English is an odd language, with even native speakers struggling to understand its rules. There are a lot of intricacies of the language that most don’t even realize exist, even if they encounter it every day. From word pronunciation to sentence order, there are thousands of weird linguistic phenomena in the English language. This article will mostly focus on Standard American English, however, a lot of these concepts also apply to other dialects.
T-Glottalization
The first linguistic phenomenon is called T-glottalization. The term refers to the pronunciation of words with the letter “t” in them. The “t” in some words is swallowed and not pronounced. This can be seen in words such as “kitten,” “mountain,” or “certain.” Some of these could be pronounced without the “t” being swallowed, but often, the “t” is not pronounced. In these words, the sound is implied through the glottal stop.
A glottal stop is when the vocal folds come together and separate quickly. This can be seen when you say “uh-oh.” The glottal stop occurs in between the “uh” and the “oh.” Even though the “t” sound in these words is implied, it is not as clear as in words such as “talk,” “actor,” or “empty.”
Everyone pronounces words differently, especially in the English language where there are over 150 different dialects. In the United States alone there are about 30, and each has its own origin. So, T-glottalization can affect words differently. For example, the word “water” can be pronounced in many different ways. A lot of Americans pronounce the word “water” with a “d” sound, replacing the “t.” But, a lot of British people pronounce it with the “t” sound fully present.
This example displays the peculiar pronunciation of certain words in the English language, and how these pronunciations don’t even make sense to native English speakers when they look at the words more closely unless they are familiar with the linguistic phenomenon that is T-glottalization.
Ghoti
When learning the English language, many people encounter problems with words that are not pronounced as they are spelled. For example, the words “comb,” “tomb,” and “bomb” all have the same “-omb” ending, but all are pronounced differently. Similarly, “tough”, “through”, and “thorough” all have the same ending but none are pronounced the same. Well, Ghoti is a term that brings attention to these weird spellings, because “Ghoti” is actually pronounced “fish,” as opposed to “go-tee.” This is because it takes its pronunciations from different words, in which the letters are pronounced peculiarly.
- The “gh” is taken from the word “tough,” in which the letters “gh” are pronounced like the letter “f.”
- The “o” is taken from the word “women,” in which the letter “o” is pronounced like the letter “i.”
- The “ti” is taken from the word “nation,” in which the letters “ti” are pronounced like the letters “sh
Putting all of these together makes the word “fish.” As absurd as it looks at first, after learning the reason for the pronunciation, it makes more sense why it is pronounced “fish.”
This YouTube video by Tom Scott details the weird history of spelling in English, which further reinforces the idea that “ghoti” is trying to convey: that spelling in English is and has always been weird.
The Royal Order of Adjectives
The Royal Order of Adjectives is a linguistic phenomenon regarding the order of adjectives in sentences. The usual order of adjectives in English sentences is quantity, opinion, size, age, color, shape, origin, material, and purpose. After all of these comes the noun. However, not all of these are used in one sentence for the most part. Once the number of adjectives exceeds three, it starts to sound clunky. For example, people don’t normally say sentences like “The four bad large new black round American cloth running shoes,” because it sounds weird. But, this order of adjectives is still followed in smaller sentences. So, let’s try a smaller example like “the cool little red shoes,” which follows the order, but only uses opinion, size, and color. Even when not using every category, each adjective still comes in order.
However, there are a few popular instances in which this order is not used, such as in the “Three Little Pigs.” The title follows the rule, but the name of the villain in the short story, The Big Bad Wolf, does not follow the rule. In his name, size comes before opinion. Exceptions to the rule can be attributed to the constant evolution of language. Language is not rigid, it is loose and rules can be broken. The only purpose of language is to have others understand what you are saying, and people understand “big bad wolf” just like they would understand “bad big wolf.” But, for the most part, this rule is unconsciously followed, because it is how most English speakers learned to speak.
Emphasis Changes Everything
Many have heard of the hilarious confusion that comes from not using the Oxford comma. Similar to this is the misunderstandings that ensue when emphasizing a certain syllable in a sentence. A popular example of this is the sentence “She didn’t kill him.”
- She didn’t kill him.: This emphasis implies that she was not the murderer, but someone else was.
- She didn’t kill him: This emphasis implies she was surely not the killer.
- She didn’t kill him: This emphasis implies that she did something else to him.
- She didn’t kill him: This emphasis implies that she killed someone else.
This type of linguistic phenomenon is not confined to the English language though. Tones in languages like Mandarin and Cantonese can be difficult to master and cause confusion if mixed up.
These four examples are just a few of the thousands of weird things that happen in language. Many other languages also have weird phenomena. This might seem intimidating when you want to learn a new language, but don’t worry! Learning languages is good for you, and you shouldn’t let weird linguistic phenomena scare you. Next time you’re talking to someone, watching a movie or scrolling through social media, see if you can listen close enough to find these linguistic phenomena!
