I used to hear Rush Limbaugh, on his show, make fun of people who would mispronounce the word “administration.” He would always say, “Why do they say it like that?! With a hard “sh” sound?! Adminishtrashin. Adminishtrashin. Adminishtrashin. Why in the hell do they do that?!”

Rush used to say that this pronunciation typically came from college-age females and young women in the media. He was right.

As it turns out, this is a terrible verbal habit that we’ve all heard before. This is commonly referred to as “Phonological Simplification.” It can expose people who might not read the English language very much in books, but it can also expose people who don’t think about what they’re saying as they’re saying it. Such individuals also don’t take the time to practice how to speak the English language properly. They also don’t pay attention to how others pronounce words, and then take the time to correct their own bad verbal habits, nor even look up the proper pronunciation.

Oddly enough, this is predominantly a female tick, but not one that is used by older women. Instead, it’s a phonetic bad habit among those of younger generations, specifically Generation X: Born 1965–1980, Millennial Generation (Gen Y): Born 1981–1996, Generation Z: Born 1997–2010, and Generation Alpha: Born 2010–2024.

While females may be more likely to make such mispronunciations (as they may do so more readily in groups of other women), I have heard men of many ages (gay and straight) mispronounce such words as well. Frankly, just get on YouTube and listen to younger women attempt to speak in their own videos. It makes my head physically hurt.

Frankly, the “-sh” sound is arguably the most common example of phonological simplification that you can hear, and it can be heard in almost any word that people attempt to pronounce. For example, the word “strong” clearly has no -sh sound, let alone a letter “h” in the word. Yet, people will pronounce the word “strong,” as “shtrong.” It’s mind-numbing.

I asked Grok (X’s AI platform a few questions abut this -sh sound specifically, and here is waht it said:

In linguistics, when a person uses an "-sh" sound (like the "sh" in "shoe") with words that typically don’t have that pronunciation, it’s often described as a form of speech substitution or phonological alteration. Specifically, this could be an example of palatalization or assibilation, depending on the context.

• Palatalization refers to a shift in pronunciation where a sound becomes more like a palatal sound (produced with the tongue near the hard palate), and the "-sh" sound [ʃ] is a palatal fricative. For instance, if someone says "tun-sh" instead of "tune" (normally pronounced "t-yoon" or "toon"), they’re replacing a different sound with the [ʃ].

• Assibilation is a related process where a non-sibilant sound (like a stop, e.g., [t] or [d]) is replaced with a sibilant sound (like [s] or [ʃ]). So, if "cat" becomes "cash" with an "-sh" sound, that’s assibilation.

If this is happening consistently in someone’s speech, it might be part of a speech pattern, dialectal variation, or even a speech disorder (like a lisp or articulation issue), depending on the individual and their linguistic background. For example, in some dialects or accents, certain sounds might naturally shift toward "-sh" due to regional phonetics. In child language development or speech impediments, substituting "-sh" for other sounds (like "s" or "t") could be a sign of phonological substitution.

Now, let me get into some examples of phonological simplification and their actual definitions of what this specifically means (and yes, if you listen to Candace Owens for just 15 seconds, you’ll get a good dose of what I’m talking about). Frankly, for me, hearing these bad verbal habits is like hearing nails on a chalkboard.

Phonological simplification is a process in linguistics where complex sound patterns in a language are reduced or altered to make them easier to pronounce or perceive. It often occurs naturally in speech, especially in informal settings, child language development, or when someone is learning a second language. The goal is to streamline the production of sounds without significantly changing the meaning of the words.

For example, a common type of phonological simplification is consonant cluster reduction, where a group of consonants is simplified. In English, a word like "strengths" (which has a tricky cluster of "ngths") might be pronounced as "strenks" or "strenth" in casual speech. Another example is vowel reduction, where unstressed vowels get shortened or neutralized, like pronouncing "banana" as "buh-nana" in rapid conversation.

This process is driven by the human tendency to optimize effort in communication. It’s studied in phonology (the sound systems of languages) and can vary across dialects, ages, or even individual speakers.

Phonetic laziness isn’t an official linguistic term, but it’s often used informally to describe tendencies in speech where speakers simplify or alter sounds for ease of pronunciation. Linguists might connect this idea to specific processes or terms that reflect how language evolves or how speakers economize effort. Here are some key terms associated with this concept:

Assimilation: When a sound changes to become more like a neighboring sound, making it easier to say. For example, "handbag" might be pronounced "hambag" because the "n" assimilates to the "b."

Elision: The omission of a sound or syllable to streamline speech. Think of "going to" becoming "gonna" in casual conversation.

Reduction: Weakening or simplifying sounds, often vowels, in unstressed syllables. For instance, "camera" might sound like "camra" with the middle vowel reduced.

Lenition: A softening of consonants, like turning a "t" into a flap (a quick tap of the tongue) in American English "water" (sounds like "wadder").

Metathesis: As mentioned earlier, swapping sounds within a word for convenience, like "axe" instead of "ask" in some dialects.

Phonetic confusion: The speaker might blend the "s" and "p" sounds into an "x" sound unintentionally.

Regional or idiosyncratic speech patterns: Some people might habitually say it this way due to how they learned or heard the word.

