PET PEEVE

  By definition, a ‘Pet Peeve’ is something one finds particularly annoying. I didn’t think I had a pet peeve but thought about it for a while and there is one thing that annoys the hell out of me. That is; people who pronounce the state name, Missouri with a long (ē) ending and ridicule others who learned to drop the (ē) and substitute (uh), “Missour-uh”. It is the self righteous ridicule that annoys me, not the pronunciation.

I am a writer and when I write I follow certain rules with an appropriate dispensation for creative license. When formality is required, the rules of grammar and syntax are clear. Writing the word “Colonel” is one thing, misspellings are bad news. But when spoken, an (r) sound comes out of nowhere. “Kernel” is another word that is spelled different but pronounced the same, but a single seed has no reference to a military officer. I know many native Mississippians who pronounce the name of their state, “Miss-ippi” a convenient shortcut and nobody takes them to task for it. 

Children frame their language from their role model’s accent, phrasing and vocabulary. Before they can read and write, their spoken language has no rules, it just has to work. The oral tradition has only one measure; is the message received the intended message? Urban street slang is almost another language but you seldom if ever see it in print. English is unforgiving once it is on the page. The spoken word doesn't leave any tracks and, if it doesn't conform to rules for writing, it can be easily forgiven. Even then, language is a dynamic construct, constantly evolving, changing, adding new words. Being gay in 1950 was not the same as being gay in 2020. The word ‘Bad’ used to mean just that, bad. But now it can mean; really good. 

When I was a little kid we lived in Missour-uh and when we spoke, nobody mistook it for some other place. When we put the return address on envelopes it was spelled, Missouri. Writing vs. Speaking, they use the same language but do not dance to the same tune; different cats from the same litter. But all this ranting only gets us to the fundamental issue. Missour-uh people don’t care, they never raise the argument. The wannabe intellects use a spelling gimmick to fake a higher IQ or to gain altitude in the pecking order. It is a condescending insult agains someone they consider to be inferior, and use the Mississippi precedent (ends with an (i) and the (ē) sound) to make their case. It is an insult; it may be subtle but an insult none the less. 

Somewhere in the argument the baiter will introduce the word, ‘Wrong’. “You are just wrong!” It has always been about right and wrong. There is a big difference between (Correct-Incorrect) and (Right-Wrong). In the first case the point is about whether or not there is an error. But (Right) expands linguistically into righteous which has moral consequence and (Wrong) is defined first as an immoral or unjust act and then, as they can be interchanged synonymously, intent is easy to identify. Context, body language and tone speak clearly to the intent; well intended correction or smug judgment.  

Formal writing has well defined rules for everything but they do not apply to creative writing, where wiggle room (creative license) allows for coloring outside the lines. Verbal communication only has one rule, it has to work. It allows for a wide range of cultural influence (accent & vernacular) and intentional anomalies. For someone to stand up in front of others and tell anyone 'Missour-uh' is wrong, is both stupid and wrong in itself. Certainly it is different but wrong? Take, ’aluminium’; in the King’s English they change the accents, add a vowel to give it five syllables (āl-ū-mīn-ī-ūm). North America is the only place in the world that doesn’t. Is someone wrong here?

I have not researched it thoroughly but I read it somewhere, once upon a time: In the early 1800’s, backwoods settlers from Kentucky were the first Americans to venture west across the Mississippi into present day Missouri. (Daniel Boone, etc.) Their pedigree and backwoods ways were deemed inferior and undesirable by the elite French culture around and south of St. Louis. It has been suggested that (Missour-uh speak) came west with the Kentuckians. They also dropped the letter (y) from Kentucky all together and it works. No less, it is generally agreed that the boundary between Eastern and Western Culture in this country is somewhere between St. Louis and Columbia, MO. Times change but some things don’t. That Eastern sense of patronizing, snobbery can still be found, especially in Greek organizations on college campuses all over the state. It would not be a far stretch to make that comparison; wanting to prove oneself superior to uncultured, wrong spoken, backwoods ne’er-do-wells. But I am an uncultured, backwoods, . . . and my pet peeve is self righteous, wannabe experts who make up rules as they go.