Separated by a Common Language

Interestingly, I spell it "woah" and am actually bugged by the "whoa" spelling. And I'm a speaker of American English.

I maintain the distinction between WH /hw/ and W /w/ ("which" /hwItS/ does not sound like "witch" /wItS/). However, I use the "whoa" spelling, even though I pronounce it "woe" /woU/. Has anybody ever pronounced "whoa" as /hwoU/?

Molly, I can't help wondering whether the "whoa" spelling (from earlier "woah") came about because of aspirating the /w/ in tense situations. I think it's quite common for this interjection to be uttered in hasty excitement, with the aspiration a result of hurried expulsion of air as one begins shouting. In such situations, it's quite possible the "w" could come out sounding like /hw/, and then the spelling could have been adapted to fit the sound.

The trick is, rather than cultivating the desire to be right, to cultivate the desire to become right and remain so. That way, when you find out that you were wrong, instead of being crushed, you are elated because you were wrong but have now become right. And because you're elated, you then rush off to tell your nearest and dearest that whereas previously you were wrong, you are now right, and isn't that amazing? And of course that totally overrides any recollection of how obstinately and vehemently you were sticking to your incorrect opinion before.

John, how funny!

I was just going to note that 'woah' has spread quite far into American usage, through the internet. I haven't performed a statistical analysis, or anything, but I seem to recall that it's heavily used in some of my favorite online forums.

But that could just be my impression, that since 'woah' is 'non-standard' in AmE, it's automatically more notable. Ya never know, with the human mind......

In the interests of full disclosure of wrongness becoming rightness, I must admit that if I had ever been asked,which fortunately I never was, I would have said as an English speaker from the South of England, that 'whoa' was the standard English form and that 'woah' was an American import.

I don't think I've ever seen the "woah" spelling, but if I did I'd just assume the writer was an illiterate idiot. I'm British.

In fact, when I saw the title of this post I thought "Oh, do Americans spell it 'woah'? That's interesting"

I must admit I've never thought about spelling that before, but I think that if I had I would have gone with woh or woe and hoped for the best.

I always used to get confused about this, so I decided to implement my own rule. "Whoa" for "Stop, horse". "Woah" for "Hello, my name is Keanu Reeves".

I (Southern England) grew up spelling it "Whoa!" and considered the "Woah!" spelling to be illiterate tabloidese, having, thus far, only seen it in the red-tops. Ah well, you learn something new every day, as they say - but if I ever have occasion to write it, or even use it, I shall still spell it "Whoa!"

Expanding on my previous comment, I deplore the spelling "whacko" for "wacko" because I don't pronounce the H.

@John Cowan: I hesitate to recommend cultivating the desire to become right. The most fanatically intolerant fundamentalists are always the converts. Whereas "becoming right" ought to be a lifelong process, too many view it as a once-and-for-all event which they look back on with a smug complacency, or worse.

@mollymooly: since all of these have come to us from 'ho', and early spellings like 'who' included the 'h', I'd think it possible that it started out as /hw/. I think there can be some preaspiration (though not as precisely made as hwen one says hwich) when saying it emphatically (which one tends to do anyway). Not sure if I actually ever say it that way in natural circumstances, but I can say it in a perfectly believable way right now at my desk...

Sorry, my last comment should have been directed
@Rick S
more so than mollymooly.

I'd be cautious, Rick, about assuming that 'woah' is earlier than 'whoa'. There are only a few years' difference between the earliest quotations for the two, and interjections are the kinds of things that are particularly hard to pin down in print. Just because the OED found an earlier example of 'woah', doesn't mean that there were no earlier examples of 'whoa'--and they do seem to think that 'woah' is a variant of 'whoa' and not the other way (a)round.

It is not a word that is often written down, in my experience. When I first saw Lynne's posting, I thought she was going to be talking about "whoarrh!!!" which may or may not be the correct spelling for an ejaculation (of the verbal kind) that someone a man might make when seeing a photo of a scantily-clad lady in a tabloid newspaper.

Oooh, I meant to include that!

I usually see it as something like phwoarrr. See this. Definitely should write more on this subject at some point!

Actually, Ginger Yellow raises an interesting point. I feel inclined to agree with the statement that "whoa" would be used to stop a horse (a command), whereas "woah" is used to express surprise (an interjection/exclamation).

