When did Think become Fink.

[WokenUpEarly]

Genuine question, taking out any speech issues, when did Think become Fink?
Throw become Frow?
Etc

I do this, my mouth can't say th, thief is my nemesis,?I just stumble over it, my mouth contorting. My parents both went to private school and did the whole local schools are best blah we don't know anything about reality and off they sent us to a rough south London comp.

My DS seems to say V for the, we don't live in the sauf now, so I don't know if that's due to him listening to me or just that he's struggled with a general speech delay.

The thing is at school I was considered too posh and now I'm too common. Can't win.

Never heard the term Estuary English !

Isn't it tongue comes between teeth for th and flicks down, not for f it's more bottom lip kissy fish ? So to me it's easier to say f. Surely that's it why it's happened. My south London tongue IS lazy

My DF isn't English and can't make a 'th' sound. He says 'tink' instead of 'think'. I don't know how he says 'throw' though and I'm now intrigued to find out.

@SquashedSpring

My DF isn't English and can't make a 'th' sound. He says 'tink' instead of 'think'. I don't know how he says 'throw' though and I'm now intrigued to find out.

I'm intrigued. Where does your DF come from?

My French friend has almost perfect English, you can't even detect a French accent. With the exception of her 'th' sound, which she can't make properly. It's not quite a T sound but definitely not a th sound either. Somewhere between the two!

I am still mentally scarred by hearing a busker on the tube 'singing' Losing My Religion about 20 years ago "I fink I fought I saw you try" .

For those of you who need help in your pronunciation of THs and Fs:-
To make the F sound:- put your front teeth over your bottom lip.
To make the TH sound:- put the tip of your tongue between your teeth
Simples........

I think people know this. But when I follow it, it is still ff.

@WokenUpEarly

Genuine question, taking out any speech issues, when did Think become Fink? Throw become Frow? Etc

Isn’t this the way people pronounce the words in London and the South East? It’s weird and very sloppy.

Isn’t this the way people pronounce the words in London and the South East? It’s weird and very sloppy.

Where are you from? I was just wondering which bits of your natural accent I could describe as 'weird'.

@belinda789

For those of you who need help in your pronunciation of THs and Fs:- To make the F sound:- put your front teeth over your bottom lip. To make the TH sound:- put the tip of your tongue between your teeth Simples........

sorry Belinda, but that comes across as really patronising. I have spent ages with DH and DD 23 trying to get them to say "TH" DD once told me she really wanted to see the film "Four" couldnt find the film turned out she meant "thor". I said you mean "Thor"

yes thats it "four"

I have tried them on "thirty thousand feathers on a thrushes throat" and get "firty fousand feavers on a thrushes"

They have the Souf London gene , although someone said to me the other day that DD speaks really nicely.

have tried them on "thirty thousand feathers on a thrushes throat" and get "firty fousand feavers on a thrushes"
meant "firty fousand feavers on a fruhes froat"

Always, my DF was a tough around the edges Lahhdana and while my DM did grow up far away, she was in a far posher area of London so said it properly. We moved to Kent and as a child it was drummed into me to speak nicely. In Kent it's very mixed and almost a class thing.

As an adult I moved to areas of London where people said fink. I kind of picked it up but can switch between the two depending on who I'm with. I think either camp gets alienated when faced with the opposite. My sister will talk in a painfully posh way but it's put on and snobbery. My brother in a very How to Win Friends and influence people way will simply match whatever other people are doing. I try to be a less fake version of the two

I’m in a NW market town; there are lots of ‘finkers’ here!

There's nothing inherent in an accent that makes it "bad" or "good". Language is fluid, it changes.

Have any of you watched the youtube video I posted? It's explained on there.

I genuinely can’t hear the difference, and believe me, I’ve tried.

I’m not a native English speaker but have done quite well in my field here. Innthe past I was humiliated by (thankfully now ex) male bosses correcting me on my ‘threes’ during my presentations.

I paid for adult speech therapy for three years.

And I still can’t do it. When people say ‘here listen, this is the difference’ it sounds exactly the same.

Three sounds like free to me.

@BetsyBoo100

There's nothing inherent in an accent that makes it "bad" or "good". Language is fluid, it changes.

You're right but people can't accept this idea.

You're right but people can't accept this idea.

No, because then it means they can't look down on other people for something totally irrelevant, which clearly gives some people on this thread a lot of pleasure.

@derxa it’s like banging your head on a brick wall!

@belinda789...well there we go. No need to study for 4 years to be a SLT now, you’ve fixed it in one post.
Or, in the real world it’s far from ‘simples’!

Knowing how to pronounce a word 'correctly' (which I still dispute) in theory doesn't help much in day to day life, where we tend to talk without constantly monitoring ourselves to check our pronunciation is posh enough. I find it really hard not to pronounce 'specific' as 'spacific' - which I know to many on MN makes me worse than Hitler and stupider than a sponge - and I spent a long time trying to train myself out of it but it slips out, so now I just avoid using the word out loud at all so as not to offend anyone's precious ears.

[quote OwlBeThere]@belinda789...well there we go. No need to study for 4 years to be a SLT now, you’ve fixed it in one post.
Or, in the real world it’s far from ‘simples’![/quote]
I know. I must have wasted years studying to be a SALT and doing 2 years Linguistics and Phonetics at university.

@belinda789

For those of you who need help in your pronunciation of THs and Fs:- To make the F sound:- put your front teeth over your bottom lip. To make the TH sound:- put the tip of your tongue between your teeth Simples........

And for those of you who need to lose weight -- eat less!