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10:37pm July 26, 2015

Why is it so upsetting to people…

natalunasans:

withasmoothroundstone:

…when people say ‘nucular’?

And why do people assume that anyone who says that doesn’t actually know anything about nuclear physics (or any other science that involves the word nuclear), even if they do?

Like… why do people care?

i know, right?!
as a language and grammar teacher (not of english! but in the same department) i’m supposed to care about this stuff, but i think it’s more important to try to break the classism around “dialects”.

also trying to be polyglot only makes me realize more how important are all the creole languages and dialects and slangs and all that stuff… regionalisms and registers of language, etc.

Yeah, I actually find linguistic variation endlessly fascinating and extremely fluid and interesting in just how varied it is on how tiny a level and how huge a level at the same time.  Not sure if that sentence made sense but I know what I meant by it.

Notes:
  1. kelpforestdweller said: to me it’s just that irrational irritation that you say you also get about certain words. rationally I know mispronouncing something is nbd and it’s unkind to be annoyed about it but most mispronunciations irritate me
  2. withasmoothroundstone reblogged this from natalunasans and added:
    Yeah, I actually find linguistic variation endlessly fascinating and extremely fluid and interesting in just how varied...
  3. katisconfused said: yeah I have gotten made fun of for it. The exact tease was “ha ha you sound like Bush”… who is known as the “stupid” president I am pretty sure they are intending to mock the way DD people when they do it :/
  4. caitatonic reblogged this from withasmoothroundstone and added:
    I have a really really hard time saying “nuke-lear” versus “nu-cue-lar” because of my damn regional accent. |:
  5. natalunasans reblogged this from madeofpatterns and added:
    i know, right?! as a language and grammar teacher (not of english! but in the same department) i’m supposed to care...
  6. madeofpatterns reblogged this from withasmoothroundstone
  7. maikisan said: This one specifically is also associated with President Bush, even though many presidents used this pronunciation. I think people assume that people mispronounce it because they don’t know about the “nucleus” instead of linguistic variation.
  8. maikisan said: Because people assume that differences in accent make one stupid or ignorant about the true pronunciation, instead of having trouble pronouncing words or regional variations. Language purists are against the evolution of language, basically. :/