The American english pronunciation is typically erbs. That's how I've always heard it pronounced. My English in-laws say: herbs. The word is 'borrowed' from the French, by the way, who employ the silent H. It evolved into Herb in the mouths of the English. Adaptations across borders occurs with thousands of words. Technically speaking, "erb" is the historically correct pronunciation.

The silent H, by the way, is very common for many words. How do you pronounce honor and heir?

I would never, ever consider either pronunciation incorrect. Honestly! :-)

Being Australian, it's Herbs for me, with a pronounced aitch at the beginning.

It's my pedantic opinion that if you're going to make it sound French, you should go the whole hog and say 'airb'. :-)

In my reasonable opinion, I agree with Rhizo - either pronunciation is correct.

If I remember right, when you call Richters, in Ontario, the switchboard answers with something like "Welcome to the world of Herbs." So it must be a British Commonwealth pronunciation to enunciate the aitch, rather than elide it as we Americans do.

I've never heard anybody say herbs until the new cooking and food channels showed up on tv.

Hmm, my girlfriend confirmed to me yesterday that some americans call it just Erbs. This would explain why some of those TV shows from the US have been using that as of late.

So, I guess that's all cleared up now.

Does that mean we don't need to discuss or-eg-AH-no versus a-REG-a-no? The latter causes me to grind my teeth.

I'm a French Canadian, and in Canadian French we say herbes (airbes), some English Canadians say Herbs and some say Erbs. I have learned to say Herbs when speaking English, but my American hubby says Erbs, and since hooking up with him, I use a mix of the two (obviously, my Canadian accent comes out on more words than that one, but habit is a hard thing to let go of :) ).

I'm personally ok with both and just shun anyone who looks at me funny if I don't say it their way. Whether I say Erb or Herb, I don't see how anyone could not understand what I'm referring to. I also say Herbal tea, and not Erbal tea ;)

This will illustrate the correct pronunciation.

Its Erbs Herb

...so is 'herbs' the only word where an H is pronouned by brits & aussies? Ironic.

My usual sense of humour has failed me, Purpleinopp, and I take exception to that comment. Perhaps I live in exalted circles, here in Australia (and I didn't think I did!), but everyone I know or have known pronounces an initial H where appropriate. We're not all Steve Irwins, you know! I've lived in the Outback, and in the cities, and in small towns, and I've never actually heard anyone speak like Steve Irwin, whose twang I found very false and irritating.

In short, we aren't all yobbos!

I am a 'erb person. I've heard Americans say it both with the "h" and not though without is the most common.

Now "soda" versus "pop," that's the contested term in my house!! ;)

FataMorgana

DaisyD, I don't recall calling anyone a yabbo, especially since I've never heard the word before this. And yes, I *was* only making what I thought was a humorous observation although without hearing the tone in which it would have been said, and without any body language to put it into context (a smile, not a smirk,) I can see how it could be misconstrued. If you (or anyone else) were (was) offended, I sincerely apologize. I googled yabbo and am pretty sure it's not a compliment. I would never insult anyone or make judgments about their character for the way they speak, exalted circle or otherwise. As far as an appropriate way to pronouce something, that seems to vary widely depending on nationality and region. I hope you are not saying that people who pronounce certain words in certain ways are yabbos.

I've not been to Australia so am limited to hearing a few Aussie accents on TV and youtube. When I visited London, the people sounded just like they do on TV - not right or wrong or yabbo, just British. In any case, it's definitely fun to observe the differences. This discussion has been a very interesting opportunity for people to share and examine one of those differences. I hope it doesn't degenerate into insults and judgments. When you consider it, how fascinating it is that people from england went to both US and Aust. and made the same language sound so different in so many ways.

After moving from OH to AL, I've very much enjoyed the differences in pronounciation between some words, and the accents are very interesting. They tease me here in AL that I "talk funny" but I've never been insulted over it. Up north, they buy inSURance, here they have INsurance. Both are correct. We have almost as many accents in the US as we have states. I can remember how years ago a roommate and I used to watch game shows to see which of us could correctly ID which states the contestants were from. There is nothing wrong with being different, and I think it's much more intersting when there is diversity.

Daisy, I 'get' what you mean about Steve Irwin's accent being annoying to fellow Aussies. Though I've lived all over the South since I was a young woman, I've NEVER heard anyone with an accent like Paula Deen. OMG, she makes my teeth hurt, my hair stand on end, my skin crawl. (She's a restaurateur in Savannah, GA and host of a cooking show.) She and Steve would have made quite a combination, with their sticky, thick accents and nasally twang.

I love Australian accents; it seems more musical than an English accent

Oh, and I confess to being one of the aREGano crowd. :-( I am not alone. I'll have to put my (British) sister-in-law to the test on that one. She's lived over here for over 40 years but still hasn't lost one bit of her lovely accent nor any of the British terminology.

Purple...."umbrella" is another word that comes off the southern tongue UMbrella, rather than umBRELLa.

Here is a link that might be useful: Oregano

Apology accepted, Purple - and it's 'yobbo', not 'yabbo'. Someone who is uncouth, a slob, no-hoper (you get the idea - NOT a compliment!). A 'yabbie' is a sort of freshwater crayfish, totally unrelated to a yobbo because they're quite nice.

As for 'soda' or 'pop' - we Aussies solve the problem by calling them 'soft drinks'. As opposed to 'the hard stuff'.

There is no correct pronunciation. It's just a case of regional variation.

Purple - not all British people speak like Dick van Dyke in Mary Poppins. In fact no British person EVER spoke like that. In British English the H is almost universally aspirated. The exceptions would be people who habitually 'drop' their H's ie some regional accents.

I first heard 'erbs on a tape of Judy Blume reading some of her own children's stories. My kids thought it was a joke to start with until we realised that was genuinely how she pronounced the word.

And what about bayzil ....?

p.s. In my experience one of the most noticeable differences of all between British and American speech is volume.

Ok, I gotta ask. Which do you find has the most volume?

FataMorgana

Do you mean volume as in quantity, or in decibels??

Decibels, Daisy.

In which case, we all know the answer, don't we?? LOL

Even the soft-spoken among us drop the "h" in "herbs", although we Americans enjoy national stereotypes as much as, oh, Aussies or Brits.

Grin ;-)

Sorry, nyg, I couldn't hear you. Can you speak up?

After having this discussion in the back of my mind for a few weeks, I've realized that all the commercials say erbs. Taxtax, do you watch tv? Your profile says you are in the US. We recently had tv hooked back up after taking an 18 month break. As I figured, there's still nothing interesting on there except a few cooking shows and documentaries. I like having the news back, especially with the elections coming up next year. Got to pick the least disgusting candidate, not an easy chore.

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This post was edited by rajumaster on Thu, Mar 7, 13 at 0:14

Dave Dobbyn and Herbs' Slice of Heaven

I really "could care less" (my dialect/idiolect) if you say, HERBS or ERBS. (In American English, the /h/ is dropped, I believe without regional distinction.) What does bother me is hearing Marta Stewart pronouncing it as "HERBS" (a total affection in her case).