10-03-2008, 01:05 PM
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 | Ultimate Member | | Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Pacific NW
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Quote:
Originally Posted by kvmj  As I said earlier, it doesn't matter how many people around you mispronounce a word like library or nuclear, it is not acceptable to say libary or nucular. People do it because they are ignorant of the correct pronunciation.
Didn't notice anything odd about the way Obama pronounces Pakistan. I don't know that everybody needs to sound like they came from Kansas. I mean no offense, but, Kansas isn't known as the cultural capitol of the world.
My mom was from Boston, my dad from Wisconsin and I have a Southern drawl. I even had a British accent for a couple of years. We're all products of our environments. | Spoken language always comes first. Many people say nucular. It's not like Palin just mispronounced it. Why Does Bush Go "Nucular"?
By Kate Taylor
Posted Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2002, at 6:29 PM ET
When speaking about nuclear weapons, George W. Bush invariably pronounces the word "nucular." Is this an acceptable pronunciation?
Not really. Changing "nu-clee-ar" into "nu-cu-lar" is an example of what linguists call metathesis, which is the switching of two adjacent sounds. (Think of it this way: "nook le yer" becomes "nook ye ler.") This switching is common in English pronunciation; you might pronounce "iron" as "eye yern" rather than "eye ron." Why do people do it? One reason, offered in a usage note in the American Heritage Dictionary, is that the "ular" ending is extremely common in English, and much more common than "lear." Consider particular, circular, spectacular, and many science-related words like molecular, ocular, muscular.
Bush isn't the only American president to lose the "nucular" war. In his "On Language" column in the New York Times Magazine in May 2001, William Safire lamented that, besides Bush, at least three other presidents—Eisenhower, Carter, and Clinton—have mangled the word.
In fact, Bush's usage is so common that it appears in at least one dictionary. Merriam-Webster's, by far the most liberal dictionary, includes the pronunciation, though with a note identifying it as "a pronunciation variant that occurs in educated speech but that is considered by some to be questionable or unacceptable." A 1961 Merriam-Webster's edition was the first to include "nucular"; the editors received so many indignant letters that they added a usage note in the 1983 version, pointing out its "widespread use among educated speakers including scientists, lawyers, professors, congressmen, U.S. cabinet members, and at least one U.S. president and one vice president." They even noted its prominence among "British and Canadian speakers."
These days, Merriam-Webster's sends every reader who fusses about "nucular" a defensive, 400-word response letter. Click here to read it.
Why does Bush go "nucular"? - By Kate Taylor - Slate Magazine
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