I’ve been writing about Poland (again) and Polish, noting how the language – for all its intimidating obsession with consonants – has a consistency that is a boon to foreigners who try to speak it. Every letter in a Polish word has a purpose, and it doesn’t change from word to word. You may not be capable of pronouncing a word like ‘upwards’ – wzwyz – but at least you know how it should be pronounced (by people raised without fear of alphabet-ending consonant clots).
English is not so accommodating. Rough and dough. Sometimes the pronunciation of a word changes depending on how it’s used in a sentence. This morning on the radio I heard a man – clearly not a native English speaker – use ‘attribute’ as a noun (with the accent on the first syllable) when it was obvious from the sentence that he wanted to use it – that he was using it, despite its refusal to comply – as a verb (with the accent on the second). Unless you consult a dictionary, there is no way to know that the word has different pronunciations for its different identities. You have to live amongst people who say ‘attribute’ and ‘attribute’ a lot. My heart goes out to learners of English.
