Friday, August 08, 2008

Anglo Mango's Guide to Ham Pronunciation

So English people like to pronounce things in strange ways completely unrelated to the way in which they are spelled, and then laugh at you when you then pronounce the word phonetically. Like somehow they've managed to trick you and you've given a clear display of inferior American intelect. But alas I have come to realize that we should just be laughing at them for their clear inability to know exactly what to do with the word ham.

Ham as a meat is basically the same. 'Hello, I'd like a ham sandwich' is a equally understood universal phrase. Then things get tricky. While the big-based lunch meat is the same, I have yet to see anything resembling a honey-baked ham style, um, ham. The Anglos love their pork, so it's clearly consumed, but I've come to the conclusion that they refer to this sort of ham as gammon steak. This may be something else entirely, but let's just roll with that for now.

Ham is also an extremely common inclusion in place names. From my limited understanding, this comes from the shortening of the word 'hamlet'. So perhaps Hamlet of Hurling becomes Hurlingham. And again while the ham in hamlet is fair play to all, if you ask someone how to get to Hurling-ham they'll likely either laugh at you, shake their head in disgust, or slap you (maybe not). After all, it is OBVIOUSLY pronounced Hurling-um. And Fulham is pronounced Ful-um. Fair enough, some consistency there.

So there you, when ham is at the front a word, it's ham ('Hamp-sure'), when it's at the back of a word it's um. In the middle you would generally have ham again, ('South-hamp-tun'). And while we're at it, shire is indeed pretty consistently 'sure'. And let's just cut to the chase - Liecester is lester, Liecestershire is lester-sure. But I think that's just because nobody can think of a better way to pronounce Liecester.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sounds like you live in a country of mumblers!

So, you get teased about pronunciation, huh? Here's a payback idea--record random Brits saying the following: Willamette, Tualatin, Oregon, Yosemite (tee-hee), Puyallup, Snohomish. Laugh heartily as they do! Then post it on You Tube.

Oops--moms aren't supposed to suggest things like that...

mark said...

as margo can confirm i can do the best american accent ever - especially my bill clinton one!

i cant pronounce any of those! especially yosemite! then again im not sure about over there but places are pronounced depending on where in the country your from here! if i went to liverpool and said im going to bath id be laughed at!

Anonymous said...

I should know how to properly pronounce "Birmingham", having lived there (the Alabama version). It rhymes with "Sam".

Chris O said...

Is it not just Yo-sem-it-ee? As in Sam and not "yosee-might"?

Also, we have honey-roast ham? Is that not the same thing?

What about: "Happisburgh". It's pronounced "haze-bruh". But of course. I don't condone such silliness, I just live here...

Chris O said...

It's Chris btw. I don't know why it comes up with that username on here.

mark said...

Kathy Margo is laughing at me! I tried your test and failed (although i can apparently say Oregon)

Anonymous said...

I'm sorry!! Oh dear, aack, it's all my fault. Aack again!