I keep hearing everyone at my work (Native speakers) saying e-X-etera. They said my pronunciation of the word as e-T-cetera was incorrect. I got into a big argument, they thought I was mad.
Is there some unknown rule as to why "etcetera" should be pronounces as "exetera"?
The pronunciation of "et cetera" is an extremely common pet peeve, to the extent that there is a lot written about it on the Internet already. E.g.
https://forum.wordreference.com/threads/pronunciation-etcetera-etc.1025972/
https://www.quora.com/I-hear-some-people-pronounce-etc-as-ekcetra-which-is-correct
https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/how-to-pronounce-etcetera
It's one of the particular words that people tend to give as examples of "mispronunciations" that drive them nuts, or that kind of thing, along with the supposedly common "mispronunciations" of words like specific, supposedly and library. I find it a bit odd that you hadn't run into any information about this before posting your question here on this site.
You can always check a dictionary to see what it gives for the pronunciation of a word. That seems more productive than getting into a "big argument" with people who probably don't know as much as dictionary makers. For example, Merriam-Webster gives your preferred pronunciation first: "\ et-ˈse-tə-rə , -ˈse-trə also it- , nonstandard ek- , nonstandard ik- \". (But there's no way to force your coworkers to take that seriously if they are attached to their accustomed pronunciation.)
So, there is no rule saying that et cetera "should" be pronounced as "exetera". It's perfectly fine to pronounce it with /ts/ as you have been doing. The reasons for pronunciation variants are often unclear, but I've seen it suggested that the pronunciation with /k/ arose because of the influence of words starting with the common prefix ex-, which is pronounced with /ks/. There are also supposed to be pronunciation variants of escape and especially that have /ks/, and of course /ks/ is extremely common in espresso (although still stigmatized by many people).
There is no simple definition of "correct" pronunciation, so if you want to ask if a pronunciation is "correct", you have to specify what criteria you are using. (Or rather than asking about correctness, you could ask about something else that is less arguable.) There are many pronunciations that are commonly accepted, but that don't correspond to etymology or spelling; e.g. fuchsia is pronounced as /ˈfjuːʃə/ "few-sha" despite coming from the German name Fuchs [fʊks] (more or less "fooks") and being spelled (in standard written English) with "chs", which as far as I know does not correspond to the sound /ʃ/ in any other English word. Rationale is pronounced /ræʃəˈnæl/ or /ɹæʃəˈnɑːl/, despite coming from the Latin word rationale, where the e is pronounced and not silent (compare and contrast with the pronunciation of simile). Colonel is infamously pronounced kernel.
There are many examples of variants according to local dialect, even within the same country. It's not reasonable to label any one of them as "incorrect", especially considering the etymological basis of the words.
In your example, et cetera is pronounced /et ˈkeː.te.ra/ in Classical Latin (according to linguistic reconstruction) and /et ˈt͡ʃe.te.ra/ in Ecclesiastical Latin . Neither of these match any of the modern pronunciations used in English.
In fact, a linguistic survey of the United States performed by Harvard University covered this exact word.
In this map, it can be seen that the "e[ts]etera" pronunciation (labelled red) actually comprises a majority (65%) of the speakers surveyed. Other common pronunciations include "e[ts]etra" (12%, blue), "eksetera" (15%, green) and "eksetra" (6%, purple).
Both are technically correct in modern usage. The form you prefer is technically the phonetically correct English pronunciation of the original Latin term (et cetera). The other form is in sufficiently common usage to be also considered 'correct' by linguistic standards. Personally, here in the American midwest, I hear the first one more often among academics (and language snobs), and the second more often in other contexts.
You can find all kinds of words like this though which have multiple pronunciations which people argue over. Other examples include:
In most cases, one form or the other will dominate in a given dialect.
As much as we might wish to fight against this kind of pronunciation shift, nonetheless it is a common linguistic phenomenon called metathesis.
