Your AS and Lack of logical phonetics in English language

Post Reply New Topic

When you were a child, learning the English language, or even more so, if you were born in a non-English-speaking country, and learned English as an adult, I'm sure you noticed one glaring thing: the phonetics/pronunciation are freaking ridiculous!! ! Most letters are pronounced differently depending on which other letters surround them, and even those rules have exceptions, and some exceptions have exceptions!

If you think about it, it's no different than NTs' unwritten social rules. Am I right or am I right? And we all know how difficult it is for aspies to learn social rules. Especially considering that they change all they time, they're different in different situations (like "read" for present and past tense), and what's right in one geographic place may be wrong in another (like "kyoo-pon" vs. "koo-pon"). Whatever you were formally taught may suddenly be wrong a year later. And you say a word incorrectly, you may get anything from a blank stare to a punch in the face. Now that's really unpredictable. <sarcasm>And we all know how aspies love unpredictable things.</sarcasm>

Consider the word "turtle". According to standard phonetics, you have a "tuh","uh", "ruh", "tuh", "luh", "eh". Say those sounds fast, and follow the rules of how letters are combined, you'd think it's pronounced "TOOR-tul" or "TUR-tul"? Wrong! It's pronounced like you just said it: the U is clipped, and the second T is slurred over entirely, producing "turl" (US English example). The silent E at the end of words is common enough to make it easy to internalize. But in some regional dialects, the word "turtle" sounds a lot like "chor-L". How in the world does the T acquire the sound of "chuh"? What's even more weird is that when you use the pronunciation that seems logical, NOBODY has an idea that you're talking about a reptile that can hide inside a shell.

Now now, I get it; there's a reason why English is the way it is. It picked up words from Anglo-Saxon, Nordic, Romance, and other language groups, each with its own pronunciation rules, and has no central authority of its own to regulate how those words are pronounced. The Oxford English Dictionary is as close as it gets. By contrast, many common languages do have a central authority governing spelling and phonetics (such as Real Academia Española for Spanish).

Now, let's get back to the real reason for this thread.
Did you struggle with the complete lack of logical phonetics in English, and how did it affect you?
Did it make you shy, because you weren't pronouncing words correctly and people didn't understand you?
Did your book smarts go to waste, because again, you weren't pronouncing words correctly and people didn't understand you?
If your first language wasn't English and it did follow logical phonetics (like Spanish), did that make things easier for you as a child?

I agree with you that English as a language has very bizarre rules that are not consistent. It's my mother-tongue, my first language, but even I'm aware that it's a very confusing language for non-English-speakers to learn because the rules change depending on what the word is or what other letters are in the word.

However, I've never heard "turtle" pronounced as "chor-l". I've hear Americans say a kind of rolling "tur-l" or "tur-dl" and I've hear British people say "tuuhhh-t,l" but I'm not sure you're hearing the "chor-l" right.

I get you about "coupons" though. Some people say "koo-ponz" rhyming with "zoo," and this is what British people say, while the particular spot in the US where I used to live said "kyoo-ponz" rhyming with Kew Gardens.

On the other hand many Americans rhyme "new" with zoo, poo and do, while Brits say "nee-yoo" (though fast).

Interesting topic.

English is my second language and I started learning English grammar in year 7 in my country. I only started to speak English in my adulthood. Reading and writing came long before speaking and listening.

1. I wouldn?t say I struggled with learning how to pronounce words in English because of the lack of systematic phonetic rules. (I did (and do) struggle with correctly producing some sounds simply because they don?t exist in my first language but that?s not really the point the OP is talking about.) I do find the lack of system really annoying and I had to diligently use my dictionaries to learn the correct pronunciation of each word. The funny thing is that when I didn?t speak English, I spelled better. Any way I don?t think my autism made it harder to learn how to spell/pronounce English. If anything, my autistic concentration and persistence helped me.

2. It didn?t make me shy in that way as I have always been pretty careful with pronunciation. I was (and am) more embarrassed about using a wrong expression and about not understanding what others are saying.

3. I wasn?t really book-smart.

4. I do think that the logical/systematic pronunciation rules made it easier to learn my first language as a child.

I do have a general discomfort about the arbitrariness of the English pronunciation/spelling. As the OP said the rules seem to change depending on the situation. I agree with the OP that it has some resemblance to the social rules of non-autistic people, which always seem to depend on the context.

I agree that Spanish is very systematic and I actually admire it for that although it has very complicated verb tenses. In Arabic they don?t usually write short vowels and I believe it?s much harder than English in that sense. I have come across a situation where two Arabic-speaking people from different countries ended up having to use English because they couldn?t fully communicate in Arabic.

It?s amazing that English still keeps its integrity as one language despite the fact that there are many versions of it all over the world.

What's logical about mute Hs and B-V (same sound) in Spanish?
Languages are not exact sciences... for 'eavens sake!

I find French quite contrary and confusing regarding pronunciation, especially the nasal N sounds which don't exist in English and I have difficulty telling it apart from an ordinary N sound. Get them wrong and you can accidentally change an innocent word into an offensive swear word. I've heard of similar happening in English though with someone in a busy office shouting across that she needed a sheet (but pronouncing it s**t). Ah the joys of foreign languages.

One of the words that I find quite interesting is: "herb". I've read that Americans are the only ones in the world that don't pronounce the "H"----except for Martha Stewart, and the New Englanders. Maybe it's because we have a male name "Herb", where we DO pronounce the "H".

Not only does the English language (my native language) have so many confusing rules, but also, words are pronounced differently depending on the location in the U.S. in which it is spoken.

Another thing is.... I've worked with a TON of foreigners, and they have had trouble when trying to pass some English test (I don't know if this is for citizenship, or what). When they go to take the test, the examiner will ask them if they learned English from an American, and if the testee says "Yes", the examiner tells them they'll never pass, that way.

Also, I've long struggled with the changes (MURDER, I call it) to the English language in this country (the U.S.). I agree with the aforementioned examiners----if you wanna learn English, don't learn it from us (Americans); IMO, learn it from the Brits!! !! !! !! !! ! 'Course there's slang / colloquialisms there, too, but....

English pronunciation is actually quite regular. In any given language, the most common words -- the core vocabulary -- tend to break the rules of spelling vs pronunciation. English is currently the most heavily used and expressive of all human languages; its core vocabulary is substantially larger than other languages, hence creating the incorrect perception that English spelling and pronunciation are incongruent. Enough experience with the language will correct this misperception.

And I can tell you from experience, if you actually try to speak Spanish as dictated by the academy in Spain, well good luck, because 99% of native speakers will not understand you. Nobody talks like that. Spanish pronunciation varies HEAVILY from nation to nation, from provence to provence, from city to city. The same is true with Hindi/Urdu (again, from experience).