Sounds Fascinating

Download or read book Sounds Fascinating written by J. C. Wells and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2016-09-22 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do you pronounce biopic, synod, and Breughel? - and why? Do our cake and archaic sound the same? Where does the stress go in stalagmite? What's odd about the word epergne? Pontcysyllte is obviously Welsh, but Penge is Welsh too! How cool is Caol in the Highlands of Scotland? What can Wesley's hymns tell us about sound change in English? How do people pronounce Wrocław in Poland? How can anyone manage to say Gdynia as just two syllables? Why is the village of Frith in the island of Montserrat usually pronounced as if spelt Frits? What embarrassing faux pas in English did a Russian conglomerate make? Should I bild a cubbard instead of building a cupboard? How should we capitalize an exclamation mark, and why might we need to? What's a depressor consonant? As a finale, the author writes a letter to his 16-year-old self.