You know what really irks me? All the silent letters in the English language. I was in college, working as a Writing Center consultant. I was really good at my job. Several people even told me so. Each session, I felt confident and smart...until I read a student's essay that for some cruel reason mentioned the Mojave Desert. I'm ashamed to admit that I pronounced it as Moh-jave. Want to know the sad part? I wasn't even aware that I had pronounced it wrong until the student politely (THANKFULLY!!) corrected me (pronounced Moh-hah-vee, just in case anyone's as apparently uneducated as me!)! I was horrified, humiliated, and cut down to the size of an ant's eye (they do have eyes, right?). Darned those killer silent letters!!
My co-workers and I often joked about silent letters, and for a semester, my nick-name was Roger (pronounced, of course, Ah-jer, because the R was silent). Who came up with that rule, anyway?
Aw! Roger! I love you! Good times! I miss the WC and our crazy adventures there! You guys are the best!
ReplyDeleteLove,
Riss :)
I miss you so much, Riss!!!! I think you guys made that job my favorite job I have ever had. Thanks for being such a great friend!
DeleteI find the silent letters fascinating. It is almost an artistic secret puzzle that keeps things interesting. I think a lot of the silent letters like J have been borrowed from other languages around the world that we are interspersing into our language. I often come across words that I would never pronounce correctley, but it means a fun challenge and adventure as to why they are pronounced that way.
ReplyDeleteHow to teach it is another issue. I was tutoring a 5th grader the other day that could not understand why the s in drebris is silent. She can not for the life of her wrap her head around it. I figure with a month or so of seeing it and reviewing it twice a week, she will finally get it. Fun Silent letters! I guess it depends on perspective. Adventure awaits.
I was actually looking up silent letters online, and there's a worksheet for students to use/memorize. I really don't remember how on earth I learned all these "creative" words, but for the most part, I'm surprised when I read it misspelled, and I know just how to correct it! :)
Deleteif it makes you feel better, mojave is the name of an indian tribe and it's probably the spanish way of spelling it. i've seen it spelled mohave too. kind of like navajo and navaho. j is h in spanish. and there are a lot of spanish words in the english languange. and french words. the silent letters like t or s at the end of a word are probably french. cause they like to add all kinds of extra letters to their words. :) no, there are grammatical reasons for it in french, but i won't bore you. this is a long comment... sorry! but i find the evolution of languages interesting. and i love you kim!
ReplyDeleteOkay, now I feel like a dork. Of COURSE Mojave isn't an English word! lol! Thanks for enlightening me, though, on where they come from--I never knew that! But can you explain why knife has a silent k? :) Love you, Ker!! (p.s. I WOULD be interested in knowing the rules for silent letters in French if you're ever bored)
ReplyDeletei have no idea about the k. no idea.
Deletebut i can explain french. they don't want any stops of sound in between words, and their syllables all end in vowels. so if a word ends with a consonant they keep it silent, so it acts like it ends in a vowel and it will flow on into the next word. and if a word begins with a vowel, they make a contraction with the consonant in the word before it so it flows too.
that is what makes french sound so pretty and flowy, and english sounds so choppy compared to it because we don't have those rules. so, if you ever see a word used in english where the last letter is silent, it most likely comes from french. ballet, debris, depot, bouquet, coup, faux pas, etc...
No kidding? That is so awesome! I DEFINITELY love hearing French, but I never could figure out why exactly. Now I know why! I would say too bad that ours isn't like that, but I don't think I could handle even more silent letters! ;)
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