Betta pronunciation

Is it 'Bett-ah', 'Bay-ta' or 'Bee ta'?

You say tomato and I say tomato......

They SAY it's Bett-ah. Personally, it doesn't matter to me either way.

Technically it's bet' tah (because of the double 'T' and after the scientific name 'betta splenden' but it's been mispronounced for so long I think both are widely accepted. Personally though, I am impressed when I hear the proper pronunciation and I think if you work in the aquarium industry, you should probably pronounce it correctly.

When I hear Bay-tah I think there must be something rudimentary and unfinished about my fishie. I know my bettas are definitely the full and complete version.

At least it's not an Alpha... or Release Candidate..

The proper pronunciation is bett-ah (as you put it above). The reason for the mispronunciation is that some people think they are really smart and that the name would be of greek derivation and must be the greek letter beta. However, if they would look at the spelling of Betta (with two t's) they might be able to figure out that it is a different word. The word is actually derived from a Siamese word for a war-like tribe of natives called Bettah.

If it seems that this is a sore point with me, it is. I've had numerous idiots try to correct my pronunciation, when I'm the one who is correct in the first place. My daughter has also experienced this.

This also brings up another sore point. Most scientific names are horribly mangled by the hobbyists, at club meetings, stores and auctions. The really annoying thing is when somebody actually pronounces a name correctly and there's always some one around who feels the need to 'correct' them with the most popular mangling of the name. In my book, you'd really better know your stuff before you try to correct somebody on pronunciation.

I think a lot of people started pronouncing it bay-ta after the now-failed Sony video cassette recorder of the same (Beta) name. Remember, it lost out to the VHS version of recorders.

It is moot. What does it matter if whatever is said communicates reliably? Is there a need to be a Safire snob?

My son will be crushed. He named his Betta, 'Epsilon' and thought he was being really cute.