Trolling (pronunciation)

[Guy Barry]

"Trolling" is in the British media at the moment because of a new law
imposing tougher penalties on people who harass others online. Most people
seem to be pronouncing it with the British short "o" vowel as in "trod",
i.e. ['trA.lIN]. I've mentioned before that I have difficulty with the
sound of "o" before "l" - I'd probably pronounce it as something like
['trA.UlIN], with a diphthong similar to the one I use in "hold". From
previous discussions on this group, though, I suspect that some others may
say something like ['tr@UlIN] with the vowel of "go".

I'm aware that these vowels are often a minefield for this group. To keep
the question simple, do you use a short "o" or a long one?

--
Guy Barry

[Dr Nick]

Well firstly even if the origin is different (coming from a form of
fishing I'd never heard of until earlier discussions) I pronounce
"troll" (and so "trolling" - yes it does go that way in my mind,
whatever I know) the same for the Internet person and the mythological
creature.

As you say, these vowels are a minefield (I can't persuade myself that I
have a different one in "hold" and "go" apart from the effect of the 'l'
in the former).

So to keep it simple, it's a "long" one.

It's "I'm a troll, fole-de-role" not "I'm a troll, fol-de-rol". I can't
be the only person who learnt to pronounce it from this song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=SaoxI1DO6Sk#t=140

[Stan Brown]

On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 10:22:49 +0100, Dr Nick wrote:
> "Guy Barry" <guy....@blueyonder.co.uk> writes:
>
> > [quoted text muted]

> > vowel of "go".
> >
> > I'm aware that these vowels are often a minefield for this group. To
> > keep the question simple, do you use a short "o" or a long one?
>
> Well firstly even if the origin is different (coming from a form of
> fishing I'd never heard of until earlier discussions) I pronounce
> "troll" (and so "trolling" - yes it does go that way in my mind,
> whatever I know) the same for the Internet person and the mythological
> creature.
>

I'm with you -- I pronounce the vowels in "troll" and "trolling"
exactly the same as the vowel in "roll".

I would have thought "trolling" came the verbed noun "troll", but the
Jargon File http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/T/troll.html agrees
with the "trawling" derivation. Nonetheless they are different words,
and a "paws" vowel for the sort of thing done by trolls just sounds
wrong to me.



--
"The difference between the /almost right/ word and the /right/ word
is ... the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning."
--Mark Twain
Stan Brown, Tompkins County, NY, USA http://OakRoadSystems.com

[mumble]

> do you use a short "o" or a long one?

Short.

But I recently came across a variant spelling, "drolling", which suggests both a back-formation and rhymes-with-rolling.

[FromTheRafters]

Guy Barry has brought this to us :

The long one. Trolling rhymes with bowling or polling.

[mumble]

> Well firstly even if the origin is different (coming from a form of
> fishing I'd never heard of until earlier discussions) I pronounce
> "troll" (and so "trolling" - yes it does go that way in my mind,
> whatever I know) the same for the Internet person and the mythological
> creature.

My theory -- everyone has one, so why can't I? -- is that the Internet usage started with someone saying "trawling" in an American accent and someone else, who also hadn't heard of the form of fishing, falsely inferring origin from context.

FWIW, the creature under the bridge rhymes with "doll" in my 'verse.

And I suspect that "troll" is a class-indicator shibboleth in BrE: rhymes-with-roll is U; rhymes-with-doll is Non-U.

[Peter T. Daniels]

A "long" one. There was a story about this on the BBC World Service
News Hour Friday morning, and I didn't notice anything unusual about
the pronunciation of the term -- but it was defined in a far broader
way than it's used here.

Is it that you never use a "dark l" after a back vowel -- for fear,
perhaps,of sounding American? (Despite what they teach British TV
actors in dialect school, Americans do not use "dark l" for every
l in every word.)

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 07:42:35 -0400, Stan Brown
<the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:

>On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 10:22:49 +0100, Dr Nick wrote:
>> "Guy Barry" <guy....@blueyonder.co.uk> writes:
>>
>> > [quoted text muted]
>> > vowel of "go".
>> >
>> > I'm aware that these vowels are often a minefield for this group. To
>> > keep the question simple, do you use a short "o" or a long one?
>>
>> Well firstly even if the origin is different (coming from a form of
>> fishing I'd never heard of until earlier discussions) I pronounce
>> "troll" (and so "trolling" - yes it does go that way in my mind,
>> whatever I know) the same for the Internet person and the mythological
>> creature.
>>
>
>I'm with you -- I pronounce the vowels in "troll" and "trolling"
>exactly the same as the vowel in "roll".
>
>I would have thought "trolling" came the verbed noun "troll", but the
>Jargon File http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/T/troll.html agrees
>with the "trawling" derivation.

