Grant! I need your help!
Over the last four years or so, I have begun hearing a pronunciation of a certain word that is driving me crazy. I've lived all over the country and had never heard it (or, possibly paid attention to it) until podcasts became a big part of my entertainment. I've now heard it from Texans, Washingtonians (?), Floridians, and, now, from you and I would like to know what's going on.
"Appreciate"; I was always under the impression that the "e" in the center was a long "e." More and more I am hearing it pronounced as either an "i" or a short "e." Is there some sort of unconscious divergence happening to differentiate between the monetary meaning (because I've never heard that meaning pronounced with the short "e") and the use that means "grateful"?
This doesn't seem to be a regional thing because I've heard it from all corners of the country. I know this may seem trivial but please set my mind at ease so the hair on the back of my neck will stop standing up every time I hear this. Is it new? Has it always been around? Am I being silly?
It's been around at least since 1955 when Stan Freberg used it in his parody of "Yellow Rose of Texas", apparently considering it iconic of a hard-core Texas accent. Mind you, Stan's always had a bit of a tin ear when it comes to accents not his own.
I tracked that down on youtube and hearing him shorten the word like that makes the changed vowel sound more palatable for some reason 🙂 Thanks for the reference. I guess it's been around for a long time and I just never noticed it before.
As a freshly baked teacher of English as a foreign language, I'm really fascinated by the whole enunciation/pronunciation issue (and would gladly listen to you going on for hours about it). One of the hardest parts of learning any language, I think, is trying to understand all those sounds that run together in natural speech. Then if learners want their English to sound more natural they try to reproduce it too… yikes.
I've begun to listen to these sounds more closely in order to teach learners that something like "uhmunna do this thing" is actually "I'm going to do this thing". (By comparison "I'm gunna" is a piece of cake.
Fascinating. Love the podcast, thanks for your great show.
I've been noticing how my wife says "Member her?" She clips remember more than I do, down to simply "member." I would more do more like either a syllabic r /rmember/ or a light vowel to start /ɪmember/, but in her speech it is simply "member." I have noticed this even in a context where the remember is preceded by a vowel "I member that well." In such a context, it would seem to me, the first syllable would have its best chance of leaving a trace.
Keep in mind that my wife is well educated, and has credits toward a masters, so this is not an example of ignorance: it is simply a matter of dialect.