[thelist] Email vs. E-mail vs. email vs. e-mail

Miriam Frost miriam at members.evolt.org
Tue May 21 10:52:01 CDT 2002


> Does anyone else see the obvious reason that the spelling 'email' won in
> this poll?

Conventional / popular usage is not always the same as correct.

I believe that "e-mail" is preferred in more academic or journalistic arenas
because in according to most English pronunciation rules, an initial "e"
followed by a consonant is pronounced as a schwa, an unaccented vowel.*
Hence:
emetic
emancipate
emanate
etcetera
(Naturally, there's an exception we're all familiar with: evolt.org --
which, because of the missing hyphen, I regularly mispronounced until Dan
corrected me... and then I corrected his spelling.)

Until it's pronounced uh-male, not eee-male, I suggest the hyphen rules....

best,
Miriam



*From Merriam-Webster: "an unstressed mid-central vowel (as the usual sound
of the first and last vowels of the English word America)"


--
http://www.dynagirl.com
They named the dictionary after me, and then spelled my name wrong....




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