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I can't imagine saying crick for creek. It sounds like the epitome of hillbilly slang.
The people who say crick usually also pronounce "roof" with a vowel sound like in "rook", not in "proof", and sometimes even "riff". It is not an error, it is a regionalism. Those same people might also pronounce "root" like in "rook", and even better, they say "rit beer".
Those usages are not necessarily southern (or as you say, hillbilly), and are often heard in the midwest as well. It is equally common in the south to hear people over-pronouncing long vowels -- like "dia-beet-tease", or "ought-toe parts".
"Sherbert" drives me up a wall. In the area where I live most people say sherbert. It makes me want to congratulate anyone who pronounces it correctly.
I've heard it both ways, and I first heard it pronounced "Sherbert". It seems to me that the spelling without the "r" came later.
I have heard people pronounced "salmon" as "SAL-min", too.
These things likely go back to days when people were first introduced to such products and only had the spelling to go by.
The people who say crick usually also pronounce "roof" with a vowel sound like in "rook", not in "roost". It is not an error, it is a regionalism. Those same people might also pronounce "root" like in "rook", and even better, they say "rit beer".
Those usages are not necessarily southern (or as you say, hillbilly), and are often heard in the midwest as well.
My sister lives in northeastern PA, in the Pocono mountains. People up there say "crick", and when I'm visiting her, I refer to the body of water behind her house as a crick, too. It's fun to say.
To me, it's "erbs and spices" or "erbal essence". Then miss Martha came along and tried to get us to say hhhherbs, but I ain't buyin' it!
From "Reader's Digest - Success With Words":
The preferred Standard American pronunciation is /urb/, but /hurb/, used by a minority, is also correct. In British, only /hurb/ is accepted as standard; dropping the /h/ is considered uneducated. This is one of the many cases in which American usage is the more conservative. In Middle English the word was generally spelled /erbe/, having been borrowed from Old French /erbe/. Ultimately, the French word is from Latin /herba/ = 'grass, herb.' When this fact was realized, the /h/ was restored in both French and English spelling. Beginning in the 19th century, the British also began to pronounce the /h/, but most Americans continue to ignore it.
I pronounce it without the /h/.
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