Sherbet, Not Sherbert

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Eric from Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

Hi, Eric. Welcome.

How are you doing?

Good.

How can we help you?

We’re doing well. How can we help you?

I’ve got a question for you.

When I was a kid, I enjoyed a delicious frozen treat that I called Sure Burt.

And I went to my neighbor’s house, who’s like my grandpa, and he corrected me and said,

No, no, it’s Sure Bit.

There’s no second R at the end.

And he showed me the label, and he was right.

I changed how I pronounced it, and I try to correct people when I hear it’s wrong,

When they say it differently.

The debate has kind of escalated amongst my spouse and then my coworkers.

I was just curious to know if you guys could clarify why there are two different ways to say this word

And then how much more right I am than they are.

I was going to say, tell us a little bit more about that debate.

You’re millions more, right?

Oh, I don’t know.

Perfect.

Call over.

So, yeah, you know, I try to correct my wife, and she rolls her eyes,

And finally I decided to pull my coworkers and say, so how do you say this?

And one would say, oh, sure, Bert.

And, you know, it kind of escalated.

I found out I was the only one, maybe one or two others, who actually said it sure bit.

Oh, really?

Interesting.

Yeah, even though the label clearly says sure bit.

You’re right.

You’re absolutely right, though.

It should be sure bit, or if you just want to avoid the argument, just call it sorbet and be done with it.

Or sorbet.

I could do that, but then I’d have to change my ways.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I did that as a kid as well.

It was sure bit for me.

I didn’t know any better until I had a similar experience.

And we said, oh, look, that’s weird.

We all say sherbert, but it’s not spelled that way.

I was like, oh!

Well, yeah, I looked at a package once and said,

Mom, it’s spelled wrong on the package.

It’s got an R in there.

I mean, it doesn’t have an R.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Is this kind of related to the wash word?

A little bit, yeah.

It’s a form of intrusive R.

It doesn’t follow the exact same kind of behavior as the other intrusive R’s.

This is when you put an R sound where one isn’t called for according to standard pronunciation or the spelling.

It is really widespread, though.

The Sherbert pronunciation is so widespread that some places have, as you might expect,

You know, where I’m going with this, have just given up and go ahead and spell it with that second R,

Even though it’s not required.

But the traditional spelling and pronunciation do not have that second R.

Sure.

Now, I work in a pretty precise field, and so is there any way you can quantify how much more right I am?

What is your field?

I’m a mechanical engineer, and we make more right.

You are right by 4 million pounds per square inch.

Yep.

Perfect.

That’s just an estimate, though.

Just an estimate.

Give or take 10%, right?

It might be different when we actually get the parts.

Right, exactly.

But you’re good to go there.

Although I just want to make a tiny little note.

You probably should avoid correcting people unless they ask you to.

Yeah, okay.

But you can tell them.

Everyone that you’ve broached this subject with before, you can tell them that you’re right.

Yeah.

Okay.

They owe you.

Okay.

Thanks, Aaron.

I’ll escalate it to match their intensity.

Okay.

Yeah, there we go.

Thank you very much.

Very good.

Bye.

Thanks a lot for calling.

Bye-bye.

If you have a dispute in your workplace about a word, you can call us at 877-929-9673.