Discussion Groups / British English / November 2011

My grandmother could buy enough liquorice to skip with for 1d. She had
little idea that inflation meant that incomes incomes had also risen and
just thought that everything had got more expensive.

If I'm going to ramble, I'd best ramble on topic. So I will claim the
Right to Curmudge. We all know that language evolves but some things
just get to us. No reason - they just do. I can never hear the word
"pitcher" from an educated British English speaker without a shudder. I
don't mean the pitcher that we pour from - I mean the pitcher that we
look at on a wall. The "k" sound is now hardly ever heard. Even art
experts, academics, newsreaders etc talk about pitchers.

And another thing. What's this with thuh "thuh" before a vowel sound e.g
"thuh age of the thuh earth". I first noticed it from that posh
presenter bloke. Memory isn't what it was. Thank God for search engines.
His name is Ben Fogle. Since then it seems to crop up everywhere in the
media. That woman with a Spanish surname and too much mascara who
presents documentaries about the history of religion. That bloke who
recently did a documentary about the Dam Busters etc. I expect it from a
child learning to read but from a Brit adult it sounds a bit "special
needs" - as if the person's mind doesn't work fast enough to know that a
vowel sound is coming next. Those who use thuh "thuh" also sometimes use
the "thee" before a vowel. I don't know if they observe any rule or just
make it up as they go along.

And now it's time to put my feet up and have a nice cup of tea.