this post was submitted on 06 Sep 2024
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Enough is enough (lemmy.world)
submitted 3 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago (2 children)

saying the letter X doesn’t make either of the letter’s major phonetic sounds

Excuse me?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

No, i think i get it but difficult to explain.

Say X, X, X in a row

Then say

Xylo , Xen, Xono

The Raw letter has different phonet-x to how it’s often applied.

When were talking about teaching kids the alphabet we need to train both individual and applied letters

I do realize that this might be very cultural and language dependent but i am pretty sure we’re talking plain english.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago

When were talking about teaching kids the alphabet we need to train both individual and applied letters

This is only slightly related but I once met a young (USAmerican) adult who thought the stripy horse animal's name was pronounced zed-bra in British English and it was really hard to convince her otherwise. In her mind zebra was strongly connected to Z-bra, so of course if someone was to pronounce the letter "zed" it would turn into "zed-bra" and not just into "zeh-bra".

[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 months ago (2 children)

X, spoken as a letter = ecks

Hard phonetic sound = zz, same as the letter Z (almost always at the beginning of a word. Xylophone)

Soft phonetic sound = ksk (never at the beginning of a word. Box, oxen)

(disclaimer: American English, ymmv.)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago

X, spoken as a letter ecks

Or ex

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago (2 children)

By this definition, Xolo wouldn't fit because the x in Xolo is somewhere between sh- and ch-. It's a Nahuatl word and many (if not all) Xs are sh-/ch-.

Sorry for being pedantic.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Don’t be sorry, you’re not pedantic enough.

The Nahuatl word Xoloitzcuintle is something the vast majority of English-speaking Americans can’t read, let alone spell or pronounce correctly. So the more digestible word Xolo was adopted to identify Mexican hairless dogs (hard X, hard O, L, hard O).

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

As an English speaking American I can confirm. I started pronouncing it in my head then kinda gave up cus I haven’t had enough coffee yet