For example, I'm sure that many people might object to the similar mis-pronunciation "ax" for the word "ask". However, as explained here, "ask" is itself a metathesis of an earlier pronunciation "ax"!!
Growing up, I always wondered why the abbreviation for eccetera/eccetra (/ekˈsɛ.ɾ(ə).rə/ or /ekˈsɛ.trə/) was “etc.” and not “ect.” Finally, I looked up why in college and found out that “etc.” actually stands for et cetera. Since then, I’ve pronounced it /et ˈsɛː.ɾ(ə).rə/ because this pronunciation matches what “etc.” actually stands for.
However, as other answers have pointed out, originally et cetera was pronounced /et ˈkeː.te.ra/ in Classical Latin and /et ˈt͡ʃe.te.ra/ in Ecclesiastical Latin, so my pronunciation still isn’t “correct,” but at least it makes me happy because it matches the order of etc. and is an American English phonetic reading of et cetera.
That being said, et cetera became eccètera in Italian, so an t to c shift in et cetera is common in other languages, not just American English. This gives some weight to those who want to go for the /ek/ pronunciations of et cetera.
Argument for /et ˈsɛː.ɾ(ə).rə/: This pronunciation not only is an American English phonetic reading of what “etc.” stands for, which is et cetera, but it also matches the letter order of the abbreviation “etc.” This helps me fall asleep at night.
Argument for /ekˈsɛ.t(ə).rə/: The same phonetic process that turned et cetera into eccètera in Italian probably made created the /ekˈsɛ.t(ə).rə/ pronunciation in American English, so let’s embrace our “cultured” Italian pronunciation of et cetera! Who cares if “etc.” doesn’t match the letter order of what we’re saying? Et cetera never was pronounced /et ˈkeː.te.ra/ anyway, and I don’t think anyone is going to start saying Classical Latin “et-ketera” anytime soon.
Argument for /et ˈsɛ.trə/: It follows the order of the abbreviation “etc.” and is a loose phonetic reading of et cetera, and it sounds less academic than /et ˈsɛː.ɾə.rə/.
Argument for /ekˈsɛ.trə/: I’d say the same arguments hold true as for /ekˈsɛ.t(ə).rə/. It’s just whatever your personal preference is.
I would suggest it's a simple case of dissimilation. The same thing occurs in Spanish too. This process occurs all the time in languages all over the world.
About the one commentor who says it's because of a lack of intelligence. Well, it isn't. They're just ignorant about how languages vary and change over time. Using their own argument, they have a lack of intelligence because they say /bəː(ɹ)d/ instead of /bɾid/ since the modern word bird has undergone metathesis from earlier bridd: the exact same as their own example of asterisk vs. asteriks. Another example is the word stones which is pronounced /stəwnz/ and comes from stānas which was pronounced /stɑːnɑs/. As you can see, the /ɑː/ has broke into a diphthong and is no longer long, the short /ɑ/ has been completely lost, and the final /s/ has voiced to /z/.
The original Latin comes from the phrase "et cetera", meaning "and (et) the rest (cetera)". Latin made no distinction based on the hard "c" and "k", so in its original Latin, the pronunciation was "et ketera". Modernizing Latin and its development through Italian and other Romance languages introduced a soft "c" sound, which sounds like an "s".
So, the original pronunciation is "et ketera", the modern pronunciation is "et setera" and in no place does an "X" sounds come into play.
Huh? This really doesn't require searching for an answer. The only valid answer to why someone would pronounce et cetera as ex cetera is lack of intelligence. It's just wrong any other way, simple as that. Amazing the number of people offering all sorts of long-winded justifications - there aren't other words that sound like it or have similar consonant strings, consonant deletion, blah, blah. So what if it's the only word that is spelled like that? Then just pronounce it like that. Why is that difficult? Both aren't "technically correct in modern usage". This is not tomato/tomahto. And by the way, neither are nuclear/nucular or asterisk/asteriks. For all of these, the only explanation is stupidity.