<cough>

That doesn't give a "trawling "derivation. It says it comes from the
style of fishing known as "trolling".

In fishing, "trawling" and "trolling" are different actions.

Trawling involves pulling a large net through the water.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trawling

Trolling involves pulling a bait through the water.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolling_%28fishing%29

> Nonetheless they are different words,
>and a "paws" vowel for the sort of thing done by trolls just sounds
>wrong to me.

--

Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)

[Jerry Friedman]

On 10/19/14 6:50 AM, mumble wrote:
>> Well firstly even if the origin is different (coming from a form of
>> fishing I'd never heard of until earlier discussions) I pronounce
>> "troll" (and so "trolling" - yes it does go that way in my mind,
>> whatever I know) the same for the Internet person and the mythological
>> creature.
>
> My theory -- everyone has one, so why can't I? -- is that the Internet usage started with someone saying "trawling" in an American accent and someone else, who also hadn't heard of the form of fishing, falsely inferring origin from context.

You can, but "troll" has meant a kind of fishing since at least 1606,
though the OED says some uses, including the first use and modern
American ones, may involve confusion with "trawl".

It has another sense:

†14. /fig. trans./ To draw on as with a moving bait; to entice, allure.
/Obs./
1565 A. Golding tr. Ovid /Fyrst Fower Bks. Metamorphosis/ ii. f. 4,
They troll mee downe too lower wayes.
1639 J. Ford /Ladies Triall/ v. sig. I3, I foster a decoy here, And
she trowles on her ragged customer.
1684 J. Goodman /Winter-evening Conf./ i. 22 The hopes he is fed
withal trolls him on.

> FWIW, the creature under the bridge rhymes with "doll" in my 'verse.

With "dole" in mine. Can one troll for sole?

> And I suspect that "troll" is a class-indicator shibboleth in BrE: rhymes-with-roll is U; rhymes-with-doll is Non-U.

Indeed, the OED gives only rhymes-with-roll.

--
Jerry Friedman

[Guy Barry]

"Peter T. Daniels" wrote in message
news:3f3f3da5-81fc-4901...@googlegroups.com...

>Is it that you never use a "dark l" after a back vowel -- for fear,
>perhaps,of sounding American? (Despite what they teach British TV
>actors in dialect school, Americans do not use "dark l" for every
>l in every word.)

The problem in my particular dialect (which is heavily London-influenced) is
that I tend to add a [w]-glide to vowels before a "dark l", so a word like
"doll" ends up sounding like [dA.Ul]. However, that's also the way I
pronounce "dole" - as has been discussed previously, [A.U] is now a common
allophone of [@U] amongst younger BrE speakers before the "dark l" sound.
Consequently I have considerable difficulty distinguishing between "short o"
and "long o" before a "dark l" - they're essentially merged in my dialect,
and the spelling doesn't distinguish. Before I discussed it on this group I
wasn't even aware that some people used a "long o" sound in words like
"bold" - it all sounds the same to me.

--
Guy Barry

[Stan Brown]

On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 15:26:30 +0100, Peter Duncanson [BrE] wrote:
>
> On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 07:42:35 -0400, Stan Brown
> <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:
>
> >I would have thought "trolling" came the verbed noun "troll", but the
> >Jargon File http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/T/troll.html agrees
> >with the "trawling" derivation.
>
> <cough>
>
> That doesn't give a "trawling "derivation. It says it comes from the
> style of fishing known as "trolling".
>
> In fishing, "trawling" and "trolling" are different actions.
>
> Trawling involves pulling a large net through the water.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trawling
>
> Trolling involves pulling a bait through the water.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolling_%28fishing%29

Thank you for the correction. I never knew there was a "trolling"
method of fishing, and my brain saw "trawling" where "trolling" was
written.

It's amazing what I learn here, apart from English!

