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[-] OldWoodFrame@lemm.ee 22 points 8 months ago

I thought 'segue' was pronounced 'seg' and 'Segway' was 'Segway'. I blame the mall cop transportation.

[-] menemen@lemmy.world 8 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I'd blame the guy who thought pronouncing "vague" as /veɪɡ/ (or better who decided to write /veɪɡ/ as vague.).

[-] reverendsteveii@lemm.ee 10 points 8 months ago

we didn't have the vegwayest idea how that would work out in the future

[-] zaphod@feddit.de 5 points 8 months ago

Vague is french, segue is italian, hence different pronunciation, the french equivalent would probably be suite.

[-] menemen@lemmy.world 5 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

It's not pronounced in the same way as in french, why is it written the same way? I am not a native English speaker. Learning to speak English was so easy. Probably one of the easiest languages to learn. But the spelling is just the worst thing imaginable.

They literally took the worst parts of all languages for that. There is literally no consistency at all in English spelling. When you hear a word, you have no idea how to write it.

[-] LazerFX@sh.itjust.works 3 points 8 months ago

That's because it pulls from french, Germanic, Celt, Roman, Norse, Indian and Hindu and many other languages depending on who conquered us or whom we conquered...

[-] bane_killgrind@lemmy.ml 2 points 8 months ago

Yeah that's correct

[-] force@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

English spelling isn't very phonetic and generally prefers to keep historical spellings, a large portion of spellings are derived from variations of spellings used by Middle English writers hundreds of years ago. And Early Modern English & Middle English writers often times tended to use French-inspired spellings and etymological spellings (hence the spelling "island" from earlier English "iland" which was incorrectly thought to be related to Old French "isle"). English speakers also tend to change the spellings of loanwords very little when they borrow them, e.g. "naïve"/"naive" or "schadenfreude". But in the case of some words, e.g. "schadenfreude", the pronunciation isn't borrowed very accurately.

This is opposed to writing systems like French and Polish writing, which have had multiple more recent spelling reforms (and semi-frequently have spelling reforms still) which keep the spellings more consistently matched with the spoken language. And, in general, loanwords' spellings are adapted rather than preserved.

[-] Leviathan@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago

It's pronounced pretty much the same in French, except with a soft 'a' and French uses a lot of silent letters, so that's probably why.

[-] marcos@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

/veɪɡ/

As somebody that doesn't speak English natively... WTF?! I would never imagine this pronunciation. If you are going to corrupt the way it's spoken, why not go and change the writing too?

[-] Oggyb@lemmy.world 8 points 8 months ago

The answer to that question involves talking about the French and what happened in 1066!

Tbf though, Webster tried simplifying some words for American English. He just didn't manage to get them all.

[-] Makeshift@sh.itjust.works 4 points 8 months ago

I am just now learning from this comment that it is not pronounced seg and that what I thought were two different words (segue and segway) actually are not different words.

I feel lied to.

[-] Hadriscus@lemm.ee 3 points 8 months ago

For years I thought segue was pronounced "seg-you"

this post was submitted on 12 Mar 2024
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