Pacific, disoriented and communial!!!!

[secretspirit]

Sorry if this is the wrong category but over the last few years I've been driven mad by people saying words wrong...

Pacific being used instead of specific is my pet hate. The Pacific is an ocean so putting it into sentences such as 'I can't give a pacific time' makes no sense whatever!!!! Does nobody know that or have the rules changed when I wasn't looking?

Another one that gets me is disoriented in place of disorientated. Did that word get officially shorted?

There's a case of extra letters in the new word 'communial'. Was the word communal not long enough?

I know I'm a pedant but these things really bother me. I won't even get started on apostrophes.

[magicdice]

ooh apostrophes, there/they're/their, to/too... infuriating

and i've never known whether it's disoriented or disorientated...

[Clanad]

Disoriented - Confused: having lost your bearings; confused as to time or place or personal identity; "I frequently find myself disoriented when I come up out of the subway"; "the anesthetic left her completely disoriented"

Disorientated - To make someone lose all sense of position, direction or time. Verb or adjective...

Similar, agreed, but valid... unlike very unique or my favorite of all time... irregardless... like fingernails on a blackboard...

 

[secretspirit]

Clanad, I didn't know that there were actually two different words! I was always taught it was 'disorientated' or nothing, so perhaps my teachers are the ones to blame.

[silly moo]

I also hate it when people are too lazy to use the correct pronounciation.
Simple idleness with a bit of poor education thrown in.

[Grunty]

Sorry to be picky, sillymoo, but the word is pronunciation - without the middle o

[greenday]

My own personal favourite was inflammable, which most people always thought to mean the opposite of what it actuley meant. I haven't seen the word for years, so I guess we are all using the far less confusing flammable instead.

[Clanad]

 There is a term that describes greenday's favorite... Antagonym (an-TAG-o-nim); It describes any word which means fundamentally contradictory things in different contexts.

The classic example is probably "inflammable." In some contexts, it means "something which can easily be set aflame," like kindling. In other contexts, it means, "something which cannot easily be set aflame." Example: "Those pajamas are inflammable".  Not to be confused with imflammable, which does mean a readiness to burst into flames... ahhh, English...

[Bert]

Even newsreaders (local, admittedly) have been heard to say "artic weather". I can't stand that. And why can't Americans pronounce "nuclear"? It's easy - new-clee-ar. Some people also talk about "nuptuals" when they mean "nuptials". A lot of people "reguly" annoy me. Enough?
I have to disagree with Clanad, my Chambers 20th Century give "disorient" first, then "Also disorientate". I prefer "disorientate" myself, but I wonder which is older, and therefore, to most of us pedeants, has greater authority?

[Bert]

Sorry to disagree with Clanad again, but I have never heard of "inflammable" meaning something which cannot easily be set aflame. Which dictionary are you using? To protect the ignorant, it seems that most warning labels now state "Flammable", though it is hard to imagine how stupid you would have to be to think that a substance would have a warning that it could not easily be set on fire. And how can Greenday type "actuley"!? (I missed the "s" off "gives" in my previous submission, but that was a typo, honest). My Chambers also does not admit "antagonym", though I suppose there should be such a word. Would "Polish" qualify?

[Bert]

"Pedeant" was another typo! I'm so used to automatic spell checking that I am getting careless.

[Grunty]

Don't know how Bert can expect the Americans to pronounce nuclear properly.  They haven't even sorted out the pronunciation of Colin.

[magicdice]

his name's colin?! i thought he actually WAS a large intestine! ah well, i'm proberly wrong as yoozhal. maybe i should go to the liberry and investagate

[delilahcat]

'Pacific' for 'specific' is one that gets my goat too, but I think the totally brainless use of 'of' instead of 'have' is hard to beat (eg 'I should of told you'). HOW can English people make that mistake?

[jno]

I think disorient came first, then the noun disorientation, and disorientate was back-formed from that (ie people who didn't know the older word figured the verb from disorientation must be disorientate). Antagonym, that's a great word. Cleave means opposite things: cleave apart/cleave together.

[smorodina]

I can't find a dictionary that gives 'imflammable' as a word, or gives 'inflammable' an alternate meaning. 'Flammable' and 'inflammable' both mean the same. The opposite is 'non-flammable'. My pet hates are 'we was' for 'we were' and the almost universal pronunciation of the letter 'H' as 'haitch' - formerly only found in comedy 'cockney' accents. I also find the use of 'I was like...' for 'I said...' quite odd, but I suppose that as long as we understand each other it doesn't really matter much.

[Gwen1149]

The worst thing for me is DRAWING and people saying DRAWRING. Even Neil Buchanan on 'Art Attack' says drawring. So frustrating!! Another is the letter H. If you look in the dictionary it is pronounced 'aitch' NOT 'haitch'

[Ladyboyg1]

Surely , If you are really bothered by other people's lack of correct pronunciation, then the problem would appear to be with yourself.We live in an ever changing ,diverse culture and to be maddened by another persons lack of intelligence or maybe social background should be considered extremely pedantic.Naturally there are different levels of awareness, but communication is about being understood, and as long as this is the case then the correct use of our wonderful language is of secondary importance.....x

[joko]

secretspirit - I think the word for doing what you have mentioned is a malapropism - so name after a women in a play 'mrs malaprop' who continually made these verbal errors for comic affect. I forget the details of the play though. One I have heard is 'what are you incinerating?' for insinuating.

other mispronounced words - particularly by americans -that I hate are -

1 warrior � pronounced  war yer
2 mirror � pronounced  mee orr
3 vase � pronounced vayce
4 aluminium � pronounced  aloominum
5 nuclear � pronounced nuc-u-lar
6 leisure � pronounced leeshure
7 wardrobe � pronounced closet (not strictly the same but a good one I think!)
8 laboratory � pronounced lab-rat-ory
9 library � pronounced  ly-berry
10 cellulite � pronounced cell-u-leet
11 camomile pronounced camom-eel
12 mature � matoor
13 buoy � booey
14 lever � lev- ver
15 crematorium � cream-atorium
16 anti � an-tie

[jno]

Some of joko's list are real mispronunciations, especially nucular. But some are just different pronunciations, or even different words. Americans actually spell aluminium aluminum (this is the older spelling; see Bill Bryson's Short History). Leezhure sounds no more illogical than lezzhure for something that's actually spelled leisure; and vayze seems a more logical pronunciation than vaaz. Americans are no more stupid or illiterate than Brits.

[Clare A]

(Most of) you are pedants after my own heart! I can't bear the language to be mangled, and no, Ladyboyg1, it's not a sign of class or intellectual snobbery. I've no objection to dialect - in some regions 'we was' or 'I done' is perfectly valid - rather, it is sloppy, idle, can't-be-botheredness that irritates those of us who were made to learn properly! And if you think it doesn't matter any more, ask the 'vile capitalist pigs' who still hire most of us (whether we like it or not) whether they'd like to look over every document that goes out, or leave it to someone who can be trusted to use language correctly.

I have a friend who watches too many films. He will quite often tell me that he will be with me 'momentarily', and I always imagine him sticking his head round the door, then going away again, rather than being with me 'in a moment', as he really means.

Bert - I've heard 'artic weather' too. Weather suitable only for heavy goods vehicles? And what are these 'tempachurs' beloved of forecasters? Presumably the low ones we encounter in 'Feb'ry'. 'Spits and spots of rain' also gets on my nerves - hardly meteorology, is it? Rant over - looks as though I'm the worst pedant on the block!