A look at how pronunciation of English words has changed over time, and eight common mechnisms by which it happens — and by which the "correct" and "incorrect" ways of saying things evolve.
Just in reading it, okay, I admit that I cringe every time someone (esp. someone with military authority) says "nukyular" for "nuclear" — but given that Jimmy Carter — who actually served on a nuclear sub — used to mispronounce it, I suppose I should just give up.
I can also recall the British director we had when we did A Midsummer Night's Dream in college, who kept yelling at us Yanks that Theseus' noble title was "Dyuke! Dyuke! Like 'puke'!"
It's all a reminder that pronunciation, like vocabulary and grammar, evolve over time, and the tension between change and stability is always there.
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This was a wonderfully interesting read!!!
I have my podcatcher set to download +A Way with Words, but sometimes don't get around to listening for a while. I just got to a podcast where there were all excited (rightly so) about:
http://www.daredictionary.com/page/aboutdaresurvey/
Very cool online resource of regional pronunciations with audio samples. Expensive for an individual beyond the 100 free samples, but very cool knowing about it. Since it is now a project of several decades, it is becoming in effect a longitudinal study on regional pronunciation and word usage shifts as well.