As a native Brit (although admittedly also a former US resident), I'd always go for 'whoa'. The spelling is particularly useful when something's proper impressive and/or surprising; the initial 'wh' can be extended for some seconds (preferably with puffed cheeks and furrowed brow) for effect, which is not possible with a simple 'w'.

To my (untrained) eye 'woah' follows 'Noah' because the 'h' qualifies the 'a', encouraging us to sound it, whereas in 'whoa' the 'h' qualifies the 'w' and the 'a' the 'o', which as we all know is the important bit of the word.

I (US English) always pronounced the "w" and "h" in "whoa," until I began to ride horses and discovered that it is, of course, "HO! or HOOOOoooo! to those in the know.

When I'm particularly eager for a horse to stop, I sometimes slip back into the "whoa!" pronunciation. It's much less effective- though probably because the horse can sense my lack of concentration/confidence, not because they notice the "w."

It's always poor form for a first-time commenter to go off-topic . . . but I'm pretty sure "woah" was also the sound TinTin's dog Snowy makes when in distress, at least in the English translations. I never figured out how to pronounce it.

In French, Milou barks "Wouah!" or "Ouah!"

Are these American horses, Macha?

It's official: in Colorado, it's WhoaI'd guess that the 'wh' association with horses may be related to other horsey noises like 'whinny' and 'whicker' which are onomatopoeic.

The spelling variation whoar/phwoar, like whew/phew, suggests an initial voiceless bilabial fricative.

Picky, they are American horses, though a few have fancy European pedigrees. They're also spoken to a lot in Spanish, so I guess they're trilingual- US English, Spanish and Equine.

Well, that's your problem, you see, Macha. So many people think that if you just speak English loud enough, anyone can understand it. Probably the same thing goes for Spanish. Take the trouble to speak to the poor souls in Equine, for heaven's sake.

I'm with mollymooly on pronunciation. "Woe!!!" But a long, long vowel rising and then falling in strength. And, being a Londoner, I have the ghost of a "w" at the end of the vowel.

When I saw the title, I thought, 'Oh, because whoa is what you say to a horse, and woah is the interjection, right?' and then I was a little disappointed when that didn't turn out to be the resolution. I'm glad Ginger Yellow said it.

All the English variants on the Mac spellcheck (well, currently I'm using Safari on Windows, but I assume it uses the same word list as in the systemwide spell checker on Mac OS X) say that woah is wrong.

I'm adding my thoughts in agreement with Macha (great name for a horsewoman, by the way!) and disgruntled. I'm American, grew up in Colorado and rode horses for many years. I didn't see the spelling "woah" until I found the internet, and always by young people who presumably are spelling it the way they pronounce it. It always pains me to see it, however, as I was taught "whoa" is the correct spelling.

I also learned to pronounce it "Ho!" while riding, but I tend to say "woe" in conversation. :) And I will add that at the famous Spring Creek Ranch resort in Jackson, WY, the stop signs all say "Whoa."

I wonder if there's any connection to the spelling of "yeah". Do some people spell it "yhea"? Or some other variant?

Constance: Funny, yes, but also serious. I actually do cultivate this viewpoint, though not always successfully, to be sure.

Mollymooly: Quite so; nevertheless, the process as I describe it can and should be repeated.

Am I the only one who remembers "Woah" as the barking sound emitted by Snowy, the white dog belonging to Tintin in the comic books of that name?

yeah you're kinda old lol

Well I live in South East England and I would have written it 'woah', but saying it this way also (though wouldn't have thought whoa was wrong either) and am sure I have heard it said 'wo-ah' often...but then maybe I have just created this dellusion in my own mind?!

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I happened to stumble onto your blog post and thought I'd support the "whoa" cause. Below are a few corpus links. COHA has over 400 million words in various genres (spoken, fiction, newspaper, magazine) balanced across the years, and the BNC, although much smaller, also has genre balance. It appears from these that "whoa" is the more accepted form in either dialect...

COHA (whoa, woah)
BNC (whoa, woah)

Great post!! I'm an Assyriologist but often wish I'd studied linguistics!

In defense of those of us who misspell whoa, to the person who assumed that those who spell it woah are illiterate idiots, I think it's forgivable to misspell slang words that are hardly ever written down.

But then again, I'll admit that the advent of spellcheck and the internet has made me a pretty bad speller.

That's nothing. I know people who spell it "woe", as in "oh woe is me". Oy vey!

And while nobody, Gordon, spells yeah yhea, there are people who spell it yea. As in "yea, though I walk...."

