To have misunderstood the meaning of this word my whole life?

[Lemonsaretheonlyfruit]

Salubrious.

I always thought it meant luxurious. Turns out it means healthy or health giving. (My 10 year old DS asked me this morning so I looked it up just to double check I was giving him the correct definition!)

Who knew? (Probably everyone apart from me). Any more of these to share?

And lapel as lay-ple

I feel like this could be another can of worms time, but I'm pretty sure lay-ple is a regional variation too.

Language evolves all the time. So a word that meant one thing in Victorian times may mean something else a century later.

This isn't exactly the same, but...am I crazy to think that "apathy" is the opposite of both "love" and "hate?"

but apathy doesn't really mean either of those?

Apathy means lack of enthusiasm/interest.
The adjectives woudl be enthusiastic/apathetic.

So I wouldn't use it as an opposite to love or hate. I think the word you are looking for is more like indifference?

Someone posted a page or so back about disinterest v. uninterested

I think you have them the wrong way round.

Disinterested means that you are impartial. I have no vested inteterst in this. At the beginning of a meeting you may be asked to declare if you have an 'interest' in anything on the agenda. if not you are a disinterested party.

If you are uninterested it means it doesn't interest you. I am not interested in football, I am uninterested in football.

pronouncing luuuuuuurve as luuuuuve, because you don't say the rrr

I have a non rhotic accent and funnily enough we always use the r in this so we don't say luuuuve, but we say something more like lerve, so the r makes it an er sound. Whereas in love, it is luve.

Now wondering how er is said in rhotic and if that is the best way to write it to illustrate!
(so for me the luuuurve would rhyme with serve?) but then said stretched out)

@steppemum

Someone posted a page or so back about disinterest v. uninterested

I think you have them the wrong way round.

Disinterested means that you are impartial. I have no vested inteterst in this. At the beginning of a meeting you may be asked to declare if you have an 'interest' in anything on the agenda. if not you are a disinterested party.

If you are uninterested it means it doesn't interest you. I am not interested in football, I am uninterested in football.

I think you're referring to a discussion about earlier etymology. See here:

www.etymonline.com/word/disinterested

Errol I am not sure what your point is? The link you posted agrees with what I have just written?

But 2 pages ages (long after the earlier discussion) someone came on and asked about its use, and used them the other way round. I was referring to them.

@ZowieCavie

Thanks ChessieFL I was also taught at school disinterested meant impartial but Candleabra that’s interesting to hear. I guess uninterested in as in ‘no stake’ in something or ‘no interest to declare’ kind of means the same as impartial so makes sense how this word shifts in meaning

this is the one I was referring to.

uninterested does not mean impartial or no stake, or no interest to declare.
It always means just not interested.

uninterested hasn't shifted meaning over time either

Only just figured out the following:

remuneration / renumeration
Although “remuneration” looks as if it might mean “repayment” it usually means simply “payment.” In speech it is often confused with “renumeration,” which would mean re-counting (counting again).

Yep, I confess I’ve been getting that one wrong!

steppemum I did get them the right way round in my original post (i.e. as you set out), it was the later poster who confused them again.

@snoodle1

Only just figured out the following:

remuneration / renumeration
Although “remuneration” looks as if it might mean “repayment” it usually means simply “payment.” In speech it is often confused with “renumeration,” which would mean re-counting (counting again).

Yep, I confess I’ve been getting that one wrong!

I hate this word.

I really cannot say it!
remuneration sounds so wrong!

I've never heard of the word renumeration used anywhere.

@Ineke

What annoys me is when them is used instead of those, eg The eggs are near them biscuits, instead of those biscuits.

You do realise that is just regional dialect? It’s not grammatically correct, and should not be used outside informal conversational settings, but it’s not the same thing as misunderstanding the meaning of a word. Same goes for the way people say “you was” in London eg “you was really hungry, wasn’t ya?” or “I seen him” in Scotland. Most people who speak that way informally are fully capable of using the correct grammatical form when the context demands it.

@midnightstar66

Banal and canal do rhyme in Scottish accent - the slightly longer aaa sound isn't enough to be noticed in an accent that tends to elongate a sounds anyway. There is definitely no R in it so why would you say that? I get that things sound different in different accents so accept that it may not be the case that it rhymes totally in every area of the Uk but there's no need for adding random letters that don't even exist in the word

The reason people add the “r” to denote a long aa pronounciation has been explained about 20 times already in this thread.