Hypercorrection: They might think "expecially" sounds more formal or correct, even though it’s not a real word.

Apocope: Dropping the end of a word, such as "photograph" becoming "photo."

Syncope: Losing a sound from the middle of a word, like "family" pronounced as "famly."

Coarticulation: When sounds blend together because the mouth is already moving toward the next sound, a natural efficiency in speech production.

I hate to break it to people, but Alex Jones, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, and the previous fake Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, were and are serial contributors to phonological simplification. All of them use a hard “-sh” sound with many, if not all words (just like Candace Owens does), but I think Candice may be the worst. Or, as Candace would say; “worsht.”

Kaitlan Collins, of CNN, is also chronically lazy with her phonetic pronunciation of words. Frankly, the list of men and women on TV who butcher the English language, is endless. No wonder our society is stupid. These phonetic habits go unchecked and uncorrected, thereby allowing these speakers to perpetuate their own mispronunciation of words, while indirectly or unknowingly forcing others to accept it.

There are endless news shows and other platforms that exist that prove this, but, as the number of young women increases on a particular platform (like the show Outnumbered on Fox News), the more likely you are to hear phonological simplification. Don’t worry ladies, I know it’s not all of you that do this.

Here are a few more examples of phonological simplification (phonetic laziness) that I can’t stand, that my ears have been forced to listen to:

• “Flustrated,” instead of the two actual words separated; “flustered” and “frustrated.”

• “Convershashion,” with a hard “-sh” sound, instead of “conversation.”

• “Irregardless,” instead of the two words separated; “irrelevant or “irrespective,” and “regardless.” While categorized as a word, it goes to show that even the dictionary and our culture will support this phonetic laziness.

• “Heighth,” with a “-th” sound, instead of the actual word “height” with a hard T-sound at the end.

• “Drowneded,” instead of the actual words “drown” or “drowned.”

• “Often,” with a hard T sound, instead of it’s actual pronunciation often (not pronouncing the T). This one bothers me. For example, another word that is spelled the same way and is supposed to be pronounced the same way as “often,” is the word “soften.” You would not pronounce the word “soften” with a hard T-sound, so it sounds like “Sof-Ten.” Sadly, people almost always pronounce the word “often” like “off-Ten.” It drives me up the wall.

• “Aplickable,” instead of it’s correct pronunciation and spelling; “applicable.” This one could be my Kryptonite. People pronounce the word “applicable” with an “-aplick” sound. However, you can’t “aplick” anything, but you can “apply” something. The word “applicable” comes from the root word “apply.” Therefore, you keep the same pronunciation as in the word “apply” when saying the word “applicable.”

• “Hairisment,” instead of “Harassment.” The word “harassment” does not start with the sound “hair.” Therefore, it’s not pronounced “hair-is-ment.” The word’s syllables clearly define this in the dictionary as: “ha-rass-ment.”

• “Surplise,” instead of “Surprise.” There is no L, let alone an L-sound in the word “surprise.”

• “Lieberry,” instead of “library.”

• “Crowns,” instead of “crayons.”

• “Slammered,” instead of “hammered,” or “slammed;” it’s a stupid combination of the two words, as if to mean “busy.”

• “Ginormous.” While actually categorized as “informal English,” it’s origin was in the 1940’s, but it, again, goes to show that even the dictionary and our culture will buckle when it comes to accepting phonetic laziness. People could just say “gigantic” or “enormous.”

• “Supposebly” instead of “Supposedly.”

• An now, perhaps one of the worst examples, I give you; “Expecially,” instead of the real word “especially.”

At this point, you might be saying, ”Hey, Sean, why do you care?” Well, I grew up in a house of well-read American individuals who cared about the English language and they didn’t want my brother and me to sound retarded (and yes, that sentence was grammatically correct). My parents were raised the exact same way by their parents as well (my grandparents). In fact, my mom (even to this day) corrects people on TV, the radio, or anywhere else, when she hears them use incorrect grammar in sentences or when they butcher the structure of a sentence or a word. For example, she hates (as do I) when people say “You and me went there…” or when someone says, “Between you and I…”.

The correct grammar is “You and I went there.” Because, you would not say “Me went there.” You would say “I went there.” Therefore, you don’t use “me” in that context. You would use the word “I.” The same is true with the latter example. You wouldn’t say “Between I,” you would say; “Between me.” Therefore, the correct grammatical sentence would be; “Between you and me.”

Frankly, with this article, I just wanted a little levity, and I wanted to make my nightmare, your nightmare. Is it any wonder why American schools fail? Imagine the volume of the grammatically incorrect language that students hear from their teachers on a day-in, day-out basis; let alone others?

In the future (if you don’t already), listen closely to people’s phonological simplification (or phonetic laziness), and get “flustrated” right along with me. We can all improve, myself included.

Feel free and add some examples of phonological simplification that come to your minds in the comments below. After all, we’re all in this together. 😂

BIO: Dr. Sean M. Brooks is the host of the podcast American Education FM and the author of several books including; The Unmasking of American Schools: The Sanctioned Abuse of Americas Teachers and Students. He’s also on Gab, Truth, X, Bitchute, Rumble and everywhere audio podcasts can be heard.

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