Actually, conuly, the "woe" in "woe is me" is a completely different word, usually used as a noun (as in this example).

Interestingly, Dictionary.com has "whoa" as the horse-stopper, but does not have "woah" at all. I think, then, that I prefer "whoa" as the word that stops a horse, but "woah" as an non-horse-related exclamation.

As for "yeah" vs. "yea", the latter spelling is actually supposed to be reserved for the word that sounds like "yay", as in "yea or nay".

People who spell the word "whoa" as "woah" are basically illiterate online comment posters. They hear the word, but never see it written in print, a medium typically written and edited by educated people. "Whoa" means "stop", when communicating with horses.

Anonymous, did you read this post?

I'm a young person and American (though I do talk with some British people on the internet, and have thus adopted some of their slang), and I have never felt comfortable with the "whoa" spelling (it just looks "odd" to me, like "cocoa" or something).

Thus, I use "woah," but though my usage will often be intended to be pronounced as one-syllable ("whoh"), I usually read that spelling written by anyone else as "wo-ah."

It's not exactly a logical method, but I don't think I'd ever be able to switch over to "whoa." It just looks too awkward.

As a youngish antipodean, I would have said 'whoa' was the spelling used by illiterates/americans.

To me:
Woah - Keanu Reeves type astonishment, pronounced slowly
Whoa - Rappers appreciating a woman, said quickly

The whole "woah" thing mildly infuriates me. No one under 21 spells it "whoa" anymore and I'm beginning to think that spelling might become a cyclical thing because of the Internet.

In a few years people will bring back "gud" and "appel" and "aks" and no one will call them out on it.

Even when I correct people on it they say that they won't change because they like their way better.

Of course I can't do anything about it. They're right. Well not that it's better but that it is indeed correct. Though they don't care that it's correct they never intended on changing anyway.

I think that's the part that makes me upset. Because these same folks will start up some big stuff for anyone who says "you're" instead of "your" or what have you. And seeing as they didn't even know that their usage of a spelling of a word was technically correct I don't get how they can get off lecturing other folks about a common mistake.

There's also this whole thing where people put the dollar sign behind the amount. It's a new thing. It technically makes sense but it's completely wrong.

Oh well. I guess I better just roll with it. There's nothing I can do.

Woe is me.

What about “whoah”? I think that way is probably coming to me from seeing it spelled both ways, not paying attention to it, so a combination of both ways seems like it.

I don't find the disyllabic American pronunciation of Noah to be significant . The same is true of British pronunciation — and of H-less boa, stoa etc.

Could it be that there's something totally specific to the word whoa that makes the spelling difficult to learn and unattractive to recognise? My hunch is that many are put out by the wh spelling of a short word which isn't a member of the set of grammar words — interrogatives, relatives, conjunctions. As writers, they may be aware that there's conventionally an H in the word, but feel reluctant to use wh for a word where it doesn't feel as if it belongs. As readers, they may register it as less of an anomaly, and so something to be copied.

Unlike other short words such as whit, whet, whale there's a spelling representing an open vowel. It doesn't look so wrong if somebody has put the H somewhere else. With is a different word, andweth could be a word. Both would suggest an unwanted change of consonant, and waleh would suggest an extra unwanted vowel. Whey does have letters representing an open vowel, but there's nowhere we could move the H to without it appearing even worse: wehy, weyh.

It is the same interjection ("whoa") whether expressing surprise or commanding a horse to slow (the meaning is not much different. You're still expressing surprise if you're on an out-of-control horse). Same word, just used in slightly different contexts. Same as how "aw" can be used in different ways: aw, shucks. Aw, cute. Aw, sad. Aw, do I really have to go to bed? I can buy adding extra w's for emphasis in informal online prose (awwwww, cute little baby!) but I draw the line at "awe," which is akin to amazement, and is not an interjection. "Awe, cute"? You can miss me with that one--and with "woah," which is not a word.

It would be interesting to see what the differences are within the UK. I only began to notice 'woah' amongst my contemporaries when I moved south for university.

In Scotland, of course, we do pronounce 'wh' as 'hw', so I'd obviously always spelt the word 'whoa', because it begins with, in my speech, a totally different sound from 'woe'. Same goes for the witch/which, whales/Wales, what/watt, and were/wear/where word groups.

I know this thread originated years ago, but the subject is still alive and well...lol. I just used ngram viewer to do a book search of woah and whoa. I searched British English only from the year 1800 through 2000. Whoa was well ahead while woah hardly registered. Interesting. I always spelled it woah but after seeing the ngram viewer results and reading a little online about the subject, I think I shall switch to whoa. Great discussion.

