science

Mispronunciation

Mispronunciation is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Mispronunciation rather than just read about it. In short: In linguistics, mispronunciation is the act of pronouncing a word incorrectly. Languages are pronounced in different ways by different people, depending on factors like the area they grew up in, their level of education, and their social class.

Key takeaways

Mispronunciation belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Mispronunciation to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Mispronunciation from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

In linguistics, mispronunciation is the act of pronouncing a word incorrectly. Languages are pronounced in different ways by different people, depending on factors like the area they grew up in, their level of education, and their social class. Even within groups of the same area and class, people can pronounce words differently. A standard of pronunciation is the most common way to pronounce a word. Standards vary among groups. Dictionaries include pronunciations. Languages constantly change, split up, and diverge. Diversity within languages as a natural consequence of language evolution is now acknowledged. This diversity is studied.

Pronunciation in dictionaries Early dictionaries, such as those by Samuel Johnson in England and later Noah Webster in the United States, played a large role in making spelling more uniform. When dictionaries began to add pronunciation guides, they played a similar role there. At first, American dictionaries (at least) tended to avoid listing pronunciations that they considered non-standard, and thus they played a prescriptive role (the British tradition is far more descriptive). However, following the general trend in linguistics, American dictionaries are now becoming more descriptive while British dictionaries are becoming less so (with Australian ones remaining in between); this is the case in other respects as well as with pronunciation. For example, the pronunciation of the word nuclear as if it were spelled nucular is one that is frowned upon by some, but the pronunciation is listed in some dictionaries that prefer to list current, common pronunciations rather than one prescribed as "correct".

Pronunciation change The following are some of the processes by which pronunciation can change.

Omission of phonemes Many words have lost phonemes (consonant or vowel sounds) somewhere in their histories. Sometimes, this changes the standard of pronunciation. For example, the silent k at the start of many words in the English language was originally pronounced. However, a word is mispronounced if a phoneme is omitted when it is not normally pronounced that way. For example, some speakers omit the first c sound from Antarctic, resulting in a pronunciation ("ant-AR-tik").

Adaptation to a different language Words and names that are adopted from one language to another can be mispronounced because the phonology of the source language is different from that in the destination language. Proper nouns such as names of people and places are written as foreign words and often given their native pronunciation too.

Terms

Spelling pronunciation: Pronouncing a word according to its infelicitous or ambiguous spelling. Aphesis: The loss of the sound at the start of a word. Aspiration: An "h" sound at the beginning of a word. For example, the "h" in honor (British: honour) is not pronounced, but it is in "happy." As with all pronunciation "rules," conventions regarding the aspirated "H" differ from region to region. In parts of the US, it is customary to pronounce "herb" without the initial "h" sound, while in the UK, the initial "h" is aspirated. Epenthesis: The addition of one or more sounds to a word, especially to the interior of a word (prothesis at the beginning and paragoge at the end are commonly used). Epenthesis may be divided into two types: excrescence, for the addition of a consonant, and anaptyxis for the addition of a vowel. Metathesis: The reversal of letters within a word when pronounced. For example, "iron" is pronounced as "iorn." Orthoepy: is the study of pronunciation of a particular language, within a specific oral tradition. Shibboleth: Any practice that shows one's social or regional origin. This usually refers to features of language, and particularly to a word whose pronunciation identifies its speaker as a member of a particular group. Spoonerism: The exchange of the initial letters or syllables between two words or even within a word, with comic results—especially when the result changes the speaker's intended meaning.

Automatic detection

Using computational techniques, such as machine learning, it is possible to automatically detect mispronunciations in recorded speech.

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Mispronunciation

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Mispronunciation claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Mispronunciation before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Mispronunciation ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Mispronunciation

In research: Mispronunciation appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Mispronunciation in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Mispronunciation is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Error, Phonetics, Phonology, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Mispronunciation outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Mispronunciation in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Mispronunciation means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Mispronunciation out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Mispronunciation in simple terms?

Why does Mispronunciation matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Mispronunciation?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Mispronunciation.