of blood, food and good.
  Mould is not pronounced like could.
  Wherefore done, but gone and lone -
  Is there any reason known?
  To sum up all, it seems to me
  Sound and letters don't agree.
  
  This makes my head hurt and I love it.
  
  It is indeed confusing
  
  The amount of lines I had to go back over was mind boggling
  
  Along the same vein as "the chaos"
  https://ncf.idallen.com/english.html
  
  Worst lingua franca evurr
  
  Guess that's why nobody coined the term "lingua anglia"
  
  Uhh! A new variant of "The Chaos".
  
  I'll take the English reformation any time now.
  Blame the french and people using endonym loan words.
- *pronunciation. So, spelling too ;)
  
  You got me there. Im a very systemic person, and pronunciation is higly asystemic, even in the English language.
- Like, how THE FSCK would I know that a geoduck is pronounced gooey-duck? Also geo-duck sounds like a Pokémon, so that’s gotta be right.
  
  geoduck
  Hey, at least it is a nice, short word. In German, it is an "Elephantenrüsselmuschel" (elephant trunk clam). At least there is absolutely no question how it is pronounced, so that's that.
  
  German pronunciation rules are awesome. If only you could get rid of some of your consonants, I’d be able to pronounce any German word.
  
  If only you could get rid of some of your consonants, I’d be able to pronounce any German word.
  You probably dislike the German variants of "ch" as much as the Germans loathe the English "th" ;-)
  
  Out of Rohrbacherstrasse, I could pronounce Ro, ba, and strasse. German has like 5 different R sounds and I can pronounce 2 of them. And yet most of you can’t pronounce the vibrating R in my name.
  And I hate English’s TH as well, both sounds of it, and especially the insistence in using it next to S. How am I supposed to pronounce “clothes” with any grace or dignity left?
  No, my mother tongue isn’t Germanic, but Celtic-Latin with a lot of Banto and Tupi thrown in for mellowing.
  
  And yet most of you can’t pronounce the vibrating R in my name.
  Spanish name, by chance?
  
  Close, but no cigar
  
  So I up one and say Portuguese.
  
  Ding ding ding!

167 comments