Mary was merry when she decided to marry
How do you pronounce “Mary,” “merry,” and “marry” in that sentence? Do all three sound different? Are two the same (and which ones), or are all the same?
According to this map, it depends where you live: only in Massachusetts, Long Island and Jersey are the three pronounced differently, there are a few spots where two are the same, but in most of the country they’re all the same.
The maps are much fun to study, and the site has a lot more for many different words. But this one (and some others) seems very wrong to me. I’m from New York, and New Yorkers say those three words differently from each other, take it from me. The distinctions may be somewhat subtle (and the vowel sounds trend somewhat toward the “eh” in “merry”), but the words do not sound the same. Nor do they sound the same in other parts of the country where I’ve lived, although they sound very different from the way New Yorkers say them.
But let’s not quibble (oh well, let’s). As I said, the maps are fun. This one (“what do you call it when rain falls while the sun is shining?”) brought back the word “sunshower” to me. I had forgotten that’s what we called that wonderful phenomenon in my youth.
And this one, about the name for a sweetened carbonated beverage, made me think of this old “tonic” post of mine. “Tonic” is the traditional New England term, but these maps don’t have “tonic” as a choice.
Wicked ignorant.
Come to think of it, though, I haven’t heard it referred to that way in a while, even in New England. Might the term have died out over time, like many other colorful regionalisms? Pity.
[Hat tip: Artfldgr.]
I really wish people would stop linking to Business Insider. As a publication it is junk, with very low standards of veracity, and Henry Blodget is an evil jerk. Plus, the links rarely work properly as they change pages so rapidly the content is not there by the time a reader tries to link in. Neo, this link failed for me, like most such BI links.
I believe the content you were trying to point us to is something I read several years ago. Another typical BI trait, they steal content from all over the web.
“Might the term have died out over time, like many other colorful regionalisms?”
Not only regional expressions, but regional accents and characters have been reduced as well. It used to be that in different parts of the country you could hear the local news broadcast with a typical local accent; imagine Rochester, NY versus Atlanta, Ga versus Minneapolis, MN. Now, most local news anchors sound much like any other news anchor.
You were also treated to a local identity of stores; Hudson’s (Detroit), Dayton’s (Minneapolis) or Marshall Field’s (Chicago) in the Midwest, Macy’s, Gimble’s and Bloomingdale’s in the triborough area. No more. Even in the infrequent cases where the names are still in use, there seems to be little regional variety because purchases originate at a centralized holding company.
A pity, indeed.
Dan D,
Go to the last page of the BI link. There you will find a link to all 122 demographic charts of the study.
Traffic circles and roundabouts are different things. I call them what they are. In NJ our traffic circles are generally disappearing. Sometimes they are replaced with roundabouts. Sometimes roundabouts are placed where there was never a traffic circle. I think I prefer roundabouts but I am nor entirely certain since I rarely drive into a traffic circle anymore.
And I can’t say I ever heard anyone in NJ call a crayfish a crawfish. Then again they are not common fare in these parts.
I remember how confused I was the first few weeks at a MA university. There was a vast difference in vocabulary between CO and MA in addition to the foreign pronunciations (what do they have against “r’s” ?): package store=liquor store, spa=convenience store, etc. I was amazed at how many of my classmates’ friends had gone to school in Alaska – until I figured out that they were referring to UConn, not the Yukon. The biggest impediment to conversation, though, was how fast everyone spoke.
In my part of the deep south, there are two pronunciations: “merry”, rhymes with “very”, and “marry,” rhymes with “tarry”.
So, ‘How do you pronounce “Mary,” “merry,” and “marry” in that sentence?’: merry, merry, marry.
The first time I can recall noticing “Mary” pronounced more or less as I would pronounce “marry” was in Dylan’s “Just Like A Woman”: to my ears, “Queen Marry, she’s my friend…”
This doesn’t prove the theorem but I do pronounce them differently and, I was born in Middletown, Conn. with my parents moving us to the Boston area (Cambridge) a year later. We left Mass. and the New England area for warmer climes (FL. my Dad had a bad case of Pleurisy) when I was seven.
