Torking Proply an' 'at

[Lateralthinking1]

Not dissimilar to the great Tom Robinson, to my Northern ears.

Now that is quite interesting. I can understand why you would hear similarities between Davis and Robinson. However, Tom has a middle class accent, albeit one without pretension. It is as precise but more consistent like a tune being played on one musical instrument. There aren't several things going on at the same time. It isn't as one would find, say, with somebody in England who spent some years in Australia. It doesn't have range in that way, irrespective of Davis also being more dramatic in presentation.

With Davis, there are definitely elements of working class London. Many wouldn't notice it as the refining of it is so good. I think he came from a family where improvements to speech were considered important. This hasn't though meant a radical change of voice a la Thatcher in which the pitch was changed more than the accent. It isn't exactly a change of accent either. While achieved, it stays true to its roots so that there are a couple of musical instruments there. One senses the potential for slippage.

Having been brought up with a similar mindset, I thought that it was the norm. It was always about betterment rather than airs and graces. I find that most people on the radio from the South East are naturally more middle class sounding. Some have lazy speech patterns or dumb it down a bit. I find that immensely irritating, fairly depressing and somewhat insulting. If the idea is that it will meet its audience halfway, it fails spectacularly with me in its objective. I really dislike it.

The BBC seems to choose from those of working class backgrounds in the South East people who still speak like barrow boys. There are very few barrow girls. While I have some time for Robert Elms, Danny Baker, etc - their interests are often interesting - they are from my perspective the antithesis. They have acquired the money and much of the culture. There is little in them that hasn't abandoned their pasts other than their accents. Fascinatingly, those remain very persuasive to other people.

[scottycelt]

The OED (and every other major dictionary) gives -ize as the preferred spelling. Trouble is, in Britain we just ignore it and usually write -ise. Except in print, when -ize is quite common. It's the French influence.

Or those fiddling, meddling Brussels Bureaucrats, no doubt ...

I suspect that even our major dictionaries are now compiled to appear terribly 'cool' and have been Americanis(z)ed of late ...

http://grammarist.com/spelling/organise-organize/

[vinteuil]

Yes, agreed, but it is pronounced "gee". Gee-o-physics, Gee-ometry, Gee-ography etc.

... and how do you pronounce "George"?

Same etymology...

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

No, British; that's why I spell it "organize"!

I'm with Scotty on this one. The OED and Collins compilers are completely out of touch, wishing we all spoke ancient Greek. Hardly anyone in Britain uses the -ize ending - just a handful of publishers, probably to help our American friends. In all official British documents, and on most road signs, you will find only the -ise endings.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Yes, agreed, but it is pronounced "gee". Gee-o-physics, Gee-ometry, Gee-ography etc.

The OED seems to back you up, Lat, but in the case of "geography", I say "jografy", but contradict myself by saying "jee-ografical".

[jean]

How much value you give to the 'e' probably depends on which syllable you're stressing.

What's certain is that the 'e' isn't

...there to soften the "g"...

It was already there in the Greek γεω- and it didn't 'soften' anything.

[vinteuil]

How much value you give to the 'e' probably depends on which syllable you're stressing.

.

I agree. Myself, I think I wd say -

jorge
jography, but jee-ographical [cf the stress difference with photo, photography, photographical ]
jometry, but jee-ometrical
jee-odetic
jee-othermal

[PJPJ]

....... the ordinal number 'third'. It comes from 'three' and used to be 'thrid' or 'thridth', but that proved a bit of a mouthful, and it 'morphed' (to use a rather quaint modern cliche) many hundreds of years ago.

It is also typed very easily! I do like "thrid".

[Don Petter]

It will be difficult to find any authority to support your view. "Compared to" not only is acceptable, but is even given a subtle difference of meaning in several authorities - you compare something "to" something when you want to highlight similarities between things that are essentially different. You compare something "with" something that's essentially similar when you want to highlight the differences between them.

I am often surprised that many record reviewers don't seem to understand this difference (and you'd have thought that comparison was central to their art).

They often talk of comparing A to B when the context makes clear that they are doing no such thing.

[Lateralthinking1]

The OED seems to back you up, Lat, but in the case of "geography", I say "jografy", but contradict myself by saying "jee-ografical".

A very generous post if I may respectfully say so. Thank you.

On vineuil's "George", and also Georgian, I would think the difference is that the "geo" there is not a prefix.

(The "r" also makes a difference but not much in support of the "e" drop as "theory" is not "thory", "thowry" or "thorry")