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There are three people I know who are intelligent and well-spoken, but each of them has a particular verbal idiosyncrasy. In general, they speak a dialect very close to Standard American English (SAE). But one of them consistently pronounces ideas as idears; another, breakfast as brefixt; a third, goal/goals as gold/golds.
It startles and baffles me each time I hear it. I can't imagine how these pronunciations could persist in these folks. They appear to have no speech difficulties. These single words are the only jarring exceptions that I've noted.
Has anyone else noticed anything similar in their friends and associates? Or do I simply live on the island of the misfit toys?
This tends to drive me crazy, but I've never broached the subject with them. I think it might be offensive.
What are your thoughts?
I have a friend who has the "idear" idiosyncrasy. He knows that he picked it up as a youth from an aunt from the east coast (though he himself never lived on the east coast), but can't eradicate it from his speech.
I find myself using some unique speech patterns of certain family members even though they don't fit in with the rest of my speech. I am aware of when I do it, and feel a closeness to those people when I use their idiosyncracies. Perhaps your friends are doing the same. Perhaps their idiosyncracies are in rememberance of some relative, place or time.
Or, maybe they're just not aware of it and never paused to question it. Even those who study speech and words full-time can't monitor every word that comes out of their mouths. The curious part about this possibility is that people who speak so well tend to be self-evaluate and self-correct well. This would mean that they don't hear the difference in their heads. Some part of their brain tells them that "breakfast" and "brefixt" are the same, but properly distinguishes other words. If they're blind to those differences in pronounciation, what other differences might they have that you are blind to?
Don't believe I've ever heard brefixt, but I'm very familiar with brefkist.
As a child, my brother always used to ask people if they wanted to play chest. This is the same brother who called the cargo compartment of a station wagon the backus (which I didn't realize until much later was his version of backest).
He also misheard "pink flamingos" as "flying gabingos". Forty-some-odd years later, we got him a t-shirt with one of the pink wading birds on it and the words "flying gabingos!" printed beneath (as far as I know he never wore it).
Ron Draney said:
He also misheard "pink flamingos" as "flying gabingos". Forty-some-odd years later, we got him a t-shirt with one of the pink wading birds on it and the words "flying gabingos!" printed beneath (as far as I know he never wore it).
Kinda reminds me of my little sister, who as a child would say "mahsewing chine" for "sewing machine" and "busghetti" for "spaghetti." In her case though, I think it was more a speech impediment of sorts, and not a matter of hearing it wrong. She eventually grew out of that and started saying the words correctly, probably around age 7-8.
Martha Barnette
Grant Barrett
Grant Barrett
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