Interestingly, that pronunciation has stuck with me. I also pronounce “Orange” differently than Californians but I have no idea if my pronunciation of orange is Floridian or New England based.
Mac,
I too pronounce “merry” rhymes with “very”, and “marry,” rhymes with “tarry” but “Mary” as ‘Mare-ry’
Hmm. I did not realize until I looked at this map that I pronounce “Mary” and “marry” slightly differently from “merry.” (I have no idea where this originates after a childhood in upstate NY and then Maryland, young adulthood mostly in New England, then back to upstate NY thereafter — but this time on the soda side of the great divide between “soda” and “pop” that carves New York right down the middle. Tonic? Are ya kiddin?
I am miffed by the absence of “grinder” from the map of names for a long deli sandwich; this caused me much confusion upon first arriving in New England, and let’s not even mention “frappes.” Also, the map’s distribution for “you all” does not square at all with my childhood memories. Everyone in my Maryland childhood said it, as one word with emphasis on the first syllable. So useful and friendly; I had to unlearn it when we moved back north. Everyone also said “frawg” and “dawg” instead of “frog” and “dog.” And I was mystified by the “point” my elementary school classmate told me she’d memorized, until I figured out it was the word “poem” pronounced poim but with the “m” swallowed.
I doubt there’s much Maryland left in my speech (does anyone out there besides me and my siblings say “sliding board” for slide?) but I do love to go back there and hear the softer, slower speech, so familiar despite so many years, and so much gentler than the fast choppy gabbling of us Northerners.
Lizzy, thanks for the good laugh about Yukon. That’s a great story.
Regarding the lost “r’s”…they show up next to the “a’s” at the end of words. Car becomes “caa” but subpoena becomes “subpoenar”.
3 Ms–Mary and marry the same, merry a bit different. Missouri origin.
Sunshower–seen it, never had a word for it.
Mac, the only problem is I pronounce ‘very’ to rhyme with ‘tarry’, so I can’t interpret your analysis.
(I was born in Minneapolis, but have lived in New England for 50 years.)
Now in Melrose, MA, Mary is “meery”.
Sangiovese – Yes! The r’s aren’t lost, just misplaced. I actually really like a Boston accent and used to engineer conversations with my boyfriend to get him to say words like “Bar Harbor.”
I had a friend from Rhode Island in my French class and her additional r’s (which are really intense with the RI accent) were hysterical, such as pronouncing “le” as “lurr”, “de” as “durr”. It drove the professor batty, but my friend had no idea she was even doing it.
How do y’all pronounce “y’all”?
Among the South’s greatest contributions to the English language, it provides an elegant and euphonious solution to the ambiguity problems inherent due to the absence of any real second person plural pronoun in standard English grammar…,
Lot’s of sunshowers in Fl, they’re magical.
But what will really twist your head 180 degrees is when you see it rainingy heavily on just one side of the road. I mean right down the center line without a drop falling on the other side and with the sun shining brightly on that side. No joke, I’ve seen it more than a few times. (only in FL?)
Ah, the Boston accent, which I don’t have and never did. We only lived in the Cambridge area for a year or so, then moved to Framingham, Mass. till I was seven. Then left for the Miami area. So while I have a partial(?) Mass. accent I guess it takes longer to get the Boston accent, to ‘paak theh kah’…:-)
Geoff, I’ve seen it rain front yard and dry back yard.
Soda, pop, sodapop. “What flavor coke would you like?”.
And roundabouts sre encroaching Michigan and are a socialist plot.
[i]Geoffrey Britain Says:
June 11th, 2013 at 4:53 pm
I too pronounce “merry” rhymes with “very”, and “marry,” rhymes with “tarry” but “Mary” as ‘Mare-ry’[/i]
I pronounce them all the same! 😀
Oops, screwed up the tags. I forgot where I was again.