@snoodle1 I had no idea there were 2 separate words! I work in HR and avoid using this word as it has always confused me. Now I know why.

@CountFosco

Those who put an 'r' in it have been taught that 'ar' is a digraph that makes the 'ah' sound. In Scotland, because we pronounce our 'r's that diraph is not used do it looks nonsensical. The earliest example I was ever aware of was 'lurve' which we're suppose to pronounce as 'luuuuuuve' not lurrrve. Weird right?

OMG. I (rhotic speaker and well aware of what RP speakers do with the “r” sound) hasn’t realised this one! “Lurve” used to pop up in Jackie type magazines didn’t? I did always wonder why it had an “r” sound!

On the subject of “love” does anybody, when speaking, pronounce “love” the way that Adele sings it? She sings something a bit like “loave”. It’s very weird.

@steppemum

Errol I am not sure what your point is? The link you posted agrees with what I have just written?

But 2 pages ages (long after the earlier discussion) someone came on and asked about its use, and used them the other way round. I was referring to them.

The post I noticed earlier with them 'wrong' was referring to the early 1600s etymology in the link where disinterested did mean uninterested, before it became impartial. I was about to dive in and 'correct' it before I realised what it was referring to.

I'm too interested in this.

On 'lurve'.... my perception is that this was a transliteration of how 'love' was pronounced in many pop and rock songs in that era, which (to my ear) often had at least a hint of 'r' in them.

I get that things sound different in different accents so accept that it may not be the case that it rhymes totally in every area of the Uk but there's no need for adding random letters that don't even exist in the word.

Are we really nearly 450 posts in and still doing wide-eyed disingenuousness about what ‘ar’ represents in non-rhotic phonics, even though it’s been explained a number of times?

It’s how non-rhotic speakers often render the IPA ‘ɑ:’ as the nearest equivalent in their (numerous) accents. It’s closer than ‘ah’ or ‘aaa’ which can be misread.

To non-rhotics, it’s the sound that’s in farm, barn, charm, cart, start, tarp. There is no individual ‘r’ sound as there would be in rhotic accents. This is how ‘ar’ usually sounds when it’s followed by a consonant in non-rhotic accents. It’s not a ‘random letter’. It’s how these people make that sound.

It’s no more ‘adding a letter’ than describing it as aaa, ah or similar things that people don’t seem to take issue with.

It’s how these people make that sound.

But-given that they are trying to explain to others- it’s a bit silly of them not to look beyond their own noses and consider that others do not make that sound in that way. Especially when more “universal”
alternatives like -aa or -ah are available.

Obviously the phonetic alphabet solves this problem but that’s not much use to the uninitiated.

I would like to offer the ineffably irritating mispronunciation of turmeric as tumeric.

Gets right on my thre'pennies. Or is it thrupennies?

I know this isn't pedants' corner, but what is the correct pronunciation for 'overarching'? I say it (not frequently!) the way it is spelt. Dh says over-arc-ing, (with a hard 'k'' sound), which he claims is a legitimate alternative, but it just sounds wrong to me!

^But-given that they are trying to explain to others- it’s a bit silly of them not to look beyond their own noses and consider that others do not make that sound in that way. Especially when more “universal”
alternatives like -aa or -ah are available.^

Just as silly as those affecting not to be able to get their heads around that rendering, tbh.

I know the utter tedium these threads descend into the moment someone types, in good faith but confusingly for some ‘I pronounce it carm’ so obviously I avoid it, even though it’s more accurate in my accent than ah or aa (the latter renders as a very flat ‘a’ for me so I don’t use it.)

I’m just suggesting that people take a fucking moment, read the threads, and at the very least stop bollocking around about ‘adding extra letters!’ while liberally besprinkling their own phonetic renderings with letters that aren’t in the spelling but make perfect sense in their own accents.

At least half of these posts aren’t in good faith, it’s posters who are intent on Making A Point.

@HunkyPunk Cambridge doesn’t list it as an alternative...

it’s a bit silly of them not to look beyond their own noses and consider that others do not make that sound in that way.

This works both ways.