This has become a pet peeve of mine and as a non-native English speaker I just don’t understand why so many people make that typo in the first place- what is it?
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mastodon is latin
Yes, words have etymology, but it doesn’t really change anything and doesn’t make latin, french, whatever-origin loanwords not be english or whatever the language is they’re loaned to. You can’t say “…well ackshually guillotine isn’t english, it’s french”.
PS. It was a dumb joke.
calm down boy
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Because that’s how most people pronounce it, and it’s an uncommon word so most are guessing on the spelling anyway
Ah, sounds fair - the O is very much pronounced O in French and I didn’t realise how similar to A it would be in English. Thanks!
So English is weird; any non-stressed syllable in a word has the exact same vowel sound: the schwa
It’s basically a very neutral vowel sound because we are lazy speakers.
People spell by sounding out words.
Ah, sounds fair - the O is very much pronounced O in French and I didn’t realise how similar to A it would be in English. Thanks!
Yeah to add to that it is pronounced more like “Mass-tah-don” rather than “Mass-toe-don”. The “tah” portion makes people think it’s spelled with a “ta” since that would give you that pronunciation normally instead of “to”. One of the many insane quirks of the English language stealing from other languages over the centuries.
Ah, nice explanation, thanks!
Same reason people can’t get their/they’re/there right, and people actually type out “could of”. The written version doesn’t match with the way certain accents pronounce the words, and people try to write what they say.
English is not exactly consistent in the way it spells words (the “k” in “knight” hasn’t been pronounced for hundreds of years, “though” and “cough” don’t rhyme despite their similar endings, are pronounced like “doh” and “coff”, all because of things like the great vowel shift and the lack of a spelling reform after).
That said, “mastodon” was a word in the English dictionary long before it was a social media platform. In order to type mastadon, you need to override autocorrect and ignore the red squiggles that tell you your spelling is wrong. I don’t really get that.
This post is literally the first time I’ve seen it.
Because when Zach Mighty Morphs into the Black Ranger… This is what it looks like.
What did he say? Clearly he said MASTADON!!!
Native English speaker here. Although I pronounce it Mast-a-don, I spell it Mastodon because that’s how it’s spelled and I know how to read and write. Also, I’ve never seen it spelled like that. English speaking or otherwise.
Because it’s fuckign confusing that is why 🤣
English speakers, especially Americans, don’t put much value in spelling, especially on the internet. Can’t be arsed to Google it, or even look at the logo on the page they’re on. Just wing it because it sounds right and they’ve never actually read it.
Then they do read it and continue to get it wrong anyway, because fuck you that’s why, I guess?
We may be pretty fucking dumb, but I don’t think disregard for spelling things correctly on the internet is a strictly American quality lol
People think it’s spelled Mastadon, because they pronounce it Mastadon. No one googles what they think they already know.
It’s to subconsciously avoid the closeness to Mast O’Don
I’ve said before the name mastodon sucks… It’s like mastrubation and dong combined.
