Where have the T’s gone?
Has anyone else noticed that consonants, especially the T, seem to be disappearing? It’s as if we are breeding a group of American Cockney. Examples:
It’s not the Tennessee Titans (ti-tenz), they are the Ti-uhns. The second T is dropped. It’s impor-ant (and don’t get me started on “impordant”). It’s not Twit-ter, it’s Twit-er. I am blanking out on the other examples I have heard recently, but you get the drift. The T seems to be the worst because it requires a little extra work with the tongue. Maybe it’s all those tongue studs….
Not only are we losing our ability to read at any great length and write accurately (my student journalists seem to think that close counts and gross factual errors are — meh….), we seem to be getting lazy in our spoken word as well. Can texting be ruining that, too?
UPDATE: I think the R is going away as well. More and more, I hear people say fo-ward instead of forward.
Hey, I resent (re-zen) that remark, the one about the student journalists…