January 8, 2006

Po-tay-to, Po-taa-to, To-may-to, To-maa-to: Still President After All These Years

NEO NOTES a brilliant examination by Callimachus @ Done With Mirrors of the oft repeated "Chimp Rant #4,281a" concerning the Presidential pronunciation of "nuclear." Bush's 'mispronunciation' of this word is, you recall, one of the oldest reasons his enemies feel he is unfit for office. But is it correct?

It's not exactly correct to say the president mispronounces the word. He uses an alternate pronunciation -- "nu-ku-lar" -- that might be considered dialectal. It is commonly heard in the U.S. South, and in the U.S. military (which traditionally draws disproportionately from the old Confederacy states). Its use has been noted since the early 1960s among nuclear scientists themselves, including British and Canadian scientists.
What follows from this is a fascinating tour of Metathesis in everyday language and American History. I was especially struck by this part of the argument:
Some linguists dismiss the metathesis explanation of "nu-ku-lar" and say it all is caused by the bad influence of secular and such words. They point out that the "-kly-" doesn't cause any pronunciation problems in clear.

But I think this is mistaken. If you look at the whole word nuclear, it requires much more effort to pronounce correctly than clear. Your mouth has to shift from a high back vowel (-u-) to front vowels (-e-, -a-) in a feat of oral gymnastics. You have to make a sort of Wallace & Gromit face.

Humans tend to like statements that "let them off the hook," so I was especially enamored of this one.

You see, my secret shame is that, although I have spent much of my life working in the publishing worlds of New York, Boston, and London, I too pronounce "nuclear" as "nu-ku-lar." I do, that is, unless I am quite careful when I come to the word in everyday speech. This tendency to say "nu-ku-lar" has remained with me no matter how hard I try to correct it. Over the years I have developed two "strategeries" for coping with it. The first is to use the word "atomic" in place of "nuclear," and the second is to think and say two words, "new-clear." I suspect many other closet metathesians abide within our nation, but the ones that are most sorely afflicted must be those dwelling deep within AntiBush Nation. Imagine the humiliation of being a GoreCard-Carrying Member of that tribe and never being able to chime in on the ritual BushBash around the dinner table. D'Oh, the humanity!

But now, thanks to Callimachus article including the KKK (Kennedy, Karter and Klinton) in the "Nu-ku-lar Kerfuffle," the metathesian malady only serves to remind AntiBush Nation that, to paraphrase Mark Twain, "There is no such thing as The New Yorker's English. The property has gone into the hands of a joint stock company and George Bush owns the bulk of the shares!"

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Posted by Vanderleun at January 8, 2006 8:45 AM | TrackBack
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"It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood." -- Karl Popper N.B.: Comments are moderated and may not appear immediately. Comments that exceed the obscenity or stupidity limits will be either edited or expunged.

I read somewhere that Pres. Eisenhower also pronounced it 'nu-ku-lar'...

Posted by: Kip Watson at January 8, 2006 11:02 PM

Really? The correct pronunciation is 'nu-clear'? It might be a Chicago-area thing, but I've never heard it pronounced other than 'nu-ku-ler' - even by the nuclear engineer who lived down the hall from me and several members of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. I always thought the Kosites' venom flowed because Bush pronounced it 'nu-ku-lar', ie with a short 'a' instead of a short 'e'. Silly me.

Posted by: LRFD at January 9, 2006 7:09 AM

How then is it that GWB is regarded as a lesser intellect because he pronounces he word in question "nuk-u-lar" When failed politician, bankrupt peanut planter and traitor, the darling of the center-left, one Jimmah Cahtah, a nuclear engineer and past Officer in The Navy of the USA pronounces it exactly the same way in his pro-islamist diatribes on foreign soil.

Posted by: Gerry N at January 23, 2006 11:08 PM
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