Language: I love diphthongs (and more)

I love Irish and Welsh a great deal, largely because of the diphthongs and triphthongs -- two-vowel and three-vowel combinations, pronounced as one syllable, that glide off the tongue of native speakers and their would-be imitators. Examples of these from various languages would be beorn (Old English for "bear"), praetor (Latin for "magistrate"), sinteoireacht (Irish for "stretching") and gheobhaidh (Irish for "will fain"). (That last one is pronounced yo-ey to modern ears, but I like to impose classical pronunciations for my own creative purposes -- as with leabhair breac, Irish for "white book.")

I've been listening since I arrived here in January 1998, though, and Texans put diphthongs and triphthongs to shame. They use hexthongs... octhongs... decthongs and even, I suspect, dodecthongs. Even saying a word like "door" becomes not just doh-war but the full range of vowel grace notes that lie in between: deaeouoaeor (or something like that). Sometime after I add mobile phone blogging, I will try to post some examples.

Love that twang!