- U -
Umbrella
Strictly speaking, the ‘wrong' word. Umbrella is derived from Italian ombra, and that does not mean ‘rain' or anything of the sort but ‘shade'. In Southern Europe, where it began to catch on from the 16 th century onwards, the umbrella, true to its name, was used, not to protect you against the rain, but against the sun. It was a footman, a certain Jonas Hanway, who brought a fine silk umbrella back to England from Spain and began using it in rainy weather with total disregard to the word's etymology. He did not allow himself to be intimidated by cries of “Frenchman! Why don't you get a coach?” which he heard every time he used it. Hanway persisted, and eventually managed to popularise the umbrella. (Flavell & Flavell 3 2005: 219)
Used to
In the early twentieth century, the vowel in used was always back and rounded in RP. In the speech of younger English people from the South-East, this vowel in words like union , human and usual has become more of a front vowel, near to the vowel in beat, and has very little lip-rounding. The word used in "I used to" thus almost sounds like the word yeast. According to one phonetician (Roach 2001: 66-7), this is one the two most noticeable changes which have happened to English pronunciation since the 1960s, the other being the replacement of /t/ by the glottal stop.
