Talk:Homophone

"...vivid example,..."

It might be vivid, if I could decipher it.

Hopiakuta 23:20, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Explanation

He died at 40 odd years, in his berth (of a ship? of a train?), someone told the sexton who then rang the bell.

Homonyms in use are "berth/birth", "tolled/told". It doesn't make sense to say that "his death which happened in his birth", so the listener has to do a mental retalk. It makes a little more sense to say the sexton "told" the bell, but again we have to do the double take and translate it as "tolled" (announcing his death).

Jarich 13:45, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Pronunciation

sore/saw

In some places, these are indeed two words that are pronounced the same. However, people with the "Chicago" or "no accent" do not pronounce these words the same. Saw is not said with an "r" sound in it. This example should be eliminated to avoid confusing some users. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.121.65.30 (talk) 15:25, 6 January 2007 (UTC).

Interesting reference

Homonyms - Due Ewe No Witch Whirred Qualifies

Removed examples

I have removed the following.

• do, due
• weather, whether
• which, witch
• whirred, word

These are not homphones for everyone. Jimp 00:50, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

I feel that these words belong on the list. Despite differences in accents and dialects, these words are pronounced a certain way by a majority of the speakers or enough of them to make these words universally recognizable.

• do /du:/ and due /dju:/ or /d3u:/ - not homophones
• weather and whether - they are homophones, however, there is a more correct (and perhaps, sadly, more archaic) difference with whether as /'xwethə/, likewise with which and witch, and whirred and word. Enzedbrit (talk) 01:00, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

I am confused by "homophones", also, including words with the same spelling ("rose" being the example used in this article)because I thought that homophones were only words that had different spellings, different meanings, and the same way of saying it. Is there a separate category that "rose" and "rose", "plant" and "plant", etc. would fall under? I am hoping that there is a word that we can call these words.

• these words are homophones - different spelling and/or meaning, same pronunciation Enzedbrit (talk) 01:00, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

A homophone is a word that, regardless of spelling, is pronounced in the same way as another word with a different meaning. Thus pray and prey are homophones, but so too are ball (spherical object) and ball (dance). Furthermore, homophony does not have to apply universally: there are many instances of word pairs that are homophonous for the speakers of one language variety but not for those of another. Thus do and due are normally homophonous in American English (/du:/)), but not in most accents of British English (/du:/), /dju:/); fort and fought are largely homophonous in British English (/fɔ:t/)), but not in most accents of American English (/fɔɹt/), /fɔ:t/). -- Picapica (talk) 04:43, 6 October 2019 (UTC)

For myself I would not have (carrot) and (carat) as the end of the words sound different carrot ends with the sound of ot as in otter and the word carat ends with the sound at as in atom, attack or attention I am British and accept that other people from different countries could pronounce the words differently than I do but as the language is called English and I would expect the word to be pronounced the same as where the language came from. Poppyann2012 (talk) 06:45, 15 October 2019 (UTC)

Homophones and accents

As previous users have pointed out, what are homophones to some are not homophones to others. I think it is necessary to organise the list based on accents.

"Saw" and "sore" are only homophones to non-rhotic speakers.

A pronounciation key should also be included when discussing homophones.

Socrates17 22:52, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Here are some for me (Location: Northeast United States)

bouy (boo-ee) and boy (boi) — I've never met anyone who pronounced bouy "boy" before

flower (flou-wer) and flour (flou-er) — common pronunciation here, at least, has a distinct "w" sound in flower.

red (red) and read (red) — could we also include reed (reed) and read (reed)?

bury (burr-ee) and berry (bair-ee) — once again, not the same (for me at least)

71.235.66.254 02:50, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

By the way, the anchored float is a buoy, not a "bouy". -- Picapica (talk) 04:49, 6 October 2019 (UTC)

Be careful with the external links: None of them provides a flawless list —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.219.109.210 (talk) 11:58, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

There is no way fool and fuel are homophones. (unsigned)

User:71.235.66.254, go to England or Australia, and everyone you meet will pronounce buoy the same a boy (male child). DaveDodgy (talk) 16:46, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

possible mistake

Happen to be quite drunk but am resonably shore (lol) that there is a mistake on the venn diagram; i think tire (car wheel) should be tyre (car wheel). (unsigned)

I agree, tire is a poor example of a Homonym as in British English it is a Heterograph. In US English tire does indeed mean both a car wheel and fatigue, but in British English tire only means fatigue, instead a car wheel is a tyre. Another example of this is US English check/check, British English check/cheque : verify/form of payment. (LittleGreenGirlFromMars (talk) 17:30, 19 February 2013 (UTC))

