A discussion while I was visiting my buddy Mike and his family this past Friday led to the question of how to pronounce autonomic. I pronounced it "aw-tuh-NOH-mik," but Mike asked whether the pronunciation was, rather, "aw-tuh-NAH-mik." I forgot this exchange until just a few minutes ago, when our conversation popped back into the foreground of my consciousness, so I decided to look the word up, suspecting that I might need to check a few different sources: autonomic struck me as one of those words having at least two legitimate pronunciations.
As it turns out, every source I checked (Dictionary.com, M-W.com, and howjsay.com-- the latter for the UK angle) agrees that Mike's preferred pronunciation is the only correct pronunciation. So I stand corrected, and this old fart will have to unlearn a bad habit of pronunciation.
[Some years back, Mike got me on my mispronunciation of miscegenation.]
_
Yay me! I will not gloat however as I know that I'll never catch you on a spelling error... At best I got this round, but you are way ahead in the game. (If there is even a game...)
ReplyDeleteI don't ever recall getting you on the pronunciation of "miscegenation." You have a better memory than me for that type of thing.