Sound and Nonsense奥利奥与金莺鸟.docVIP

Sound and Nonsense奥利奥与金莺鸟 　　I used to dream of a stadium filled with fans， everyone on their feet and holding a chocolate sandwich cookie， chanting1）， Oreos， Oreos， Oreos， as Baltimores baseball team won the World Series2）. 　　I should be clear that （a） I know nothing about baseball， （b） I love Oreos， and （c） English is my second language. It is incredibly easy for me to mix up words that sound similar. 　　My Oreos dreams persisted until one night when I was having dinner with my friend Dave， a sports fanatic3）， and the subject of baseball came up. 　　How cool is that？ I said. A baseball team is named after a cookie！ 　　What team is named after a cookie？ Dave asked. 　　Oreos—you know， the Baltimore team. 　　Dave cast a long， silent glance at me and then said： The Orioles4） are named after a bird， not a cookie. He proceeded to spell it， trying to get me to pick up the difference between orioles and Oreos. I could hear the laughter in his voice. 　　This business of mixing up words is embarrassing， especially when I mispronounce peoples names. Craig and Greg； John and Joan； Marian and Myriam. A few years ago， I worked with a Gail， who sat across from me， and a Gil， who sat next to me. When I called out to Gail5） （or to Gil）， nine times out of 10， both would reply， Are you talking to me？ 　　My son Alex laughed his pants off when I told him I had a sneaker for a snack. Mom， he said， Snickers， s-n-i-c-k-e-r-s， is a candy bar. Sneaker， s-n-e-a-k-e-r， is the shoe. 　　At least I am not swimming alone in this sea of mispronunciation. According to and ， both native and nonnative speakers have trouble pronouncing words like nuclear， Realtor6）， jewelry， library， and rural. Nuclear is often mispronounced nu-cu-lear， Realtor becomes Rea-la-tor， and jewelry changes to jew-le-ry. Dr. Language at lists the 100 most often mispronounced words and phrases in English. Here are some words to watch out for. 　　·While a card shark sounds more dangerous， the word is card sharp7）. 　　·Bob