This meme is so old that I was 27 when I first read it.
This meme is so old that I was 27 when I first read it.
I’ll never understand why low res images like this always have half the text cropped off. I get why it’s done when they’re conveniently censoring something, but…ugh. :(
Yup. That phenomenon is called “analogical change”. The opposite happens too though! For example, “person” and “parson”.
Actuallyyy…
Goose comes from Old English, where they pluralized [go:s] (think “goes” with a soft S) by adding [iz] (like “ease”).
When saying [go:siz], it was kinda hard for the mouth to switch the vowels from the [o] to the [i] quickly, so to save themselves the trouble, they’d change the first vowel to make it a little more similar to the second, so [go:siz] became [ge:siz].
Then, that was too long, so they dropped the [z]. [ge:si] (think “guessy” but the “e” lasts a bit longer than usual).
Then, that was too long, so they dropped the [i]. [ge:s] (“guess” with that same drawn out “e”).
📯It’s the Great Vowel Shift!📯 Now, [go:s] and [ge:s] become [gu:s] and [gi:s]. Almost there!
The vowels become a tad short over time, and now, you have [gus] and [gis] which are written “goose” and “geese”.
But “MOOSE”? That’s Algonquin. It has nothing to do with all that noise. “But they sound the same and are written the same?!” So? Haven’t you heard? English orthography is a dumpster fire. Nobody knows what they’re doing. Not even the words.
Serious question: How is this different than all the other sensationalized headlines about some technology that’s gonna change everything, and then you later hear nothing about it?
I genuinely appreciate the technical breakdown. 💜
America. 🦅
I had to stop drinking milkshakes once I started counting calories because of this kind of thing. Like, I knew it was bad, but I didn’t know it was this bad. 😬