4 ms·
An herb? An hour? An horchata?
by cageface 16y ago
An herb? An hour? An horchata?
- telemachos 16y agoSure, but there's also 'an historical novel' - less likely, unless you are a character in said novel. I would say that the real rule is not about the letters (vowel or consonant), but the sounds. So, you receive 'an MBA' because it's pronounced 'an em-bee-eigh'.
- hugh3 16y agoIncidentally, the soft h on "herb" is one of the things that bugs me most about American English (and it took me several years of living here to even figure out that it was consistently done that way). Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't Americans pronounce a hard "h" on "herbivore"? How does "herb", then, lose its h?
- cageface 16y agoI actually say "erbivore", as do most people I know.
- hugh3 16y agoReally? Oh, in that case it's at least consistent (though it still bugs me, for no particularly good reason other than that it's unusual). What about the name "Herb"?
- cageface 16y agoI don't know any personally but I usually hear the H enunciated in the name. But Herb is short for "Herbert", which is a German name, so maybe we inherited the pronunciation rule there.