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Old 15th Mar 2017, 9:11 pm   #21
TonyDuell
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

I always liked (but don't use for obvious reasons) the one that starts

Aisle
Bdellium
Cue
...

I think a google search for 'misleading phonetic alphabet' (no quotes) will turn similar things up
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Old 15th Mar 2017, 9:29 pm   #22
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

I worked in motor insurance for some years, and i can certainly say that reading out registration numbers over the phone permanently burns a fairly standard police or nato phonetic alphabet into the mind!

I still prefer apple sugar nuts to alpha sierra november, symptomatic of being a ww2 buff.
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Old 15th Mar 2017, 10:44 pm   #23
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

I work in a call centre, and yes, we all need to know it. Dealing with the wide range of mother tongues, accents and dialects now present in London (Cockney is virtually extinct) it's an essential tool, though sometimes you need to adapt (E for Elephant, M for mother, and frankly "M for Mike" is totally useless, Gawd knows who came up with that one. It's not even a real word).

Also, the Multicultural English that most youngsters now speak has some surprising convergences, particularly "T" and "Q".

And of course, Kiwi only has one vowel, "I". The New Zealand Bible starts with the story of Idim and Iiv.
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Old 15th Mar 2017, 10:52 pm   #24
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

Some years ago, a colleague became the subject of friendly derision for some time, having spontaneously sought to confirm 'Is that Q for cucumber?'.
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Old 15th Mar 2017, 11:19 pm   #25
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

Quote:
Originally Posted by The Philpott View Post
I still prefer apple sugar nuts to alpha sierra november...
Well, they certainly sound tastier!
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 2:30 am   #26
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

re #16, some years ago I had to call a company in Texas, and their automated switchboard asked you to speak the number of the extension you wanted. It did not recognize my British English pronunciation, and I had to say numbers in my best imitation of the sort of Texas drawl I had heard in cowboy films to get connected: fow-wer for 4, nine-er for 9, etc.
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 8:34 am   #27
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

The one that always amuses my is the word "hotel" for "h", when most folk say it as "otel"
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 8:49 am   #28
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Phil G4SPZ View Post
I'd love to find the full version of the joke phonetic alphabet that starts "A for 'orses, B for Mutton, C for lookin'..." and includes such other notables as I-falutin', O for the wings of a dove, P for relief, Q for a bus, R for sixpence, T for two, and X for breakfast!
Wikipedia offers a few variaions of it.
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 10:11 am   #29
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

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Originally Posted by Dave Moll View Post
Now, that reminds me of the old cockney alphabet that starts:

A for 'orses
B for mutton
C for yerself...
It isn't a phonetic alphabet, though is it? It's like a children's alphabet.

Ian states that "Mike" isn't a real word - I have several friends called Michael who would beg to disagree. It could also be a shortened form of "microphone", though that is usually written "mic". If we are going to say that names shouldn't be there, how about "Charlie", "Juliet", "Oscar", "Romeo" and "Victor" then?

Colin.
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 11:42 am   #30
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

I use Mike or Mexico same result
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 12:13 pm   #31
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I use Mike or Mexico same result
Same here. If I need to clarify, I use an obvious word starting with the same letter.
'P' is usually for 'Peter', rather than an infantile Northern euphemism for sh*t. Likewise, 'S' usually gets 'Sammy', for phonetic reasons.
Quite a few letters are quite phonetic enough in themselves, 'W' for 'Dubya' being a case in point!
The 'Thirteen-o'Clock brigade' isn't anything Northern at all. It refers to pretentious types who say "I'll meet you at thirteen-thirty hours" when they mean "half-past one".
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 1:39 pm   #32
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

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Originally Posted by trsomian View Post
The one that always amuses my is the word "hotel" for "h", when most folk say it as "otel"
I thought the "h" in hotel was supposed to be non aspirated anyway. It is in French, whence the word came.
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 1:45 pm   #33
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

The Oxford Dictionary states that the "h" in hotel is indeed aspirated.
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 2:42 pm   #34
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

In international circles you need to tread carefully: speaking to a German some years ago I read out a phone-number including "Nul" "Zwo" and "Funnuf"

The person at the other end was East-German and my pronunciation brought back bad memories of the Communist Stasi-era: the West-Germans were at the time using "Zero", "Zwei" and "Funf".

[Guess I spent too many hours listening on HF in the 1960s and 1970s with DDR "Numbers stations" burbling away in the background]
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 2:56 pm   #35
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

"Mike" is always an abbreviation though. For Michael, microphone, microgramme, etc. Hardly anyone with poor English understands it. "Sugar" is far better than "Sierra" since sierra is not a commonplace word. I also often say "pepper" instead of "papa". And for those not familiar with 1930s dance crazes, I prefer a fandango to a foxtrot.
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 3:01 pm   #36
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

As most of my years on the ham bands were spent QRP I always used the NATO version along with an alternative using well-known commonly used phonetics.

In particularly difficult conditions the number was invariably the worst to get across and I sometimes resorted to counting: Golf, one-two-three-four, ... I would get my report over in the same manner and have my contact. Bagged some real DX that way!

Some pronunciations are difficult for speakers of other languages. I remember working a French station with an X in his call-sign who used 'Xylophone'.

As for the alternative alternative: 'L for leather' struck me as a particularly good one.
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 3:19 pm   #37
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What's wrong with morse? Should be taught in school.
 
Old 16th Mar 2017, 4:05 pm   #38
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ColinTheAmpMan1 View Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave Moll View Post
Now, that reminds me of the old cockney alphabet that starts:

A for 'orses
B for mutton
C for yerself...
It isn't a phonetic alphabet, though is it? It's like a children's alphabet.
I never said it was - just that an earlier post reminded me of it.

Like with Cockney rhyming slang, it's more to obfuscate than to clarify!
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 4:33 pm   #39
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Default Re: The phonetic alphabet and the modern world.

Quote:
Originally Posted by IanBland View Post
"Sugar" is far better than "Sierra" .
But 'Sugar' is a 'sh' sound (soft) whereas 'Sierra' is a 'S' sound (hard); there may be bandwidth issues or interference that render 'Sugar' unintelligible. I wonder just who drew the phonetic alphabet up and decided 'Sierra' was better than, say, 'Sing' or 'Sin' or whatever, and why?

No doubt the word would have to be understandable to different accents.
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Old 16th Mar 2017, 4:38 pm   #40
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Originally Posted by merlinmaxwell View Post
What's wrong with morse? Should be taught in school.
Quite so. I taught it to Cub-Scouts (well, a little as part of their communications badge) with Aldis lamps.
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