I’ve always pronounced the word “Southern” to rhyme with howthurn. I know most people say it like “suthurn” instead. I didn’t realize that the way I pronounce it is considered weird until recently!
I’ve always pronounced the word “Southern” to rhyme with howthurn. I know most people say it like “suthurn” instead. I didn’t realize that the way I pronounce it is considered weird until recently!
I don’t personally do this, but many people in my family say the days of the week with “dee”. Like “Sundee”, “Mondee”. I think it’s charming, but one of their children said they were weird for saying it that way.
Also, as a programmer, there are some words that programmers use that are abbreviated which I refuse to pronounce the way that others pronounce them because I think it’s weird, but virtually everybody pronounces them different to me.
For example, there is a common keyword in programming languages called “enum”, and most people I know pronounce it as “EE-num”, like it rhymes with “ME dumb”. But “enum” is short for “enumeration”, so I pronounce it as if it’s the first two syllables of “enumeration”, like “ee-NUUM”. Although I think the normal pronunciation is weird, I don’t say anything to people. I just pronounce it the way that I think it should be pronounced. But on multiple occasions, other programmers have called me out for it and asked why I pronounce it “wrong”.
There are several other programming terms like this, but they don’t immediately come to mind. Enum is the most common example.
Do you pronounce “char” like “care”?
I do, especially in VARCHAR as vare-care where everyone else is on the varr-carr train.
I typically pronounce “char” as “character”. Honestly, I rarely have any reason to talk specifically about chars, so it doesn’t come up often.
The next logical question is, then, why don’t I pronounce “enum” as “enumeration”? And the answer is that I often do. But I do say it both long and short.
Reminds me of my highschool computers teacher who pronounced “modem” as “mo-deem”. Because it’s short for modulator/demodulator.
Over time I switched to saying it like you. It’s more internally consistent for me to pronounce all abbreviations the same as the words being abbreviated. That applies to enum, char, var, serde, num, regex, etc.
sudois spokensoo-dooin my house. Where I live alone.I pronounce it the same as you, and by the way, that’s also the pronunciation listed on Wikipedia.
But I can’t remember how other people that I’ve worked with pronounce it. I’m sure it’s come up, but I just don’t recall.
I think the fact that its configuration file is called sudoers is fairly decisive that other pronunciations are wrong.
Continuing the programming vernacular, I was waiting to checkout at Best Buy in America like a month ago, and all the registers were empty forcing everyone to check out at customer service by the geek squad.
Someone came up behind me and asked if we were in the place to checkout. I replied, “Yes, this is the queue.”
Shortly after that, he had the same conversation with the person behind him and also used the word “queue” to which the third person asked if he was British, and the second guy just said he repeated what I said so I had to chime in and say I wasn’t British, just a programmer.
I don’t get it. Are there other pronunciations for queue?
Their story is more about the choice of words. In America, we typically call it a “line”. In England, it is typically called a “queue”.
It bugs me a bit when people treat acceptable synonyms as foreign just because it’s not the word or within the range of words they would’ve chosen.
I had something similar happen getting off a plane at London Heathrow. I asked airport staff where I could find the restrooms and they replied with a slightly confused look, “do you mean toilet?”
I thought the Brits used Loo? Toilet feels so crass lol
That’s exactly what I thought! I figured that if airport/airline staff there were paid as poorly as in the US (with modern cost of living considerations), maybe it’s more common than I thought at the time.
Spoken language is about communication with the immediate group of people you’re interacting with, and is fluid, so while I agree with the idea you suggest of enum on an intellectual level (as well as several others), using the generally accepted way to pronounce things verbally reduces misinterpretation, so I pronounce things as they are generally pronounced. Spoken language is too ephemeral to be imprecise or use your own flair, IMHO. It’s a communication method that has shared rules, not a self-expression medium that is owned by you alone like what clothes you wear. There’s way more wrong with how the English language pronounces things than a few niche technical terms, but those weren’t decided by any one person. In fact that’s why it’s such a mess, but it’s functional.
Just my opinion from a sociological and practical standpoint. Probably contributing to that, I’m AuDHD and so misinterpretation is something I’ve struggled with my whole life. So precise communication is something I’ve spent a lot of time perfecting, especially at work. For reference, I’ve been a software product analyst, product manager, engineer, and currently architect as well as I used to run a nonprofit focused on ethics in the software industry, so I have had to do a lot of communicating ideas around software at many different levels for decades with both technical and nontechnical people.
So, in my case, enum is programmer jargon and is not something that I’d pronounce at all to a layman or larger audience. I don’t think anybody has ever misunderstood me. I often also simply say “enumeration”. But again, that is still jargon. For a programmer, an enumeration is a data type, and for the layman, it probably just means something like “numbered things”.
I would say that this is a good rule of thumb.
But then, how do I put this? I think people who are on the spectrum are much more concerned with misinterpretation than neurotypical people. I understand why, as I’ve struggled with being misinterpreted in the past. Being misinterpreted feels like a major disaster. But I noticed that other people basically assume that they’ll be understood, no matter how poorly their message is conveyed. I suspect that you’ve noticed the same thing. I don’t go that far, but I definitely think there is room for self-expression.
In the end, if you understand and feel comfortable with the normal rules, then you can understand where it’s okay to start to break them. Some estimates say that Shakespeare invented 1700 words in his written works. I’m sure that in the majority of those instances, he expected to be understood, despite using a word that nobody else had ever used.
Your fashion metaphor is actually a pretty good one, I think. There is room for expression, but there are also general guidelines to follow. In a typical office environment, nobody comes in to work nude or wearing a toilet seat around their neck. Okay that’s extreme, but nobody wears tons of jewelry like Mr. T, either. What I’m saying is that, outside of high fashion like you see on runways, people do follow a basic set of clothing rules, some of which are social and not specifically practical, and their self-expression is only built on top of that base.
The basic rules for clothing are to conceal certain areas, to provide comfort and protection. That sort of basic thing. So with that, everybody’s clothes serve that purpose. And then, like I said, there are some social rules. You know, like don’t wear a white dress to a wedding. When people violate those rules, other people notice and are often confused. And once the basic purpose of clothing is met, then there are areas for flair. I would say that the same thing applies to language.
“ee-NUUM” seems like it would roll of the tongue easier than the former and that’s the way I would say it too because of what it’s short for, so I get it!