Timeline for Is it "a honor" or "an honor"? is h silent in this word in American English? [closed]
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
17 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 31, 2015 at 20:46 | history | closed |
FumbleFingers Chenmunka tchrist♦ Tushar Raj user66974 |
Not suitable for this site | |
| May 25, 2015 at 2:47 | comment | added | Steven Littman | Hot Licks, where do you live? I'm sure you know what you're talking about, but here in New York, no one pronounces the h in honor. Maybe it's a localized thing. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 9:17 | comment | added | Hot Licks | Whatever you say. Been speaking English for 60-odd years, but I suppose you know better. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 3:42 | comment | added | Greg Lee | @HotLicks, I should have explained. The difference between an h-beginning word and a vowel-beginning word is categorical -- it's not a matter of degree. Some phonetic differences are matters of degree, but not this one. And we know that because this difference conditions the phonemic difference between forms of the article /a/ and /an/. Non-phonemic differences cannot condition phonemic differences. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 3:24 | comment | added | Hot Licks | @GregLee - Whatever you say. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 3:10 | comment | added | Greg Lee | @HotLicks, there's no h in the pronunciation of "honor". Not even a hint. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 2:24 | review | Close votes | |||
| May 31, 2015 at 20:46 | |||||
| May 24, 2015 at 2:18 | comment | added | FumbleFingers | @Hot Licks: I think you're mistaken. Most people no longer aspirate where, whom, etc. at all - but some still do, and I suppose a few of those will have reduced it to a "hint". But I don't think there's any corresponding "residual aspirate" in words like honour. Or even in historical, come to that - and that's one of the few "potentially silent aitch" words where some real purists say an historical event is correct even though it's also correct to enunciate the aitch. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 1:31 | vote | accept | BigOther | ||
| May 24, 2015 at 1:07 | comment | added | Janus Bahs Jacquet | @HotLicks I suspect it's not actually there—or rather, that the likelihood of there being any actual, phonetic aspiration in honour is about the same as in on a (can't think of a pair that rhymes properly in AmE apart from on her, which just moves the issue to the next syllable). | |
| May 24, 2015 at 1:00 | comment | added | Hot Licks | @JanusBahsJacquet - It's definitely subtle. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 0:55 | comment | added | Janus Bahs Jacquet | @HotLicks I have never heard any hint of an h in honour as spoken by any native speaker. Of some people do add in a bit of aitchiness, I suspect it's because of the spelling. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 0:26 | answer | added | Rand al'Thor | timeline score: 7 | |
| May 24, 2015 at 0:23 | comment | added | Hot Licks | The "h" is mostly silent. There is often a hint of an "h" sound in words like "honor", but it is still treated as a vowel sound. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 0:22 | review | First posts | |||
| May 24, 2015 at 3:45 | |||||
| May 24, 2015 at 0:21 | comment | added | A.Ellett | The "h" is silent. But both "a" or "an" can be used. It would be a bit odd to hear "a honor", but some people do this for emphasis. | |
| May 24, 2015 at 0:20 | history | asked | BigOther | CC BY-SA 3.0 |