METATHESIS

Recently, a friend (who was born and reared in Oregon), and I were together at a function when another attendee said the word "ideal" when he clearly should have used "idea";  my friend and I exchanged pained expressions, and she whispered to me that she thought that only happened in her former locale.  I said that I thought it was just peculiar to my area.  She said, "There's a word for it--METATHESIS."  Thrilled with hearing a new word used, I was soon off to my computer.

Metathesis:  noun:  "transposition of letters, syllables, or sounds, in a word, such as the  pronunciation of "comfortable";   I guess metathesis does not apply to the "ideal/idea" quandary.

With a little research, I learned that the usage of "IDEAL" for "IDEA" is usually a problem mostly in the northern parts of the United States.  My brother asked, "What's the difference than people saying "IDEAR" for "IDEA" in Massachusetts?"  I said, "That's just a regional dialect;  they know that IDEA and IDEAR are the same word;  they just pronounce it that way." My favorite comment about "Boston accents" was when there were gibes about JFK's pronunciation of "Cuber" for "Cuba":  my brother said he had to use the "R" he'd left out of "Havard" (Harvard)!

I no  longer quiz people about the peculiar usage;  however, several years ago, I talked to a friend because she says ideal for idea.  She said that her family also says that.  I asked, "Didn't anybody ever tell you the difference?"  She was confounded and after my saying "idea", she would repeat "ideal";  then I was confounded and asked, "Do you know they are two different words with completely different meanings?"  She stated that she could not hear the difference.

I read that it was the same problem-- with people who say "AKS" or "AXE" for "ASK"--that they cannot HEAR the difference.

My brother quipped, "What about Presidents who don't know the difference between nuclear and nucular--whatever that is?"