Route or route?

[John Fairbairn]

Copper was certainly used in American films before the second world war. In particular James Cagney used the term:

In those days Hollywood often used an artificial so-called mid-Atlantic accent, no doubt to pander to as wide an audience as possible. I'd be a bit surprised if Cagney was not using a real US accent, at least as a gangster, but perhaps writers, too, tried to straddle the Pond? We see a variation of that now in British-made films and tv programmes where writers try to insert Americanisms like 'gotten' to widen their markets. I object, not because it's American but because it sounds so artificial. I'd like to think Americans would object, too, on the additional ground that it is being assumed they are ignorant.

I see the OED says copper is "Brit. informal", which I had assumed anyway. We use the verb cop (=catch) quite widely and I'm not aware that Americans do.

More on the "route" and "en route" - I got yet another variation on Chicago PP last night: "enn rowt" as opposed to the previous "on rowt". Why don't they just say "I'm on my way?" It's like "I've got eyes on him" instead of "I can see him". Along with "copy that" and "affirmative", is this all supposed to convey a tough-guy military flavour among cops? If so, it seems to me they could do with a change of PR consultants in the light of recent events.

[Marathon]

Not a quote, but ...

Cleaner Clara Clifford claims Cleveland kleptomaniac Claude Cooper copped clean copper clappers kept in a closet.

[Bill Spight]

From Canada here. My wife and I were chatting about this yesterday. We realized that we pronounce route differently depending on the part of speech: "root" as a noun (except for an Internet rowter) but "rout" as a verb.

As in, "The Rout of the White Hussars"?

[Bill Spight]

I see the OED says copper is "Brit. informal", which I had assumed anyway. We use the verb cop (=catch) quite widely and I'm not aware that Americans do.

My sense of cop as a verb has the connotation of taking or grabbing something without permission or that you are not supposed to.

More on the "route" and "en route" - I got yet another variation on Chicago PP last night: "enn rowt" as opposed to the previous "on rowt". Why don't they just say "I'm on my way?"

Another quirk of my dialect. When I was growing up people mostly pronounced route by itself as rout, but en route as on root. Perhaps because of the proximity to Louisiana. Despite being a French phrase it was not a marker of class or education.

[John Fairbairn]

Another difference resurfaced for me yesterday. Not a pronunciation thing this time, but a vocabulary item.

Not having been into central London for best part of a year now, I haven't been to a coffee shop. Before then there was a conversation I'd have in London several times a week: "Cappuccino, please." "Regular or large?" "Small, please." (And that was it: I'd get what I wanted.)

I was reminded of it yesterday because I went for a walk in a local park where there is a small café. I (very apprehensively) ordered a mocha and got the usual "regular or large?". No doubt because of the frustrations of lockdown, I didn't utter "small" as the usual reflex action but did something that, I imagine, showed up as a flash of indignation. I got small without having to say anything.

Very often, though, 'regular' is much more likely to give me a fit of giggles than dyspepsia. If someone is introduced to me as a "regular guy" my reflex thought is to imagine him doing his bowel movements at the same time each day. (Doctors here say things like, "Are you regular?")

However, I must admit we don't seem to have a good Britism for 'regular guy' in the American sense. I'd be inclined to say it varies according to dialect (I'd say "he's a canny lad"), but more often than not I think we feel the urge to give a mini-speech: "He's a pretty decent bloke. Plays beginners at the go club. Got a dog. American, but he hasn't got constipation."

[Bill Spight]

Como esta usted?

Regular, gracias.

[John Fairbairn]

Another pronuciation foible came to may attention watching a TED talk last night.

I am aware that missile tends (strongly) to be pronounced like missal in the States but some speakers do make it rhyme with style in the standard British way.

But through watching documentaries and TED talks as opposed to the usual Hollywood action-movie diet, I am hearing more and more of the style rhyme in various words by American speakers. The one that caught my attention last night was 'versatile'.

What's the feeling of American members on this difference? Given that I'm hearing -yle mostly from academics and the like, as opposed to movie stars, I'm wondering if it's seen as a sign of educational status.

Mind you, when I was young there was a lot of controversy about how to pronounce controversy, but that's died away completely as far as I can tell, even while both pronunciations are still current. We all clearly care about these things less nowadays in the global village. I think the only one I personally care about now is frustrated. Americans stress the -u-, we stress the -a-. For reasons I don't understand I get uniquely frustrated by that.

[Bill Spight]

Another pronuciation foible came to may attention watching a TED talk last night.

I am aware that missile tends (strongly) to be pronounced like missal in the States but some speakers do make it rhyme with style in the standard British way.