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 12:08:39 -0400, Stan Brown

<the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:

>On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 15:26:30 +0100, Peter Duncanson [BrE] wrote:
>>
>> On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 07:42:35 -0400, Stan Brown
>> <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:
>>
>> >I would have thought "trolling" came the verbed noun "troll", but the
>> >Jargon File http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/T/troll.html agrees
>> >with the "trawling" derivation.
>>
>> <cough>
>>
>> That doesn't give a "trawling "derivation. It says it comes from the
>> style of fishing known as "trolling".
>>
>> In fishing, "trawling" and "trolling" are different actions.
>>
>> Trawling involves pulling a large net through the water.
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trawling
>>
>> Trolling involves pulling a bait through the water.
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolling_%28fishing%29
>
>
>Thank you for the correction. I never knew there was a "trolling"
>method of fishing, and my brain saw "trawling" where "trolling" was
>written.
>

While the methods of fishing are distinct the names given to them are
not so distinct.

OED:

trawl, n.
I.
1. A strong net or bag dragged along the bottom of fishing-banks; a
drag-net; = trawl-net n. 1; esp. that now often distinguished as the
beam-trawl, described in its modern form in quot. 18801. Also
applied to a similar smaller drag-net used for the scientific
investigation of the sea-bottom, dredging for deep-sea organisms,
etc.

So far, so good.

But then:

II.
3. U.S. Applied to a buoyed line used in sea-fishing, having
numerous short lines with baited hooks attached at intervals: see
quot. 18641; a trawl-line. Cf. also trawl-anchor n., trawl-buoy n.,
trawl-roller n. at Compounds 2. to set, shoot, or throw a trawl , to
place a baited trawl-line in position for fishing; to strip a trawl,
to examine a trawl-line in position and remove the fish caught.

(The connection of this with sense 1 is doubtful.)

1864 Webster's Amer. Dict. Eng. Lang., Trawl,..a long line,
sometimes extending a mile or more, having short lines with baited
hooks attached to it, used for catching certain fish, as cod,
mackerel, and the like.
1864 Webster's Amer. Dict. Eng. Lang. at Trawl-line, It is used
in deep-sea fishing, and is over-hauled every hour or so by men in
small boats, who remove the fish (strip the trawl) and rebait the
hooks.

That is the noun. Now for the verb:

trawl, v.
Forms: (Also 17 trowl, 18 troll.)
Etymology: Goes with trawl n. q.v.: compare Middle Dutch traghelen
to drag, < traghel.
1.

a. intr. To fish with a net the edge of which is dragged along the
bottom of the sea to catch the fish living there, esp. flat-fish;
to fish with a trawl-net or in a trawler.

b. To drag or dredge: cf. drag v. 7b.

c. trans. To fish over (a ground) with a trawl-net; in quots. fig.

2. intr. To drag a seine-net behind and about a shoal of herring,
etc., in order to drive, enclose, and catch them. (Also trans. with
the net as obj.: see quots.)

3. trans. To catch or take with a trawl or trawl-net.

And then:

4. Often confounded with trowl, troll v. (q.v.).The following
quot. 1701 appears to be the earliest instance of this confusion.

1701 W. Kennett Cowell's Interpreter at Trawlermen, Hence to
trowle or trawle with a Trowling-line for Pikes.

>It's amazing what I learn here, apart from English!

--

[Steve Hayes]

On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 10:05:15 +0100, "Guy Barry" <guy....@blueyonder.co.uk>
wrote:

>"Trolling" is in the British media at the moment because of a new law
>imposing tougher penalties on people who harass others online. Most people
>seem to be pronouncing it with the British short "o" vowel as in "trod",
>i.e. ['trA.lIN]. I've mentioned before that I have difficulty with the
>sound of "o" before "l" - I'd probably pronounce it as something like

As in "college"?

Nevertheless, I pronounced "troll" like "bowl".

>['trA.UlIN], with a diphthong similar to the one I use in "hold". From
>previous discussions on this group, though, I suspect that some others may
>say something like ['tr@UlIN] with the vowel of "go".
>
>I'm aware that these vowels are often a minefield for this group. To keep
>the question simple, do you use a short "o" or a long one?

In the morning, when I have more time, I'll check Forvo.


--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://www.khanya.org.za/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://khanya.wordpress.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk

[Guy Barry]

"Steve Hayes" wrote in message
news:jku74a5qka0kb2amv...@4ax.com...