Here is the link to the full 122 map site. A commenter linked it at AoSHQ over the weekend, and I spent quite a lot of time there. Choose a map from the drop-down list.
I enjoyed it immensely. I was born in Ohio to parents who were both from Maryland, and have lived in Pennsylvania most of my life except for a couple of brief periods in New York State (once in the extreme western part and once on LungIsland).
So I have an interesting mish-mash of pronunciations and phrases.
Oh, and “hoagie” is the correct term.
I lived for a couple of years in western New York State when I was a kid in school. The other kids pronounced “milk” as “melk”. Drove me f’n crazy. I kept trying to correct them.
Remember those old Bell Lab science videos from the 50s & 60s? They did one on pronounciation The Alphabet Conspiracy”. someone put it on Youtube and it has the Mary, Merry Marry pronunciations around minute 36.
I forgot to mention that when you go to the 122 map site, you can click on the “individual” tab to see a breakdown of the different answers. Dark red means it’s commonplace and dark blue means it’s rare. In some cases you can glean more information from those maps than the “composite” ones.
I know a woman from Boston who works down the street from me. Good God, her accent is thick as hell. She really stands out like a sore thumb around here.
I find it entertaining. English is the only language I speak, but the worldwide variants are endlessly fascinating.
Here is a classic YouTube video (15 million views) of a British kid doing a variety of English accents from around the world. Language warning, but he is a fookin’ genius.
Wash/Warsh.
rickl just brought to mind a question with his mention of the variety of distinctive English accents. The question being; how do other languages compare as to the variety of accents they embody? Is English inherently unique in that aspect? Rare but with some other languages comparable? Or as I suspect is it just the unusually wide distribution of English speaking peoples?
And while we’re on the subject of pronunciation, what specifically accounts for the regional differences in accents? The regional inhabitants of New England and the South, etc. didn’t take a vote, instead a group consensus amorphously emerged…why?
Former New Yorker here.
Mary had a hairy boyfriend.
She was merry when she drank cherry Coke.
After Mary’s hairy boyfriend married her, he carried her over the threshold.
Well, you know… Some say tomato, some say tomahto, some say potato, some say potahto.
Here in KY, we sometimes say maters and taters.
…and if you really want to go crazy, just try and pronounce the name of our biggest city.
Ira Says:
June 11th, 2013 at 8:55 pm
They all sound exactly the same to me. 🙂
Sometimes I listen to Dennis Prager on the radio. He pronounces “marry” almost as “maa-ry”. I don’t exactly know how to write it. It sounds almost exaggerated to my ear. According to Wikipedia, he was born in Brooklyn.
Mary, merry, and marry are all the same to me.
IRA has nailed it at least for me. And I pronounce Mary similarly to Denis Prager’s Brooklyn accent ‘Mare-ry’ as in ‘h-air-y’.
rickl, that they all sound exactly the same to you demonstrates, as does all of ours, that where we spent our earliest formative years determines our pronunciation.
I don’t know what they’re talking about. I’m from Massachusetts(south shore) and Mary and marry are pronounced the same.
For me; it’s:
Mary = May-ree
merry = meh-ree
marry = maeh(as in “match”)-ree
The wildest U.S. accent I’ve heard was in upstate NY (Plattsburg) and northern VT In both cases, the local’s accent sounded like an Irish brogue. Always wondered if this is what the locals of Smith Island, MD sound like.
I was afraid there would be confusion about the rhyme guides being themselves ambiguous.
There is a particular accent heard occasionally in the south, now passing away I think, in which “Mary” is “May-ree”. “May” as in “merry month of”. I guess I have a bit of it, as I grew up pronouncing “Sarah” as “Sayrah” and didn’t know it wasn’t normal until someone remarked on it.
I pronounce those three as Neo does.
Ohio born and bred, I’m with Neo and scottthebadger.
