Vowel Ignorance (caution, angry tone of voice)

Rather recently, I was in a tech support chat channel on IRC for a major corporation. The operators were actual employees that simultaniously filled both public relations and tech support for the company's products.

During a lull in the number of people needing help, one of the operators starts up a bit of trivia with the people hanging out in the chat room. The question pops up "What is the only word with no vowels in the english language?"

Half the room said something like "there are no words, not real ones", the other half just waited for the answer. Eventually the operator says "The word is rhythm."

Now, I and a few others tried to explain that Rhythm actually has two vowels, but only one of them is actually present in the written form of the word.

The operator, who was actually a supervisor and supposedly highly trained in public relations, started actually arguing with us. The fact is, she was quite simply wrong.

Here's the deal. A vowel is not a written letter. A vowel is a type of sound you make with your voice. Yes, the English vowels are A, E, I, O, and U. No those are not the only vowels. Y is sometimes used for a vowel. However, Y is never a constenant. Whenever Y is not a vowel, it is a semi-vowel (also known as a semi-consonant).

The reader of this rant might be thinking "but Y is not a vowel." Yes it is.

"No, it's not, Y is a consonant, and there's no such thing as a semi-vowel" Yes there is, stop arguing you ignorant child.

Look, it's REALLY quite simple. In the word "fly" for instance. Now, lets look at this word...

F... that makes an F sound... L, that makes an L sound... What about the Y? Try to pronounce that without making a long "i" sound such as the word "eye". Hmm... Now, if I recall, the long "i" sound is a FREAKING VOWEL.

"But it's not written with an i, it's written with a y". Big freaking deal. Do we speak in letters? NO! Do we write before we speak? NO! Sounds do not represent the written word. Rather, the written word represents sounds.

"Even if, hypothetically speaking (and it's not how things are), "Y" is used as a vowel sometimes, the word "rythm" only has one vowel and none of the other letters are ever used as a vowel." *cough* Ok, you just earned yourself a stooge slap.

In Czeck-Slovak languages, the letter R is used as a vowel. But barring other languages the English word of "rhythm" does in fact have more than one vowel.

The word is pronounced Rihh-thehm or Rihh-thihm. It does not matter that the second vowel is not written, when you SPEAK the word, the vowel is infact there.

To finish, I am sick of people who either do not pay attention during grammar in school and teachers who are ignorant of the subject they presume to teach.

Lastly, "rhythm" is the only word I know of in the English language where the written form does actually leaves out a vowel from one of its syllables.

Anyone who dares argue the point needs to go back to school and do their freaking research before spreading ignorant filth.

The major corporation I work for has an internal newsgroup called language.nitpick. It's the place for ultimate gramatical pedantry, and it's a lot of fun.

Well, I think it's a lot of fun. YMMV.

Well I hope you feel better now it's of your chest I'll make it even better and support you: you're right! The definition of a vowel is indeed based on sound and sound alone. How it's written doesn't matter. That's only representation.

Yes, I always think of 'y' as an honorary vowel.

However, I take issue with you that the word rhythm has two vowels. the combination 'thm' is correctly pronounced with no intervening sound between the 'th' and the 'm'. To say 'rhythum' is to me a mispronunciation.

Mind you, if you are American, this might be another example of trans-Atlantic variation.

I *love* pedantry!

You really get your knickers in a twist over this stuff?

(although it was interesting to read I'll grant it that )

* Waits for misguided anti age-play rants to begin*

When I was a schoolboy (some centuries ago), we were always taught that the vowels were "A, E, I, O, U, and sometimes Y."

P2

You are correct, in North American usage, there is a more open vowel sound after the vocal 'th'. In IPA:

ˌrɪðəm

If Unicode does not work, oh well.

I completely agree with the parent post. English (ænglisc; Englyssche; Ynglyche?) as expressed in Roman conventions, quite often has nothing to do with the letters -- and saying that a word has no vowels because it is not spelled with any, is foolish. Especially when you consider that standardised spelling is a relatively recent notion. A glance at any dictionary with decent etymology will reveal just how inadequate the twenty-six letter alphabet is.

When Shaw died, he left behind a wish for an alphabet to replace Roman English, and left a large sum of future royalty money in his will toward the development and awareness of what would become this new form of spelling. Unfortunately, his wishes were never fully granted (in a legal tangle that diverted what would become a substantial fortune to the estate, instead), but the alphabet was designed. In it, there are around 40 distinct letters, one for each of the most common sounds in the English language. There were around a dozen different vowels! When using that alphabet, you literally do speak the letters, for there is a glyph for every sound.