>
>On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 10:05:15 +0100, "Guy Barry"
><guy....@blueyonder.co.uk>
>wrote:
>
>>"Trolling" is in the British media at the moment because of a new law
>>imposing tougher penalties on people who harass others online. Most
>>people
>>seem to be pronouncing it with the British short "o" vowel as in "trod",
>>i.e. ['trA.lIN]. I've mentioned before that I have difficulty with the
>>sound of "o" before "l" - I'd probably pronounce it as something like
>
>As in "college"?

That's the way I heard it pronounced on the radio this morning. It sounded
wrong to me, but my intuition about "o" before "l" is not good. I didn't
realize that most speakers used different vowels in "doll" and "roll" until
it was discussed on this group.

--
Guy Barry

[Mark Brader]

Stan Brown:

> I'm with you -- I pronounce the vowels in "troll" and "trolling"
> exactly the same as the vowel in "roll".

Agreed. Anything else is wrong wrong wrongity wrong.
--
Mark Brader, Toronto | "You keep using that word. I do not think it means
m...@vex.net | what you think it means." -- The Princess Bride

[Adam Funk]

On 2014-10-19, Peter Duncanson [BrE] wrote:

> On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 07:42:35 -0400, Stan Brown
><the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:

>>I would have thought "trolling" came the verbed noun "troll", but the
>>Jargon File http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/T/troll.html agrees
>>with the "trawling" derivation.
>
><cough>
>
> That doesn't give a "trawling "derivation. It says it comes from the
> style of fishing known as "trolling".
>
> In fishing, "trawling" and "trolling" are different actions.
>
> Trawling involves pulling a large net through the water.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trawling
>
> Trolling involves pulling a bait through the water.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolling_%28fishing%29

"Trolling motor" is how my mom describes her job in the canoe when she
goes fishing with my dad.


--
You're 100 percent correct --- it's been scientifically proven that
microwaving changes the molecular structure of food. THIS IS CALLED
COOKING, YOU NITWIT. --- Cecil Adams

[Robert Bannister]

"Roll" and "toll" definitely have the "go" vowel, but some others (boll,
droll, knoll, moll) I have heard with varying sounds. I don't think I've
heard "troll" with a short [A.] except for those rock people, originally
from Scandinavia until Tolkien got hold of them.

--
Robert Bannister - troll, troll, fol-de-rol
or whole troll in the coal?

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

On Sun, 19 Oct 2014 10:22:49 +0100, Dr Nick

<nosp...@temporary-address.org.uk> wrote:

>"Guy Barry" <guy....@blueyonder.co.uk> writes:
>
>> "Trolling" is in the British media at the moment because of a new law
>> imposing tougher penalties on people who harass others online. Most
>> people seem to be pronouncing it with the British short "o" vowel as
>> in "trod", i.e. ['trA.lIN]. I've mentioned before that I have
>> difficulty with the sound of "o" before "l" - I'd probably pronounce
>> it as something like ['trA.UlIN], with a diphthong similar to the one
>> I use in "hold". From previous discussions on this group, though, I
>> suspect that some others may say something like ['tr@UlIN] with the
>> vowel of "go".
>>
>> I'm aware that these vowels are often a minefield for this group. To
>> keep the question simple, do you use a short "o" or a long one?
>
>Well firstly even if the origin is different (coming from a form of
>fishing I'd never heard of until earlier discussions) I pronounce
>"troll" (and so "trolling" - yes it does go that way in my mind,
>whatever I know) the same for the Internet person and the mythological
>creature.
>

I don't merge them. The internet "troll" derives from fishing
"trolling": bait-trailing. I pronounce both with the first syllable as
in "trolley".
That sense of "troll"
http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/T/troll.html

The trouble is that some internet trolls are also trolls in the extended
Scandinavian sense: people who are deliberately unpleasant rather than
just provocative coat-trailers.

I pronounce the Scandinavian trolls to rhyme with "rolls" and "bowls".
But I still use the short-o form for all internet trolls.

>As you say, these vowels are a minefield (I can't persuade myself that I
>have a different one in "hold" and "go" apart from the effect of the 'l'
>in the former).
>
>So to keep it simple, it's a "long" one.
>
>It's "I'm a troll, fole-de-role" not "I'm a troll, fol-de-rol". I can't
>be the only person who learnt to pronounce it from this song:
>https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=SaoxI1DO6Sk#t=140