We must move in different circles. All the people I know pronounce mirror as the British do. (The accent is slightly different, of course.)
I have heard people (not among my friends) who pronounce nuclear as Bush does (nukuler). Ugh. One of my pet peeves is processes, which should rhyme with mistresses. So many people pronounce it processeez, as though it were the Greek plural of the non-existent processis. I even knew someone, some years ago, who pronounced it prosseez. Another otherwise intelligent person (Canadian, in this case) would pronounce databases databaseez, as though it were the plural of databasis, rather than of database. Funnily enough, he was the CEO of a business that offered database solutions. I used to write these things down, with a book in mind. Maybe I'll resume that process. My main metric pet peeve is, of course, kilOMMeter, rather than kilohmeter. I wonder if the people who say kilOMMeter measure short objects and distances in milLIMMeters. Maybe they weigh themselves in kilOGGrums. Bill ________________________________ Bill Potts Roseville, CA http://metric1.org [SI Navigator] -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Ziser, Jesse Sent: Tuesday, May 13, 2008 17:53 To: U.S. Metric Association Subject: [USMA:40913] Re: Alternate meaning of the word "metric" or its plural "metrics" --- Stephen Humphreys <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > [snip] > > legitimize it the same way they did with the mispronunciations of > > "February"> (feb-YOO-ary) > and "nuclear" (NOOK-yoo-lar).> > (If I live to be a thousand, I will never say "NOOK-yoo-lar," > no many how many> scholars say it and point confidently to a > dictionary.)> > > You might be able to help me out. > Often, when I watch US shows like '24' and 'Lost', I hear what I > believe is a weird way of saying 'mirror' > > Am I right in that some Americans pronounce this as "mee your" instead > of "mih-rur"? Part of me says I've mis-heard it but it's happened too often! I think the customary pronunciation here is something like "mee-rur", though if you've ever listened to Bush speak about the "war on tear", you know some Americans have trouble with the "rur" syllable. Could that explain it?
