goldenecho Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Quick pronunciation survey - what state (or country if not in the US) are you in, and how do you pronounce milk? Is it with short i sound (rhyming with silk), or with short e sound like melk (rhyming with elk). Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alisoncooks Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 (edited) Third option: southern/NC, almost-2-syllable pronunciation of meee-ulk. 😂 (I rhyme it with silk, fyi.) Edited February 26, 2023 by alisoncooks 1 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
historically accurate Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Illinois/Wisconsin border area: milk rhymes with silk. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spryte Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Mid-Atlantic and Southwest. Rhymes with silk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spryte Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 3 minutes ago, alisoncooks said: Third option: southern/NC, almost-2-syllable pronunciation of meee-ulk. 😂 (I rhyme it with silk, fyi.) That’s the other pronunciation that came to mind here, too! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pawz4me Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 9 minutes ago, alisoncooks said: Third option: southern/NC, almost-2-syllable pronunciation of meee-ulk. 😂 I think I rhyme it with silk, but I probably say it more like ^this.^ LOL 1 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mom31257 Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 I'm in GA and grew up in TN. I pronounce it rhyming with silk. My dh grew up in southern Ohio and rhymes it with silk. My best friend and I just had this discussion last weekend! She grew up in Chicago and moved to the south in her teen years. She rhymes it with elk. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MercyA Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Indiana, milk often rhymes with "elk" here. We also say "ornch juice." 🙂 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barnwife Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 It definitely, 100% rhymes with silk. The "melk" pronunciation absolutely grates on me ears. It's worse than nails on a chalkboard for me. I know it's normal in places, but anytime I heard someone say it "melk" I absolutely correct it mentally. (Note: I'd never do so aloud.) 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Indigo Blue Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Southern NC. I actually pronounce it with one syllable, rhyming with silk! Lots of people say mee-ilk around here, though. Dh says bank as a two syllable word. His accent is strong. Our two sons have a milder accent. I have a medium-ish accent, but I DO say milk with one syllable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Katy Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Rhymes with Silk. Grew up in rural North Florida with a thick Southern accent but my mom was from the Midwest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AmandaVT Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 New England (have lived in both southern and northern) rhymes with silk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drama Llama Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 So, if someone's accent means that they pronounce milk differently, wouldn't they pronounce silk differently too? It seems like they would still rhyme. 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rebcoola Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 PNW and it rhymes with Silk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maize Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 (edited) 14 hours ago, BandH said: So, if someone's accent means that they pronounce milk differently, wouldn't they pronounce silk differently too? It seems like they would still rhyme. Not necessarily. Milk is much more of an everyday word, and those tend to be more prone to local variants and shifts. Language is primarily oral, we talk the way others around us talk. But words we don't hear often may not get pronounced with as much of the local color because they might be more familiar from print. In addition, si could trend in a different direction fro mi. Apparently melk is becoming more common in Canada as part of an overall vowel shift trend, I found several articles calling it "the great Canadian Vowel shift." The original Great Vowel Shift was responsible for quite a lot of the poor mapping of standardized English spellings to modern pronunciation: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Vowel_Shift#:~:text=The first phase of the,%2Fiː uː%2F became diphthongs. Edited February 26, 2023 by maize 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KungFuPanda Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 15 minutes ago, BandH said: So, if someone's accent means that they pronounce milk differently, wouldn't they pronounce silk differently too? It seems like they would still rhyme. This is an excellent point. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScoutTN Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 52 minutes ago, alisoncooks said: Third option: southern/NC, almost-2-syllable pronunciation of meee-ulk. 😂 (I rhyme it with silk, fyi.) This! Middle TN. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twovetteslater Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 South-central Iowa: milk rhymes with silk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mom2scouts Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Ohio. Probably closer to rhyming with elk here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kalmia Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Maine: Milk with a short "I" rhyming with silk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 1 hour ago, alisoncooks said: Third option: southern/NC, almost-2-syllable pronunciation of meee-ulk. 😂 (I rhyme it with silk, fyi.) Same way though my husband and I were from Asia. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melissa Louise Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Australia, short i sound. I think there are a couple of states here where the short i might have more of a hint of the short e. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Harriet Vane Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 1 hour ago, MercyA said: Indiana, milk often rhymes with "elk" here. We also say "ornch juice." 🙂 Chicagoan here. Same. Remembering back to my little sister, who persisted for many, many years to call it: "nelk." 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amethyst Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Milk rhymes with silk. Pennsylvanai Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ann.without.an.e Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Terabith Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Southwest Virginia, but grew up in West Tennessee. Milk rhymes with silk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKS Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 West coast. Milk rhymes with ilk, bilk, and silk. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eagleynne Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Southwest Indiana here. Milk rhymes with silk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kidlit Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 2 hours ago, Pawz4me said: I think I rhyme it with silk, but I probably say it more like ^this.^ LOL Two-syllable Alabamian here, though I hear it as rhyming with silk. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jean in Newcastle Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Milk, ilk and silk all have a short i sound. I did not grow up in the US and my parents came from different regions of the US. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Laura Corin Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Southern England. Silk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elizabeth86 Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 2 hours ago, MercyA said: Indiana, milk often rhymes with "elk" here. We also say "ornch juice." 🙂 Strange. We live in the south and I say milk that rhymes with silk. Dh does too even though his people are from up north. Now, for whatever reason all 4 of my kids say milk that rhymes with elk. No idea why. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lady Florida. Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Rhymes with silk, central Florida. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
