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Is it a 'hooper' swan or a 'wooper' swan? (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Guizotia
- Start date
I´m with you on this one, David. There are three, yes three, initial sounds being debated.../w/, /h/, and /wh/. The last is how it´s spelled (spelt?) and how it´s pronounced insofar as I´ve ever heard here. But there are varieties of English accent, curiously closest to "Standard" SE-England English, that seem to always substitute the first or second sound for the third. No idea why. Surely one "woos" a lady, jumps through "hoops", and hears the "whoosh" of a passing train.....and all three words have different initial sounds? SE-England folk...try pursing your lips as if to kiss, leaving them slightly open. Then vibrate your vocal chords and blow gently at the same time....there you go! You can do it! Now say "-ooper" at the end, and By Jove, You´ve Got It! "Whooper"!!! Well done.:t:
Barred Wobbler
Well-known member
You've never stood next to me in any of the previous 40-odd winters that I've been seeing them round here.
Actually, I've checked my dictionary and both pronunciations are valid. (Hooper still makes my teeth go on edge, nevertheless).
Docmartin
Thought Police
Guizotia
Well-known member
Oh now I'm confused... so there's three options?
Whooper = WOOper
Whooper = HOOper
and
Whooper = h'WOOper
?
If it started as h'WOOper then I can see it would easily degrade into the other two forms.
While = Wile
Whole = Hole
Both might have started as h'Wile and h'Wole (that second one doesn't sound right!).
Anyway, from this thread HOOper seems to be the most common in current usage, so I'll use that...
Cheers :t:
dantheman
Bah humbug
Guizotia
Well-known member
No one actually says "Boo-icks" do they? :eek!:
Richard Klim
-------------------------
Bit late... only just noticed this thread, but 'hwooper' (approximately - strong h, weak w) gets my vote.
Richard
Richard
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No, probably not. I was kind of thinking of the American Car of similar name.
ColinD
Well-known member
It never is pronounced anything other than hoo. If it was meant to be pronounced as "wooper" it would be spelt wooper, NOT whooper. It's the same with ph, always pronounced with an "f" sound as in photography. Nobody ever says p-hotography.
When you try to put bird calls into words, you can come up with a wide variety of words, and the call probably varies from individual to individual (bird).
Farnboro John
Well-known member
The correct pronunciation is "Hooper" but I often refer to them as "Whoppers" because they are!
John
Farnboro John
Well-known member
If you listen to Flanders and Swann's Drop of a Hat LP you will find "who" pronounced w-hoo as part of a joke song about pronunciation centred around how to say "Gnu".
Nothing new under the sun I guess.
John
robinm
Registered User
I'd forgotten that one - very clever writers F & S.
At the end of the day does it really matter how Whooper is pronounced as long as we understand each other?
No, it doesn´t. And it´s nonsense to speak, in the case of English, in terms of "correct" pronounciation or usage, as there has never been an official body prescribing on same (like the Academie Francaise or the Real Academia). It is precisely because of its flexibility, adaptability and the acceptance of same that English has become such a powerful means of international communication. So far, we´ve uncovered three accepted pronounciations of "wh". (Mind you, my one´s the Best......
)bobthebirder
Well-known member
The Oxford/BBC/"received" pronunciation of "whoop" and its derivatives was "hoop", so everything else is by definition a dialect!
(There, that should start a few wars!)
Let's just be thankful no bird has "lieutenant" in its name.
(There, that should start a few wars!
)Let's just be thankful no bird has "lieutenant" in its name.
Barred Wobbler
Well-known member
The Oxford/BBC/"received" pronunciation of "whoop" and its derivatives was "hoop", so everything else is by definition a dialect!
(There, that should start a few wars!
Let's just be thankful no bird has "lieutenant" in its name.
Lieutenant Pigeon did. Mouldy Old Dough.
Johnny Allan
Dip or Glory
I've always called them "wooper" Swans myself but the Concise Oxford Dictionary suggests both ways are ok so there is no right and no wrong ?
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gmax
Sontium Dweller
_____________________________
Whoop:
Pronunciation: /w-/ /h-/ or /hw-/ /wuːp/, /hu/
Etymology: From Middle English whopen, to whoop, variant of hopen, from Old French hopper, of imitative origin/onomatopoeic, meaning a cry (of joy)
Which leaves where you started :smoke: ... one thing is not clear though: "of imitative origin" ... imitative of what?
For example as in whoop·ee cush·ion / ˈwoŏpē / (also whoop·ie cush·ion ) • n. a rubber cushion that makes a sound like a fart when someone sits on it :-O [from The Oxford Pocket Dictionary of Current English]
Possibly a corruption of:
Whip:
Etymology: from Middle English hwippen or whippen. Middle low German and Middle Dutch wippen (“‘to move quickly’”), Possibly from a Proto-Germanic *wip, although such word has not yet been found written.
This meaning fits quite well ....
Pronunciation: it is usually pronounced: /wɪp/
Whoop:
Pronunciation: /w-/ /h-/ or /hw-/ /wuːp/, /hu
/Etymology: From Middle English whopen, to whoop, variant of hopen, from Old French hopper, of imitative origin/onomatopoeic, meaning a cry (of joy)
Which leaves where you started :smoke: ... one thing is not clear though: "of imitative origin" ... imitative of what?
For example as in whoop·ee cush·ion / ˈwoŏpē / (also whoop·ie cush·ion ) • n. a rubber cushion that makes a sound like a fart when someone sits on it :-O [from The Oxford Pocket Dictionary of Current English]
Possibly a corruption of:
Whip:
Etymology: from Middle English hwippen or whippen. Middle low German and Middle Dutch wippen (“‘to move quickly’”), Possibly from a Proto-Germanic *wip, although such word has not yet been found written.
This meaning fits quite well ....
Pronunciation: it is usually pronounced: /wɪp/
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