my wife’s little sister did put on an affectation and call her mom “mum” for a good few years because of some cultural phenomenon i’m too old for. perhaps related…
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This is interesting because it’s a true discussion about not just what people say but also what people hear. It is nice to sit back and not have any dogs in the race.
Or should that be dugs?
Absolutely perfect jokes aside - an actual question just to make things more interesting. It’s clear there’s a difference with the word mom, but is there a difference with the word mother?
Unless this is some weird new youth subculture thing
I live in Santa Monica and am dealing with all sorts of people on the daily and no one says mome. 
I also had family in the south that calls them Nintennuh Tapes
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Look at that:
It appeared on my youtube subscription feed. See I know nothing about it and now it’s everywhere!!
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The frequency illusion happens to me all the time like that, especially with terms. I remember hearing someone utter “zeitgeist” about a dozen years ago like it was some term I should be familiar with, then all the sudden I started hearing it everywhere.
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here in england’s west midlands we also say “mom” which is but one of the reasons i don’t bother with voice controls. accents are great! we shouldn’t homogenise the way people speak just because alexa can’t understand mild regional accents.
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general question for everyone: when using a loan word (such as croissant for the non-french), do you try to pronounce it correctly as it would be in the original language? or do you “dumb it down” for the the vox populi?
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I switched to “folks” as my generic inclusive group word a few years back.
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i wouldn’t use it myself but i always found j kenji lopez alt’s “guys, gals, and non-binary pals” to be pretty friendly
I never pronounce anything correctly in French - when they start doing it I will!!
I always try to pronounce it when I’m speaking to someone when it’s their native tongue, but sometimes go lazy and very phonetic if they don’t necessarily understand the word or accent.
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If I’m speaking French (not something I do well often or well) I’ll do my best to be understood, same goes for English. Which to me means just saying croissant like how my mom probably says it haha. I always cringe when people radically alter the way the say a non-English word in the midst of an English sentence (mostly because I used to do this because I thought it would sound like I was an authority on the subject.)
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Typically I go with the Anglicized pronunciation, because I’d rather come across as not being a snob rather than being smart. If both pronunciations are known I’ll go with the original.
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as for me, i’ll not only pronounce it incorrectly but also a good chance i’ll say the wrong word as well
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Me wearing a beret and riding a bicycle in the Burger King drive through at 7am: “Une sausage egg and cheese croissant-wich si vous plet!”
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People who do this while pausing before and after the word make me irrationally angry. What’s the break in speaking for? Are you expecting applause from me?
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Yeah! And what about the reverse? If we were speaking to someone for whom English was a second language would we be correcting them if they said a word from their own language just the way they’d say it? Like their own name?? I hope not!!
(I have witnessed this and it was not very cute imo.)
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If the word is properly loaned ie most english speakers understand and could use it in everyday conversation then yes it is now an “english” word and should be pronounced per public opinion (like croissant with the T).
If it a word you are using a single time or is rarely used in typical english then you would keep the original pronunciation. I’m an architect and we may say something like brise soleil and pronounce it in french way (or how we undersatnd a french person would pronounce it).
Some words are on the periphery. Quesadilla is not strictly pronounced in the Spanish way but the LL as a Y is maintained. If you don’t you’re even seen as a rube.
English is cool! and weird
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Honestly knowing the US like I do, and knowing the English language like I do, I’m forever shocked that quesadilla and other food-related terms made it into popular use so easily and completely. I wouldn’t have been shocked in the slightest if either the pronunciation or the word itself had been mangled completely in bringing it to the Taco Bell set in the 60’s and 70’s.
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I split the difference. With croissant I’ll often include the [r] when ordering because otherwise 50% of the time I get, “Huh?” and they’re thinking, “Kwasaw?” But I will be close on the second vowel and omit or nearly swallow the [nt].
But you could probably catch me in a hyperforeignism, where I overcompensate for what I think is the pronunciation pattern. At this point, forte is often pronounced with an “ay” at the end, even though that’s the Italian and not the French pattern; do I say “fortay” to be clear to English speakers expecting Italian, or “fort” to be pedantic and have to answer a, “Huh?” And people tend to omit the [s] sound in coup de grâce, even though that’s important to distinguish from gras; I insist on the [s], but I can imagine being corrected on that.
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