mic vs. mike

M

mathman

Valued Senior Member
Year ago, short for microphone was "mike". Recently it has become "mic", but pronounced as "mike". What happened?
 
I've seen it spelled "mic" more than 50 years ago. I remember because I didn't like it then any more than I like it now. When I see "mic", I'm hearing "mick", not "mike".
 
Nothing happened. "Mic" and "Mike" have already been pronounced the same and "mike" has never been short-hand for "microphone". That's not to say that no one ever spelled it out as "mike" but that spelling was never commonplace.

Why would it be?
 
mathman said:
Year ago, short for microphone was "mike". Recently it has become "mic", but pronounced as "mike". What happened?
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Been that way a long time.

Not that I'm advocating for any particular explanation for what's in vogue, but note that:

- "mic" is the abbreviation of microphone, as might be printed on a piece of equipment
- "mike" is the abbreviation of microphone, as spoken
 
DaveC426913 said:
Been that way a long time.

Not that I'm advocating for any particular explanation for what's in vogue, but note that:

- "mic" is the abbreviation of microphone, as might be printed on a piece of equipment
- "mike" is the abbreviation of microphone, as spoken
Click to expand...
Since "mic" is pronounced the same as "mike" how would one know? :)
 
Seattle said:
Since "mic" is pronounced the same as "mike" how would one know? :)
Click to expand...
I'd say first came the spoken pronunciation, which sounds like "Mike", and then it started getting spelled like it sounds.

What I should have said was:


- "mike" is what the abbreviation of microphone sounds like, when spoken
 
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what i find even more interesting is the subconscious bias to assert a sense of self into the thought process of manifestation
thus the assertion of "my" being the predominant aspect of association.

equally is the term "i" from "i am"
currently the trend is "i cant"

we have moved over the last few decades from
"i" to "i can" to "i am" to "i cant"

psychology anthropology / psychological sociology & the pro-noun evolution ...

there is a stage of "me" which seems to be unchanging
"me" was the mid to late 80s followed by "we"
but "we" has been sidelined by congruent morphology to become an "us" as a non self inclusive pronoun to validate the variance of race & gender & socio economic class.
 
DaveC426913 said:
I'd say first came the spoken pronunciation, which sounds like "Mike", and then it started getting spelled like it sounds.

What I should have said was:


- "mike" is what the abbreviation of microphone sounds like, when spoken
Click to expand...
My guess is that using spoken mic pronounced mike is cutting off the full word at mike-ro-phone but cutting off the spelling at mic-ro-phone because micr, sort of unpronounceable and micro, a word in its own right, nothing to do with microphone

:)
 
Michael 345 said:
My guess is that using spoken mic pronounced mike is cutting off the full word at mike-ro-phone but cutting off the spelling at mic-ro-phone because micr, sort of unpronounceable and micro, a word in its own right, nothing to do with microphone

:)
Click to expand...
Micro does have something to do with microphone. It's a small "phone".
 
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