Pronunciation III

And while we're at it...

What do you put cut flowers in?

Where I grew up, we put them in a "vase," which rhymed with "face." Recently, which is to say in the last seven years or so, I have heard more and more people calling that thing a "vahz." Where I grew up, we found all that there fake French stuff mighty pretentious.

However, it has crossed my mind that perhaps "vase" is another word that's pronounced differently here. In fact, I started wondering if it's another word with regional pronunciations in the U.S. (Not much happening on the roof; lots of thinking time.)

Yes, Virginia, what you call the "vase" Santa brought you may vary throughout the U.S., according to dictionary.com. Apparently you can rhyme "vase" not only with "face" but with "phase" as well as "paws." We Oklahoma hicks need to get off our high horses about faux French things.

For "vase," the Canadian dictionary (not online) lists two variations of pronunciation--one with the "a" sounding like that of "barn" and one with the "a" sounding like that of "hot." In both pronunciations, the "s" sounds like a "z."

And how did you mentally pronounce that "z"? Aha! That's a "zed" on this side of the border! What I find most interesting about this pronunciation is that they still sing the alphabet song, and in spite of singing about "gee," "pee," and "vee," not to mention going on to sing "Now I've said my A-B 'sees.' Next time won't you sing with 'meeeee,'" they don't feel the need to rhyme that last letter. They happily sing "double-you, ecks, wye, and zed."

To me, that's just silly. But what do I know. I rhyme "route" with "doubt."