"ough" sounds....

[Hammster]

Ok, the A vs An thread got me to thinking about the "ough" sound.

Why is Cough pronounced "Koff"?
Why is Bough pronounced "Bow"?
Why is Through pronounced "Threw"?
Why is Rough pronounced "Ruff"?

Yes English (or American style English) is a strange and wonderful language. :D

I think I really know the answer, but maybe one of the language buffs can chime in.

TIA.

[Gumbeaux]

I think I really know the answer, but maybe one of the language buffs can chime in.

TIA.

Long story, made short with oversimplication. We identify words not just by how they sound when spoken but also how they look visually when written. There's a finite number of sounds that can be easily enunciated in English. For that reason there are some words with duplicate sounds, with different spellings, that have different meanings.

Example:

"Threw the pipe" and "Through the pipe" mean entirely different things even though threw and through are pronounced the same.


Words that sound alike but that are spelled differently (homophones) are a common source of improper word usage. Especially on the internet!

Example: "Your" used in place of "you're".

[Hammster]

I wonder why words that end in the same 4 letters, "ough", are pronounced so differently. The speech examples I gave were just to show phonetically how each word sounds when pronounced.

My question is why aren't through, cough, bough and rough all pronounced the same? They have the same last 4 letters. And you gave a 5th example in your answer. The word "though". Why are they all pronounced differently?

[Meganator]

I don't really know, but I'm eagerly awaiting someone to enlighten me!

[Gumbeaux]

If you spell "cough" like it sounds -"coff", then people who cough would be spelled "coffers" which is another word with a different meaning. Sometimes when you try to correct something in one area in causes problems in other areas.

[Meganator]

If you spell "cough" like it sounds -"coff", then people who cough would be spelled "coffers" which is already another word. Sometimes when you try to correct something in one area in causes problems in other areas.

But is that really the original reason we pronounce the "ough" words all differently? As you stated in your previous post, there are many words that are pronounced the same; we know the difference by the context, ususally.

[Gumbeaux]

But is that really the original reason we pronounce the "ough" words all differently? As you stated in your previous post, there are many words that are pronounced the same; we know the difference by the context, ususally.

We know the difference between words by context and by how they are spelled.

It's kinda like silent letters. If the letter used in a word is silent why does it need to be there? It is usually there partly due to usage tradition and party to make the word look different than another words in use.

[Hammster]

Ok, I'll say what I think the reason is. I think they are pronounced differently because they are derived from words with different pronunciations. A quick check at www.m-w.com confirmed this.
But it sure makes for a hard time for an ESL person learning English to see 5 words all ending in the same ough letters and all pronounced differently. We do have a tough language.

When I was in Thailand, well over 20 years ago, I went into a jewelry store and the people at the store sat me down, gave me a coke (free!!) and asked me all about the ough words. Wow was that a tough lesson, for them and me. LOL. I guess the Coke wasn't really free huh??

Of course I bought some jewelry too. :D

[leebee]

There isn't a "rule" to fall back on here. They are irregular words. English is made up of words from many, many sources. This one has Germanic roots, that one is from Middle English, and on and on. So not all words with the "ough" combo in them rooted from the same source. Some are spelled to appear like the original word looked or sounded, and it goes on and on. If you look at early English (not just American) language lessons, these words are usually taught by rote, that is, memorized, because you can't just "sound them out." English is so complicated!

[Gumbeaux]

There isn't a "rule" to fall back on here.

True, there isn't really a "grammar board" composed of English majors that decides what new words we will use and how they are to be spelled or used. Most words just "evolve". One such word that I hate is the word "snuck", which used to be a non standard form of the word "sneak". "Snuck" has been used so much that it has now become standard.

[dogzncats]

having a weird kind of afternoon, so...

--bough comes to us from "Middle English, orig. from Old English (PIE root bhaghu-)"

--cough comes to us from "Middle English coughen, ultimately of imitative origin"

--enough comes to us from "Middle English enogh, from Old English genog (PIE root -nek)

--though comes to us from "Middle English, of Scandinavian origin. (PIE root to-)

--through comes to us from "Middle English thurh, through, from Old English thurh. (PIE root -tere)"

I'm using the 4th ed. of the American Heritage Dictonary, which includes an appendix of Proto-Indo-European roots.

cynthia (wickedly noting that we've skipped words like "ought," which add yet another sound to the OUGH spelling weirdness)

[Hammster]

having a weird kind of afternoon, so...

--bough comes to us from "Middle English, orig. from Old English (PIE root bhaghu-)"

--cough comes to us from "Middle English coughen, ultimately of imitative origin"

--enough comes to us from "Middle English enogh, from Old English genog (PIE root -nek)

--though comes to us from "Middle English, of Scandinavian origin. (PIE root to-)

--through comes to us from "Middle English thurh, through, from Old English thurh. (PIE root -tere)"

I'm using the 4th ed. of the American Heritage Dictonary, which includes an appendix of Proto-Indo-European roots.

cynthia (wickedly noting that we've skipped words like "ought," which add yet another sound to the OUGH spelling weirdness)

at www.m-w.com.

[newtricks]

Hammster -
A great book about this is Bill Bryson's The Mother Tongue. English and How It Got That Way.. It's full of examples like this and very funny.

[Hammster]

I may just look for that book. I'm not an English major or anything like that. But I do find our language interesting and funny at the same time. :D

[honeygirl1971]

The same thing happens in most modern languages, even in French where there actually IS a group of people who decide which new words will be adopted and how they will be spelled. As many have said, it happens largely because words come from different sources, but also because of pronunciation trends, regional dialects, and so on. When lexicographers like Noah Webster tried to standardize American English, they had to make choices, and necessarily some of them ended up being pretty arbitrary.