Came to this topic somewhat late. Had noticed, though fairly recently, that there were people, mostly much younger than I, who spelled it woah, but as they were related to me and I didn't wish to be unkind, refrained from correcting their spelling, thinking that, as with pharaoh, for instance, the correct spelling wasn't highly intuitive. I stand corrected - sort of.

I believe it started because whoever programmed the most widely use spellcheck databases did not flag it as a misspelling. I'm American and the correct spelling has always been whoa until the widespread use of email, smartphones etc.

I was reading a French magazine and the title used Wō (with macron) and I realized in the story that it was meant to be whoa. No aspiration of the "wh" I assume.

I've always thought "whoa" was what you said to mean stop or wait, and it's often associated with horses in my mind.
"Woah" on the other hand is used for amazement or surprise, and I associate it with surfers.
I guess this isn't as widespread an understanding of those spellings as I had thought, but it feels so intuitive to me.

I wish I could hear all of you read your posts out loud because I'm wondering how you pronounce those words. For my entire life, I've said and heard two separate but similar words, one of which I didn't know how to spell. I've even had discussions with multiple groups of people about how to differentiate the two words.

One is "whoa" (or at least how I spell it), and it rhymes with Noah. That means stop or slow down (especially for horses) when you're talking more slowly or emphasizing it. The other is "woe" which rhymes with "grow." I never knew how to spell it, but I didn't usually write it down anyway. That can also mean slow down (but not stop), but is usually said in a sequence, like "woe, woe, woe." It can also be a single exclamation of amazement (like from surfers).

But tonight my two roommates told me that they had never heard of whoa rhyming with Noah and that it wasn't a word. But I have definitely heard it pronounced that way by many people in my life. Maybe it's regional? I'm also from Colorado, for the record. So I'd be interested to know if there is anyone else here who also differentiates the pronunciation of those. From your posts, there were a few that seemed to, but I'm not sure.

After reading this post and a few others, it seems to make sense to pronounce "woah" to rhyme with "Noah" and "whoa" to rhyme with "snow." Maybe I will adopt that.

I'm very late to this party, but while reading the post and some of the comments I realized there is a similar (though quite unrelated) issue going on right now concerning the capital of Ukraine. Is it the two-syllable name I grew up with, Kiev (pronounced kee-ev) or the single syllable Kiyv (pronounced keev)? Our president seems inadvertently to have hastened the switch.

For what it's worth, I always spell it "whoah" and assumed everyone else concurred. "Whoa" seems acceptable, but lacking in finesse, like using straight quote marks instead of the properly curled ones. "Woah" seems like it was written by someone who not only can't spell but doesn't particularly want to.

:)

I am British but have been living in the US for 25 years. I had never seen the woah spelling until relatively recently (within the past few years), and then only on social media. For me it has always been whoa, and I've always associated it with a call to a horse one is riding to stop (even though I have never ridden a horse in my life).

'Woah' is what Snowy/Milou, in the original French of the Tintin books, barks.

BrE (Scot, 60+) I’ve never had to stop a horse, but I’m with Mollymooly and others. To me, the sound is not hwoe, it is woe, and I don’t mentally hear an ah sound tacked on to the end. Given the choice, I might write it something like Wohohoh, to indicate an extended duration of the vowel. Then, I suppose, someone would say that that sounds lik woe-oh-oh, like a Beatles song. It’s difficult.

I’ve never actually seen woah outside this thread. For an exclamation of surprise, I would expect something more like whaaat?

At school, we had to recite the poetry of Robert Burns. To me, the spelling of some of the dialect words bore no relationship to how I would pronounce them, unless pronounciation has changed radically in approximately 250 years. For example, there is the well known vowel shift that oo in English cecomes I in Scots, so foot becomes fit, boot becomes bit and good becomes gid (rhymes with rid). In Burns books, good is invariably spelled guid, and I’ve never been sure how that is meant to sound. If you don’t use phonetic alphabets, writing down how people say things, words or sounds like whoa, is difficult, and will never please everybody.

As a native Brit (although admittedly also a former US resident), I would always go for 'whoa'. Spelling is especially useful when something is impressive and/or surprising; The first 'wh' can be lengthened for a few seconds (preferably with swollen cheeks and frowning brow) for effect not possible.