GHOTI

[Kekerusey]

How do you pronounce the the word, "ghoti"?

I know the answer and I would ask if anyone else knows it to please stay quiet for the moment

Keke

[Dave]

Oops

[Sandra Craft]

If compelled to, I would probably say "gotti", but I'd prefer just to smile and say nothing.

[hermes2015]

"Fish" (as proposed by Shaw, I think).

[Recusant]

It looks like it might be Indian in origin, so I'd pronounce it "goatee" with the accent on the first syllable (if I hadn't already known its true origin).

[Kekerusey]

"Fish" (as proposed by Shaw, I think).

I can see you read the message and went along with the game!

Thanks for ruining it. 

Keke

[hermes2015]

"Fish" (as proposed by Shaw, I think).

I can see you read the message and went along with the game!

Thanks for ruining it. 

Keke

Yes, sorry! I did not read the message properly -  was bored in a meeting and had to reply furtively. I am very naughty and deserve punishment.

[Arturo]

Woah

[OldGit]

It was indeed "fish", given as a silly example by GBS.

[Dave]

It was indeed "fish", given as a silly example by GBS.

Yes, Shaw thought the English spelling system was ridiculous. It is, but it is part of the history of England.

Not that I am a great fan of history - other than as a set of lessons humans ignore cyclically.

Come on, Keke, explain why "ghoti" spells "fish" to the perplexed!

[Dave]

There have been, so far failed, attempts to rationslise English spelling. One chap wtote to the Daily Mail (back when it was a more sensible newsrag)

Daily Mail, Wednesday, January 17, 1996

Straight talk

   ENGLISH having been chosen as its preferred language, the EU is studying ways of improving communications efficiency.
   European officials have often pointed out that English spelling is unnecessarily difficult; cough, plough, rough, through, for example.
   A phased programme of changes is needed to iron out anomalies.  In the first year the committee would suggest using 's' instead of the soft 'c'. Sivil servants in all sities would reseive this news with joy. Then the hard 'c' could be replaced by 'k'.
   Not only would this klear up konfusion in the minds of klerikal workers, but typewriters kould be made with one fewer letter.
   In the sekond year, it would be announsed that the troublesome 'ph' would henseforth be written 'f', making words like 'fotograf' 20 per cent shorter.
   In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reash the stage when more komplikated shanges are possible.
   Government would enkourage the removal of double leters which have always been a deterent to akurate speling.
   We would al agre that the horibIe mes of silent e's in the languag is disgrasful. We kould drop thes and kontinu to read and writ as though nothing had hapend.
   By this tim peopl would be reseptiv to steps sutsh as replasing 'th' by 'z'. and ze funktion of 'w' kould be taken on by 'v' vitsh is, after al, half a 'w'. Shortly after zis ze unesesary 'o' kould dropd from words kontaining 'ou', and in mani suwords ze 'l' kud go az vel.  Ozer words viz 'ough' wud end viz a simpl 'o', u, ov, uv ets.
   Similar arguments vud of kors be aplid tu ozer kombinashons of leters.
   Kontinuing zis proses yer after yer, ve vud eventuli hav a reli sensibl riten styl.
   After tventi yers zer vud be no mor trubls or difikultis and evrivun vud find it ezi tu understand ech ozer.

PETER JONES, Port Talbot, West Glamorgan.

[Dave]

This poem is actually quite a good aid for teaching English IMO:

A WORD POEM

I take it you already know
of tough and bough and cough and dough
others may stumble but not you
on hiccough, thorough, laugh and through
well done, and now you wish perhaps
to learn of less familiar traps?

Beware of heard, a dreadful word
that looks like beard and sounds like bird,
and dead, it's said like bed, not bead
for goodness sake don't call it deed.
watch out for meat and great and threat
they rhyme with suite and straight and debt.

A moth is not a moth in mother
nor both in bother, broth in brother,
and here is not a match for there
nor dear and fear for bear and pear.

And then there's dose and rose and lose!
Just look them up, and goose and choose
and cork and work and card and ward
and font and front and word and sword
and do and go and thwart and cart
come, come, I've hardly made a start.
A dreadful language? Man alive
I'd mastered it when I was five.

[Kekerusey]

Come on, Keke, explain why "ghoti" spells "fish" to the perplexed!

OK,

Probably the easiest way to explain is by this image:



The English language is a peculiar beast. Which (to my mind) brings up accents.

My youngest daughter visited her cousin in California a couple of years' back and, being the token Brit in a land of Yanks, her accent became a thing ... she had waiters ask her top order again just so they could hear her accent and so on. But by far the most interesting thing was a discussion she got into with her cousin who was commenting on New York accents saying how weird they were. My daughter agreed and mentioned that she (herself) had an accent which her cousin agreed with readily but then made the mistake of saying that she (her cousin) also had an accent.

Her cousin disagreed and said that it was everyone else who had an accent, that she and her family/friends did not. Patiently (as was her wont) my daughter explained that to everyone else every other person/culture/nation or whatever had an accent but, although agreeing with the basic concept, her cousin insisted that she had no accent.

Ultimately my daughter gave up.

While I admit I can't detect accents in my own voice or that of my family/friends it is equally clear to me that I must have one and I had assumed that everyone would realise that. Clearly there's a disconnect there because her cousin isn't stupid by any means, she's one of the few in her family/social group that has concluded there is no god which (to my mind) is not normally a position one takes on faith or because of stupidity. Atheists, for the most part, seem to arrive at that position because of evidence (lack) and reason.

Anyway (to return to the original subject) yes ... "ghoti" is pronounced "fish"

Keke

[Dave]

Yeah, EVERYONE has an accent in the mind of any from another place.

I seem to have a facility for picking up British accents that the speakers think they have lost. Get them to speak for long dnough and a slight inflection in or use of a word can give clues. Also clues to other aspects, like education, or at least erudition!

Playwright Ben Jonson  (17C) said, "Language most shows a man, speak that I might see thee."