Twenny

[RaraRachael]

Since when did the second t in twenty disappear?

Three times over the past few days, I've heard reporters and presenters saying "twenny".

It's twenTy FFS.

Seckertary
Nucular

I say it quite like that in my accent (southern). I know how to say it ‘properly’ and sometimes do- it depends who I’m talking to. Like most people, I adjust my register to suit different contexts. I’m a bit of a pedant, but only for written language- spoken language is a different beast and I can’t bring myself to criticise people’s pronunciation because accents exist, as do speech impediments.

Quite.
I've recently heard on radio 4 presenters who can't pronounce 'nuclear' when talking about nuclear power stations and presenters who say ,'aks' instead of ask.
Radio 4 used to be the gold standard of British speech radio where presenters could be relied on to speak properly. That's sadly no longer the case.

A fair proportion of us that live close to Gatwick pronounce it like that, especially in Crawley where most of the Gatwick workforce live!

Febury.

If you can say “brewery”, you can say February.

I teach year one. They are corrected when they say twenny.

I remember when Barbara Dickson had a hit with "January, February" and there being comments about her "odd" pronunciation. Being Scottish she pronounced it as it's written Feb-roo-arry.

A lot of people thought it should have been Feb-you-arry 🙄

Interesting @RaraRachael.

I just repeated it to myself and confess I say Jan-u-ry & Feb-u-ry ., so a bit of lazy diction on my part.

That said, if the cadence required it for singing, I guess I would be more like Barbara Dickson ( though my singing voice is nothing like hers)

Funny because I had to actively learn to say twenny.

This one is hurting my brain a bit, I pronounce it ‘brew-uh-ree’ (fast) and ‘Feb-u-airy’. Are they supposed to sound more similar?

What? Why???

I say it properly. And I HATE people who say SIKTH. You don't say one two three four five sik!

ARGH!

@RaraRachael YANBU. See also fiddy - instead of fifty. Though, not many people say that LOL!

I pronounce twenty with the T in the middle, and I'm not posh!

Ooooh I also hate Feb-ree and Jan-you-ree.

Feb-roo-airy would be acceptable. Maybe it’s one of those words that get mispronounced because it’s often spelled incorrectly.

This is just linguistic differences in dialect. There is a standard British English written language (and American) However there have always been differences in speech.

Radio 4 being a “bastion” might just mean that groups from across a lot of the UK were excluded, just as talented but spoke differently (and didn’t attend a school that trained it out of them).

I don’t know about the examples here but a lot of the Americanisms that people complain about were the original accents or word pronunciation that people emigrated with and British English has changed when American did not.

I always assumed it was more like a silent ‘R’ situation, I don’t think anyone I know pronounces it, damn you learn something new.

It's not though. We're not talking about the glottal stop. Twenny is being said by otherwise more or less RP speakers who pronounce the t in all other words, including thirty, forty, fifty etc. It's just poor old twenty that gets this treatment.

Plice instead of police! So many broadcasters say this now and it drives me mad!

I realise I say many of these. I can't hear the difference between some word such as maths and mass which DD tells me is different. Or free and three that I know is different. I wrongly blame my eastern European parents as some of these sounds don't exist in their language.

I do say twenty though!

Worst offender for this is Stacey Dooley. Isn't that right geowls?

I'm a glottal stopper on certain words, twen'y, sa'urday (and I pronounce the day as di) but I might also say twenny at times

Me too , I'm originally from SE London , if I'm talking to friends or family it's twen'y, I'm posher at work!

Recently , I've started to hear ekspecially, which I hate .

To sound like everyone else so as not get teased for my Welsh speaking accent. I don't drop t's everywhere, but this one is almost always dropped where I come from.

Yes. Fè-brewery.

I tend to freestyle February in two different ways, neither of them correct 😆

Either
Feb-you-erry
Or
Feb-ruh-ry