By the way, How do you pronounce bathe now?

By Awonuga Oyinlola The word bathe is a very common one in the sense that almost everyone has a bath regularly.There is however an irony with bathe.The rate at which it is used is almost the same as it is mispronounced.That is why I asked the question in the topic of this lesson The problem has its root in the fact that bath and bathe are usually interchangeably used rightly or wrongly.To complicate the matter some experts say while bath is strictly a noun, bathe is essentially a verb. Indeed, in British English bath is also used as a verb while bathe also assumes the role of a noun in one or two contexts.The grammar of the word is not our focus here but we can quickly exemplify this observation: E.g She wants to have a bathe now (correct) She wants to bath now (correct now as a verb) Are you sure she wants to bathe now (correct as a verb) In bath the letter produces a long vowel /a:/, but in bathe while we also have a long vowel, it is not the /a:/ type indeed in bathe what we have is a diphthong, which is a combination of two vowel sounds. In this wise the a in bath is not to be pronounced as the /a/ you have in sea, bat and bath. It is also not the /a:/ in star, bard or pass.Rather, it is /ei/, the type you have in lait, late, waste, and freight it is thus pronounced as bEIthe. What this means is that when you want to have a bath and say you want to baf or bat you are committing double errors.You should therefore take time to further study the correct articulation of both. Source:Punch/Awonuga Oyinlola