But through watching documentaries and TED talks as opposed to the usual Hollywood action-movie diet, I am hearing more and more of the style rhyme in various words by American speakers. The one that caught my attention last night was 'versatile'.

What's the feeling of American members on this difference? Given that I'm hearing -yle mostly from academics and the like, as opposed to movie stars, I'm wondering if it's seen as a sign of educational status.

Judging only from my own experience, when I was a kid I learned a lot of words through reading, without ever hearing them pronounced. This led to some pronunciations that were unusual among other speakers of my dialect. If I had first learned versatile through reading at age 6 or 7, I would have followed the rule for pronouncing the tile as in reptile (in our dialect). I doubt if that pronunciation is taken as a marker of educational status, but it may be the result of doing a lot of reading at an early age.

[SoDesuNe]

As a non-english native I know about the two pronunciations for missile through movies, series and stuff but never heard the american (?) pronunciation of versatile - had to check just now and it sounded very strange to me. Interesting stuff.

Then again, back in my school days we aspired to speak "the Queen's english" ("Received Pronunciation"). We should have cut our loses though after seeing our english teacher's failing attempt to be understood by a bloke in a London shop.

[Marathon]

A couple of years ago, a guest on a radio program claimed half of Shakespeare's rhymes don't rhyme, because pronunciation changes over the centuries. Although they did rhyme when Shakespeare wrote them.

[John Fairbairn]

A couple of years ago, a guest on a radio program claimed half of Shakespeare's rhymes don't rhyme, because pronunciation changes over the centuries. Although they did rhyme when Shakespeare wrote them.

Yes. There have been many books on this, and there are similar studies for other languages. For example, we can infer that Caesar did not say veni, vidi, vici but wenny, weedy, wiki, and so can be regarded as the father of the internet. There is even some guy who has reconstructed how Genghis Khan sounded. Terrifying, I think the short answer is.

But in English the most famous case may be the poem "Tiger, tiger, burning bright/what immortal hand or eye/can frame thy fearful symmetry." I have noticed that people still discuss this today, but when I was young and we learned this at school, there was no problem. Eye was pronounced ee in our area (and the plural was een, just as the plural of shoe was shoen), so it did rhyme with symmetry. And, if it comes to that, thy is still in use here, oop North.

[Bill Spight]

But in English the most famous case may be the poem "Tiger, tiger, burning bright/what immortal hand or eye/can frame thy fearful symmetry." I have noticed that people still discuss this today, but when I was young and we learned this at school, there was no problem. Eye was pronounced ee in our area (and the plural was een, just as the plural of shoe was shoen), so it did rhyme with symmetry. And, if it comes to that, thy is still in use here, oop North.

That reminded me of one of the popular folk songs sung by the Chad Mitchell Trio.

"Queen Elinor was a sick woman
And afraid that she would die,
When she sent for two friars out of France
To come to her speedily."

They pronounced speedily as speedileye instead of pronouncing die as dee.

Also, not about pronunciation, but in my dialect, back in the 19th century the past tense of hear was hearn. Also, from my grandmother's high school English book I learned that the plural of pease is peases. I'm sure it still is. But I had thought that pease was an alternate spelling of peas.

[John Fairbairn]

Queen Elinor was a sick woman
And afraid that she would die,
When she sent for two friars out of France
To come to her speedily."

This is a very interesting case. I think the spelling in the original Child ballad is sometimes 'dye' (and also fryars), and the content is about the English court, so that might indicate the eye sound.

But Child ballads very often have a Scottish/northern origin (and this episode was at a time of constant England/Scotland warfare), and dee would have been (as it still is) the normal Scots pronunciation.

In support of that, there is a verse later on where knee is rhymed with speedily. I'm not familiar with the Chad Mitchell version so don't know whether they include that verse, but if they do, and if they are trying to be authentic, do they pronounce the k in knee?


Hearn is new to me. Peases is, too, but does not surprise me. Pease pudding was a common dish of my childhood (it is regarded as one of our local dishes) and I can remember always being fascinated by the spelling, but we didn't have the internet in those days, so I remained unenlightened. My guess was that it was an archaic spelling that stuck because of the nursery rhyme Pease Pudding Hot. But since these peas are yellow and not green, that may be a source of differentiation. Is the US version yellow, too?

Can you believe I had to learn Child ballads at school? I expect nowadays people think it means nursery rhymes. I was gobsmacked on a recent walk when my well-educated grandson revealed he didn't know who William Tell was. But then I don't know who Chad Mitchell is/was, and I only found out vaguely yesterday who (or what?) Thin Lizzie was.