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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To be aggrieved at the loss of 'th'.......

43 replies

AzureBlueSky · 10/08/2009 22:49

It drives me potty! Secretively though, as my sister's kids, her husband, my friends children (in the main), and a number of my friends, all do it.

E.g: Baff/Bath....Fink/Think...Free/Three etc...

When I hear 'th's' dropped it makes my teeth itch. Also my 2.5 year old son does it, and my DH tells me off for trying to correct him.
He (my son) now wanders around the house saying 'baff/aff/aff'.
AIBU? Should I just let it go?

OP posts:

PfftTheMagicDragon · 11/08/2009 08:38

Some children can't say it though, and mellowdrummer says. Just like V/B and Y/L some sounds are difficult.

In adults though it is very annoying.

Am currently trying to teach DS to say TH instead of FF at the beginning of words by sticking his tongue out but I think that at that age when they can't say it, they can't her when they are saying it wrong.

HSMM · 11/08/2009 08:51

I thought it very sad when I went to DD's Christmas carol concert and the whole school sang 'Oh Little Town of Befflehem' - shocked me a bit!

GibbonInARibbon · 11/08/2009 08:56

I find my self correcting DD at times, but as another poster mentioned, I watch myself as the last thing I want to do is make her self conscious (DD is nearly 3)

On the other hand I find it hard to understand how for some, it is the huge issue it seems. I think being raised in east London and knowing many intelligent, articulate, educated people who at times (shock horror) dropped the th on words, I will worry about it less than some of you.

I do have to say, speech therapy to correct it? Oh dear God.

4andnotout · 11/08/2009 08:58

I had this the other way round in that my sister when she was younger would call me Sothie after getting th and ph confused.

MoonIsATiredSlayer · 11/08/2009 09:04

My DS1 says 'f' for 'th' all the time and I keep trying to correct him but he seems unable to make a 'th' sound no matter how hard he tries. We don't speak like that (I hope!) so I am just hoping that MrsMellowdrummer is right as he is only 5.

GreatGooglyMoogly · 11/08/2009 09:47

YANBU. Also the loss of 'ing'. It now seems to be playin', talkin', etc. No wonder DS1 (5.4) has trouble spelling!

AramintaCane · 11/08/2009 09:54

YANBU - People here say pack lunch instead of packed lunch it drives me crazy. Even all the school letters are incorrect and say please bring a pack lunch. Its Packed lunch what happened to the ed

AramintaCane · 11/08/2009 09:55

GreatGoogly don't you mean spellin

cthea · 11/08/2009 10:01

Heard a mum the other day calling her son Eton. I think she meant Ethan.

cthea · 11/08/2009 10:02

I agree with Mrs Mellowdrummer about not correcting children who are just too young to be able to pronounce some sounds. DD1 (4) still has some trouble with s/f.

GrendelsMum · 11/08/2009 10:12

Speaking as a non-th person, I'm quite amused by this one - and very amused to think how horrified some people would be if I revealed my job. However, I should say that when I was younger it was extremely upsetting to be mocked (and this includes by ladies in shops who took it upon themselves to correct my speech) for an inability to hear and say a particular sound.

People have to learn to distinguish between sounds - or rather to comparatmentalise sounds into notional categories which are the same notional categories that the person making them intends them to have - and that relies on there being some useful difference between them. So native English speakers hear the difference between 'red' and 'led', but we don't really hear the difference between the different sorts of Russian 'i' - we just don't need ot. For some people, 'th' and 'f' are vitally different. For other people, actually you don't need the difference - 'three' and 'free' are distinguished by context, not by sound, as they are homophones. You might say 'wouldn't it be better if there were no homophones in the English language?' but this is another point. If you don't hear the 'th'/'f' difference, it's extremely difficult to reproduce it, and fairly pointless. I'd like to stress again that this is not "laziness" or "stupidity", any more than the fact that a native English speaker not distinguishing between different 'i' sounds in Russian is not laziness or stupidity.

Interestingly enough, 'th'-lessness has apparently also at some points been an indicator of higher social status, not unlike the 'G-dropping' (substituting the alveolar nasal instead of the velar nasal) associated with both Cockney and upper-class English speech.

The conclusion - feel free to teach your children to hear and reproduce 'th', but don't take it upon you to correct others who may already be embarrassed and ashamed at what they are made to feel is a sign of ignorance and stupidity.

MoonIsATiredSlayer · 11/08/2009 10:16

Are you a speech therapist by any chance GrendelsMum??

cthea · 11/08/2009 10:29

GrendelsMum - I agree with what you say there. DH can't hear some differences in my language and I still can't hear some differences between sounds in English, or rather between how I pr. them and how they should be. And I've been exposed to it since I was 6. But I think most people others refer to on here are English born and bred. I know my daughter can hear the difference between f/s/th but she just can't pr. it correctly all the time.

For a free SLT consultation - is it true that it's easier to just learn to say a sound later rather than say it early wrongly and then correct it later?

GreatGooglyMoogly · 11/08/2009 11:47

Araminta!

spiritguide · 14/08/2009 19:39

wots this all about, does it really mata how you spell words as long as people get the jist i cant see wot the problem is, the world is rapidly changing, get with the flow love, live n let live, who really cares??

SenoraPostrophe · 14/08/2009 19:48

yab completely u.

language changes. /f/ for /th/ is now well established in several accents and there'll be no going back. It happens - just like most accents dropped /r/ at the end of words, and southerners changed the vowel in cup (well, they probably did). /r/ is changing too, but most people can't hear it.

there's just no point in getting your knickers in a twist about it

katiestar · 14/08/2009 20:17

I remember reading that the cut-off point for hearing a sound is really young - about 12 months I think.So if your baby never hears the 'th' sound they will never be able to reproduce it and also I would it imagine it makes literacy more difficult.
I guess this is why it is so important to check babies hearing very early and also beneficial to babies to expose them to foreign languages.

Lusi · 14/08/2009 21:27

I physically couldn't pronounce th until I was at least 10 - I can remember both my mum and teachers getting me to stick my tongue out and say th th th (no speech therapists in my day)
Also I used to stutter a little and still do occasionally when under pressure...
I usually know just before if I am going to stutter on a word and now almost automatically change it.
Also friends taught me to say squirrel rather than squiwel when I was in my early 20s (endless repeating squ rel squ rel) - also had problems with Foie Gras and also I sometimes can't say 'physiological' and related words.
If someone corrected me - I wouldn't mind - I'd just explain I have a speech impediment.
I think the OP's issue is with people being lazy (or trying to be cool... as far as I am aware the f for th is part of a relatively new 'accent'
Not from Lancashire (where I was brought up) -their vowels tend to be longer than southerners - only place I have met it is when I lived in 'sarf Lonnon innit'...

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