


Germanic lan gua ges, whose descendants include German, Dutch, and the Scandinavian ton gues, gave us words like “ gut”, “ gift”, or “ greet”. That is because En glish has taken in words from various sources, most of them from Germanic and Romance lan gua ges. From a purely lin guistic standpoint, a word spelled “g-i-f” could either be pronounced with a hard G or a soft G. Say hello to fuchsia (few-sha, not futch-see-a), Wednesday (wends-day, not wed-nes-day), colonel (kernel, not colon-L) and island (eye-land, not is-land). Get ready to learn some basic lin guistics!Įn glish spelling is so convoluted that even Phonics or the I-Before-E rule fails. Well, it’s not the only lo gical pronunciation. Note: In this page, every soft G is notated in green, and every hard G in red. Are there valid arguments for pronouncing it with a hard G?.Okay, but that only means it could be either.But graphics is pronounced with a hard G.This page’s headlines are in the format of what someone pronouncing GIF with a hard G might say:

If you have any problems with the text below, send them to me via Twitter after looking through the rebuttals page. This is a documentation of the facts, of what the rules of the English language has to say about the pronunciation of GIF. This is not meant to counter any arguments that is done in the big red link above. This page is dedicated to those who are confused and want to learn what the correct pronunciation is, or those who want to convince a dear friend to see the world the same way you do.
#Choosy programmers choose gif how to#
This Web page is an instruction on how to say the word “GIF” out loud, and the reasons behind why it is said like it is. What’s more, a FAQ for the format even addresses the issue saying, “‘GIF’ is specified in the GIF specification to be ‘jif’, as in ‘jiffy’, rather then ‘gif’.” But it does also add, “This does seem strange because the ‘G’ is from the word ‘Graphics’ and not ‘Jraphics’.”Īnd while logic may have nothing to do with it, Wilhite is also often quoted as saying that it was “jif” and that’s because “‘Choosy programmers choose ‘jif,’” referencing a Jif peanut butter commercial that says “Choosy mothers choose Jif.Now available: THE TL DR EDITION Introduction The correct pronunciation, according to Wilhite, is “ jif.” If you search for Wilhite and GIF pronunciation you’ll find various sources that say he not only pronounced it “jif” but he corrected those who did otherwise.
