King Alfred's English, a History of the Language We Speak and Why We Should Be Glad We Do

by Laurie J. White

Do you pronounce these words differently or the same? whether and weather where and wear If you say each pair the same way, you’ve dropped the sound of the h, and you’re part of an ongoing language shift that’s happening today. Try testing your parents and grandparents, if you can, to see if they think these words are pronounced differently or the same. I clearly pronounce the h, but my kids don’t. And linguists don’t know why this is happening. It just is. Gradually, the sound of the h in words beginning with wh is being dropped. It will make one more spelling conundrum for English-speaking school children who already complain, “Why can’t we just spell these words like we say them?!”