Correct pronunciation of the?
Favorite Answer
About the “why” of it. There is no formal method of selecting one’s pronunciation of “the.” What we do is what we do with all our words when we combine them with others (or, almost every time we open our mouths and speak!): we say them in whatever way is closest to our understanding of their proper pronunciations yet gives them enough distinction to allow others to separate them. In practice, this can be understood as saying them so that they sound best. We even consider some forms of words to be awkward as well as many combinations and sentences. “Word choice” and “awkward” adorn many a schoolchild’s compositions and other papers. There is nothing invalid about them, they just sound bad together or are hard to enunciate clearly when spoken. One obvious area for this is choosing between “more ‘something'” and “somethinger” — historically, English has wandered back and forth on this topic, sometimes requiring only one form or the other and usually allowing free choice while migrating from one extreme to the other (free choice but leaning toward the preference of the day). There is nothing improper about “He shouted louder and longer than Mary and consequently was more hoarse.” but using “hoarser” would be so much more preferred today that a teacher would likely mark “more hoarse” wrong rather than “awkward.” (It has even been occasionally accepted to use both: “more hoarser”) “The” is subject to the same forces. Saying “tha cow” and “thee cow” sounds fine either way and you will hear it both ways. But not “tha apple” as much because of the similarity between the “a” sounds. “Thee horse” will be picked over “tha horse” in most cases and “h” is certainly a consonant. It can even depend on the words around the “the phrase” and often depends on the function of the modified word in the sentence: one way for a subject, another for the object of an unimportant prepositional phrase. But the essence is: what sounds right (in your head or) when spoken?
(Another example is “beloved.” “Dearly belov-ed, we are gathered here today to celebrate this thing called life…” vs. “He led a truly charitable life and was much belov-d.”
We do this constantly and with all our words, every day and change our preferences and choices throughout our lives.
But there is no formal rule such as he tells you about. He may have been taught one by a twit taking advantage of a prejudice that Germans respond best when told something is a rule, but there is none.
