Why is it pronounced "Zed"??
 

As I was watching Top Gear video.. I noticed the British guy kept saying.. 350 Zed... is that how the Brit's pronounce Z?

...w, x, y, Zed?

It is indeedy!

yup, they really do say that. Weird, huh? Even my Philippina wife says it. When I told her it's pronounced Zee, she busted out laughing, certain I am nuts (i might be, but not for that reason.)

I'm still waiting for someone from England to explain this one to me... Because I just head BMW Zed 4. :P

I don't think there is any explanation needed.
However, here is one. As most european languages, English has been influenced by other neighbouring languages throughout the ages. Ancient Greek left the letter Z in the alphabet of almost all of them. And Z is ZETA in Greek (Zèt in French for example).

God knows why it became Zee when you crossed the Big Pond...

Yes, they pronounce it Zed. The question you should be asking is why we pronounce it as Zee....

We're Americans, we're right. They're wrong.

Yeah right :).. and maybe just maybe there's a reason why Americans are disliked the world over?

Evveryone loves Americans, if they don't we park the Army there.

It was we radical Americans who changed the pronunciation from the British Zed to the American Zee. It had something to do with wanting to be different right after that nasty business about breaking away from England and wanting to be an independent nation.

According to the Concise Oxford Companion, "The modification of zed ... to zee appears to have been by analogy with bee, dee, vee, etc."

And besides, now the Alphabet Song rhymes at the end.

mm

And can you imagine saying : Zed Zed Top?

Do the British have a different alphabet song?

Can you imagine a frenchman saying Zee Zee Top?
Zizi in french = dick

And why the heck is Y pronounced Why? And not Yee or Yed?
And why is W pronounced doubleyoo?

hehehe language is funny that way.... If you line-up two of the letter "U's" it looks like a "W".

Hence "Double - U" = W

Other languages have a similar pronunciation..

More or less: it's 'double Vé' (i.e. double Vee) in French.

Double V, that makes a lot more sense!!! :)

VV = W

Chinese is so much simpler. Each word is represented by a character.

Sort of. Each idea is to be represented by a character. That may include sounds and letters if required.

In Greek, the equivalent letter for "Z" is zeta, pronounced zee-ta
The English distortion zay-ta only complicates the issue of understanding the Greek origins of English.
For that matter, beta is properly pronounced vee-ta and delta is thel-ta.

You don't want me to explain gamma. Its obscene, anyway.:p

I've read that somewhere before...

In this same thread maybe?

Well.....At least we (American's) pronounce aluminum correctly.

al-oo-min-um

NOT

al-oo-mi-ni-um


First time I saw TopGear, and they were describing the Lotus Elise, I thought they made up some new type of X-men metal for the car. Then I realized it was just aluminum.... :P


And at least we spell thing correctly.
theater vs. theatre

It's pronounced thee-ah-terr.
Not thee-ah-tray or thee-ah-truh

You indicated ZETA without noting that it is ZEE-TA.

"Zed" is not "Zee-d".

Not quite!
The Brits spell it aluminium and pronounce it alumi-nium. The Americans aren't spelling it right. Otherwise you'd have calcum, sodum, potassum, uranum etc.

The English invented the English language. So, you cannot claim that the American pronounciation is the correct one, except for words that you invented.

Did you know Canadians also pronounce it "Zed"?