knitgrl Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 (edited) 2 hours ago, Ann.without.an.e said: I was going to waste so much time looking this video up. Thanks for doing that for me. 😆 Edited February 26, 2023 by knitgrl 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prairiewindmomma Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 I say milk/silk but most of my extended family says milk/elk. It’s a generational divide, I think, in the Plains state community I grew up in. You can pretty much guarantee that the elk crowd will also say: ”crick” for creek, “warsh” for wash and a few other things There are also some distinct phrases that you can sometimes still hear in the hollers of Appalachia that tie back to older English phrases like “of a morning” that are fairly unique to my home region. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
knitgrl Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 WNY here. Milk rhymes with silk. But my father says "cherry" kind of more like "churry," which I suspect might be more of a generational/upbringing thing, as his parents were older when they had him. His mother pronounced it like that, too. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fraidycat Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Canadian prairies. Short i, rhymes with silk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KidsHappen Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Middle TN. I say milk like silk. I have lived all over the country and I don't think I have ever noticed anyone pronouncing it any other way. I have heard young children kind of stretch out the i so it is more like miiilk. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ann.without.an.e Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 3 hours ago, knitgrl said: I was going to waste so much time looking this video up. Thanks for doing that for me. 😆 It’s all I could think about when I saw the title 😂 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MercyA Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 (edited) . Edited March 11, 2023 by MercyA 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maize Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 (edited) Anyone who dislikes linguistic shifts and feels words should stay the same and be pronounced the "right" way should be pleased to know that "melk" is just a return to "milk"'s roots, throwing off the new-fangled short i pronunciation (such an abhorrent innovation, kids these days...at least the Dutch kept saying it properly 😁) Edited February 26, 2023 by maize 5 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stephanier.1765 Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Silk, North Florida. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GailV Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 (edited) Northern Indiana growing up, I rhyme it with "silk". Mom grew up in southern Indiana and had quite a few Appalachian throw backs, but I suspect she concentrated on getting rid of them. Lord knows I developed a habit of using subjunctive tense from her ("if I *were*"), which I imagine wasn't standard issue in rural southern Indiana. Dh (St Louis) also rhymes it with "silk" but his sister is die-hard "melk" Dh's family is also likely to say "warsh", "farty"(40). I can really hear generational shifts in that family in pronunciations and usage. Edited February 26, 2023 by GailV 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kirstenhill Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Minnesota.... Rhymes with elk for me. I pronounce all the other "ilk" words like silk with the expected short i. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Myra Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Upstate NY: Milk rhyming with elk here. pronounce all the other "ilk" words like silk with the expected short i. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lady Florida. Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 (edited) 1 hour ago, GailV said: I can really hear generational shifts Re generational shifts in accents: One of my maternal grandparents grew up in Brooklyn the other in the Bronx. Both were children of Italian immigrants. My grandfather said woik (work) and joik (jerk), my grandmother said burl for boil, winder for window. She could not pronounce the oi sound and had a friend named Joyce she called Jerce. If you've ever seen All in the Family they sounded like Archie and Edith. Those are both accents that are pretty much gone from Brooklyn and the Bronx. I don't think you hear them anymore from anyone except the very old. Edited February 26, 2023 by Lady Florida. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SKL Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Great lakes. Milk rhymes with silk. BUT, when I was a little kid, a lot of kids called it melk. Possibly including us. I don't know why. Maybe we had some friends or relatives who grew up elsewhere. Or maybe "ilk" is harder for little kids to say. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 (edited) @maize my kids use the german pronunciation as well sometimes since they took German classes from kindergarten age. Edited February 26, 2023 by Arcadia 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SquirrellyMama Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 I have lived in S. Illinois and Central Iowa. I pronounce it both ways: milk (silk) and melk. I also do this with other words. Maybe, because I learned to read and speak in S. Illinois, but have lived most of my life in Central Iowa. There is a definite pronunciation difference between the two areas. Kelly Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted February 26, 2023 Share Posted February 26, 2023 Mid-Atlantic; short i prononciation. However, there are regional dialects that include the “melk” pronunciation. My FOO did use many of them but I changed my speech as an adult and dropped the Baltimore/Eastern Shore words. Some of these were: “warsh” for wash; “wooder” for water; and the ubiquitous exchange of a “d” sound for th - “Der” for there, “Dem” for them. I also de-regionalized “against” and “closet”. My dh’s family does not easily distinguish the sounds of short e and short i; they don’t seem to have phonemic awareness of the difference. One sibling’s name has a short i sound in it but they all (and now me by extension) pronounce it as if it were an e. So (this is not the name) but if it were Kristen and they all pronounced it like “Kresten”. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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