Concerning tire: the article is about homophony, not homonymy. -- Picapica (talk) 04:49, 6 October 2019 (UTC)

Yes, but in the Venn diagram in this article the example given in the overlap between 'Same pronunciation' and 'Same spelling' is inevitably a homonym and "tire" is a poor choice as it only works in U.S. English. Better examples might be "skate - glide on ice" / "skate - type of fish" or "ball - formal party" / "ball - spherical body"? JezGrove (talk) 21:00, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree. It's a poor diagram, and should use universal examples.Halbared (talk) 21:47, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

Number of homophones

The link http://people.sc.fsu.edu/~jburkardt/fun/wordplay/multinyms.html in English section of "Number of homophones" section isn't valid anymore. This will require to reword the whole section. Should it be removed or different list be found (I couldn't find any). Dwellee (talk) 15:03, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Wayback Machine has the page. Feel free to reword text - the url shouldn't be listed directly in the text. Kirin13 (talk) 21:24, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Known meme

Think the beer-can/bacon "in certain accents" is too much of a stretch? ―cobaltcigs 01:48, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

You would have to be familiar with Jamaican English to get the similarity, which might be beyond the scope of this article in terms of international clarity. But yes, it's a great meme. JezGrove (talk) 21:06, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

See Face–near merger. It's also possible in Geordie. Kbb2 (ex. Mr KEBAB) (talk) 09:38, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Chinese and tonal languages

We should discuss whether tonal languages such as Chinese regard otherwise identical syllables with different tones as homophones, and the cultural role of homophone wordplay. --Daviddwd (talk) 20:44, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

Indeed. The discussion could include information from / link to other related articles such as Euphemisms for Internet censorship in China, for example. JezGrove (talk) 21:22, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Chinese people often use "谐音" to refer to sensitive terms. They are homophones or near-homophones. For near-homophones, it's like using "corn" as a substitute for "porn" in English. Obviously near homophones are not homophones, but it depends on the definition. ~2026-40707-17 (talk) 06:21, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

Between different languages

• Does homophone apply to words sounding the same but are of two different languages. Qwepo (talk) 18:07, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

That's not normally how the word is used, but one could describe two such words as homophonous. Bondegezou (talk) 18:41, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Are you sure?

Carat and carrot? --179.26.220.123 (talk) 02:46, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

This depends on dialect. It should be replaced. Nardog (talk) 06:19, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Where do aluminium/aluminum fall?

On that venn diagram, where would aluminium/aluminum fall? Unlike sulfur/sulphur there is a difference in pronunciation but it’s tiny. It doesn’t seem right to say “‘aluminium’ is a synonym for ‘aluminum’” because they’re really the same word.

Other examples similar: spelled/spelt, burned/burnt, &c. of these forms of past tense. 2601:1C2:5000:8CC7:9889:D50D:1D5C:B135 (talk) 02:17, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

In Wordplay and Games

The following is listed;

"The pairs do and due as well as forward and foreword are homophonous in most American accents but not in most English accents"

The words "do" and "due" are not a pair as there is also "dew". Perhaps a perceptible difference in pronunciation in England but sounds the same to me here in America. ☉Qψîδịzഴ^ⓧ•—>Quisizyx _talk 20:22, 23 February 2026 (UTC)

Subtitles in China

In China, TV hardsubs are not used in live shows, but are pretty common in others, such as MVs, movies, documentaries and talk shows. Though it's mainly a East Asian preference, for China it's also because:

1. There are many distinct accents and dialetcts, which result from its long history and vast territory.

2. Because of the limited syllables, Chinese has many homophonic characters and some homophonic multisyllabic words. And Chinese people often intentionally substitute words with characters, considering the latter are more concise and punchy (even classical, for historical contexts), such as using "吃" instead of "吃飯", like directly using the root "sub" or "pro" instead of their complete word forms.

3. Chinese characters are not phonetic, so different etymologies won't merge into one, and subs can effectively help avoid ambiguities. For example, when hearing "‌tā men‌" (they), a Chinese speaker can't tell the gender, but he can by reading the subtitles. By contrast, whether you hear or read "state", you can't tell if it refers to a political entity or a condition.

4. Chinese sentences are concise and characters are unique, making it very quick to read.

By the way, the issue of ambiguity in Chinese songs is overstated. Not being able to hear tones in Chinese is just like not being able to hear consonant clusters and final consonants in English—it doesn't really affect understanding that much. Distinguishing the meanings of "they", "state" and "USA", or grammatical ambiguities is basically the same thing. ~2026-40707-17 (talk) 06:08, 21 July 2026 (UTC)