Comments Elsewhere

Some people, when asked to read the word “asked,” will tend to spontaneously say “ax’t.” Other people, when asked to read the word “asked,” will tend to spontaneously say something that is much closer to “ass’t.” Both of these represent a significant difference between the way the word is pronounced (a metathesis of the /s/ and /k/ in one case, and a complete elision of the /k/ in the other, not even getting in to what’s going on with that last syllable). Yet it’s only the people who say “ax’t” who routinely get mocked, or get judged as ill-educated, or ignorant of the standard pronunciation, or who are assumed to lack basic literacy skills, just because of the way they happen to pronounce the word. I wonder why that is.