[cherylopal]

you might enjoy this book. it's been on my to read list for a while. i read another of his that said the word ""was" really was pronounced as if you said the a sound in cat the s like an s. i told that story to my first graders! :D

well i tried to copy a pic of the book but couldn't so

the mother tongue by bill bryson

[Canice]

Most words just "evolve". One such word that I hate is the word "snuck", which used to be a non standard form of the word "sneak". "Snuck" has been used so much that it has now become standard.

Grrrr! Don't even get me started on that non-word! How old is it, 10 years? I'm not terribly ancient, yet I grew up with the past tense of sneak being "sneaked" -- what is "snuck"? Seems to have come into use around the time people decided "further" sounded more erudite than "farther" - no matter which word was correct. :rolleyes:

[Canice]

I used to lead historic walking tours of my neighborhood, and always stopped on the stairs of a park across the way. I would recite this bit of 19th century doggerel, there at the corner of Sacramento and Gough streets:

As if my life weren't trying enough,
I have to live on a street spelled Gough.

I just can't see the reason, though;
Why not pronounce it simply Gough?

And if slough is slough to rhyme with through,
Why the deuce can't I say Gough?

Or if you're saying plough and bough,
What's wrong with just plain Gough?

You can lead a horse to the watering trough,
but you can't make him drink--
And I WON'T say Gough!

[cherylopal]

how would you pronouce this??

phoch

or

ghoch


(i think i got that right??- everytime i take a class on teaching phonics this is shown.)

[cherylopal]

fish!

for the first one:
ph for the f sound
i sound is from the o in women
sh sound is from the ch in champagne

and the second:
gh is from laughter

[ellielk]

When I was in high school, a couple of us decided to use 'alternate' phonetic spellings such as the examples for fish. It drove some of our teachers nuts but other's thought we were quite clever. :D

[Aubergine]

cynthia (wickedly noting that we've skipped words like "ought," which add yet another sound to the OUGH spelling weirdness)

yes, and i've been through this one a few years back. "ough" yields a minimum of 6 pronunciations in [Standard) American English, and isn't it fun?

honeygirl mentioned French, and that was interesting to me, because, when one looks at a French word (as opposed to the many borrowed from elsewhere, like 'le weekend'), there really is no doubt about how it is to be pronounced. this is one reason that, for centuries, French has been the language of diplomacy; it is so rigorously precise, in terms of spelling, verb tenses, person-noun-verb-gender-plural agreements, etc., bar none. (among the common western languages that i've studied.)

[knunes]

Don't forget "hiccough", alternate spelling of hiccup, but same pronunciation! Go figure!
I totally agree that these are an ESL student's nightmare!

[Canice]

yes, and i've been through this one a few years back. "ough" yields a minimum of 6 pronunciations in [Standard) American English, and isn't it fun?

honeygirl mentioned French, and that was interesting to me, because, when one looks at a French word (as opposed to the many borrowed from elsewhere, like 'le weekend'), there really is no doubt about how it is to be pronounced. this is one reason that, for centuries, French has been the language of diplomacy; it is so rigorously precise, in terms of spelling, verb tenses, person-noun-verb-gender-plural agreements, etc., bar none. (among the common western languages that i've studied.)


Those same traits were a welcome surprise to me when I first started studying Italian - with the added plus that 99% of the time you know a noun's gender without seeing a definite article. Although there is an Italian word for spelling ("ortografia"), I've never heard an Italian use it because spelling isn't an issue in that language. Usually they say "lo spelling" :p

[honeygirl1971]

yes, and i've been through this one a few years back. "ough" yields a minimum of 6 pronunciations in [Standard) American English, and isn't it fun?

honeygirl mentioned French, and that was interesting to me, because, when one looks at a French word (as opposed to the many borrowed from elsewhere, like 'le weekend'), there really is no doubt about how it is to be pronounced. this is one reason that, for centuries, French has been the language of diplomacy; it is so rigorously precise, in terms of spelling, verb tenses, person-noun-verb-gender-plural agreements, etc., bar none. (among the common western languages that i've studied.)

Not true!!!! I am amazed on a daily basis at the exceptions I find to "rules" that seem inflexible. To cite a really simple example, usually a T at the end of a word that is not followed by an E is not pronounced. So the word "pot" is pronounced "poe," not "pott." I find exceptions to this rule, and to other standard pronunciation rules, frequently, and in words that are not of "foreign" origin, like the word "Lot" (pronounced "Lott"), a department in the south of France. And agreement is not free from exceptions either. Usually the article, adjective, and noun all agree in number, but if you are using the indefinite plural article and the adjective precedes the noun, you drop the "s" from the article: "De vieux monuments." And the more you learn about grammar rules, the more exceptions you find! There's a reason Le bon usage, the French grammar standard par excellence, is almost 2000 pages! Reading it is an eye-opening experience, just like reading the Chicago Manual of Style is! French, like English, is a language with multiple origins--Latin, the germanic language of the Franks that conquered the north, and the regional languages such as langue d'oc, langue d'oil, and provençal, just to name a few. Even with an official body standardizing the language as much as possible, the language still shows its varied origins and influences.

[Aubergine]

honeygirl, since you are currently living in france and i have not for many years, i certainly cede. neanmoins, i take issue with a couple of points, but it's not appropriate to debate them further here. d'ac? :)