Try to find the different pronunciations of the word “oil” for a few laughs. My mom grew up in southern Indiana and northern Kentucky hearing “oil” pronounced “erl” although her parents taught her to say it correctly. Kerosene was called “coal oal” or, weirdly, “coil erl”.
This topic also jogged a memory. Quite a few years ago PBS did a series called The Story of English hosted by Robert MacNeil (of MacNeil/Lehrer fame). It was a fascinating look at our mother tongue which I was fortunate enough to tape.
One of the memories which stands vivid is about several islands in the Outer Banks where English is still spoken almost exactly as it was in the days of William Shakespeare and the decided difference in the English imported by settlers to New England which was different from the English imported further to the U.S. coastal South. (Teaser: The “hoiddy toiddy” were the well-to-do visitors to the island who could only sail out to it during high tide—dialectly pronounced “hoi toid.”)
Don’t know if it’s available on DVD, but some readers may want to reference the series.
Susanamantha,
“Coal Oyl” was also the name of Olive Oyl’s father in the Thimble Theatre “Popeye” cartoons.
Oh, the missing R’s! And that NY metro habit of switch the position of “k” and “s” – I aksed Anitar faw a date but she needs to warsh huh haiyah tonigh. (gotta drop most ending T’s and G’s also).
And where I grew up in NJ we said “frog” and “dawg”. One of my favorite little vignettes from my youngest daughters earliest school days was the time she came home furious because she’d gotten a rhyme question wrong on a test. She’d taken “none of the above” since “dawg” most certainly did NOT rhyme with “fog”.
Sunshowers are marvelous. Loved ’em since I was a kid. But I like tundah stahms too.
Coming on:
Young, getting to early middle aged women saying “Yuss” and “dusk” for “yes’ and “desk”. Not, afaict, regional. Other “yes”-sounding words suffering the same fate.
Same demographic opening up the “fat”, “that” to “faht”, “thaht” “fahst”, “fahmily” and similar vowel shifts. And they seem to linger a half a second, as if they enjoy it.
Knucklehead,
Your daughter’s story reminded me of a similar occurance with our oldest son. In the second grade he was asked to identify correct sentences. One of the sentences he marked incorrect was the following: “Suzie sits in the sun.”
Of course the teacher said that was a correct sentence. When we asked him why he thought it incorrect he responded: “Because if she sat in the sun she would burn up.”
We pointed this out to the teacher at our conference and we all had a giggle about it, but of course, our second grader was absolutely correct.
I once went to city hall to get some papers notarized. The clerk introduced herself as Dawna. I thought to myself, Boston Irish, must be Donna from Southie or Dorchester, correctly pronounced Dawchestah. Nope, turns out her given name is Dawna. Her mother had a sense of humor.
Y’all is an attempt to write the Old English ‘eall’ for ‘all.”If eall are coming, come on now.” Attempts to write dialect produce some fairly bizarre gobbledygook. Old English became a virtually unwritten language for a couple of centuries after the Norman conquest, in 1066.No doubt y’all have seen the ‘can not’ contraction spelled as ‘cain’t’. What the speaker was actually doing was pronouncing the Old English Aesh, which you can only say if you grew up in some parts of the South. I have forced my own children to practice this particular linguistic fossil. I have known one cunning linguist in my life who was able to duplicate the Aesh.
Once, my wife and two friends and I were clearing up after a church coffee hour, Lisa, who grew up in South America, but whose parents were Mississippians, my wife and I are both from Northeast Texas and Lily, whose mother was from southern Louisiana, and whose “Black” speech was rounded over by growing up in San Antonio. With just the four of us there, we slipped into our native tongue, pure upland Southern, with “R’S as strong as they were first heard on the docks as people debarked from Northern Ireland and Scotland.”Can you reach me that, please? “I might could. Lemme see.” Our normal speech is such homogenized American, we rarely think about the fact that it is a later acquired language. But we spent a very relaxed afternoon, speaking the language of our mothers, now departed this life.