I wonder, though, if this lack of difference in pronunciation is behind a question that’s confounded me for years: “why do so many people spell the singular as ‘women’ by accident (e.g. ‘a women’), but I’ve never seen something like ‘a men’)?” I always chalked it up to “a men” looking weird as basically “amen”, but this could be it instead.
It’s strangely kind of either/or for the pronunciation if you take a look at the IPA pronunciation of the words.
I wonder, though, if this lack of difference in pronunciation is behind a question that’s confounded me for years: “why do so many people spell the singular as ‘women’ by accident (e.g. ‘a women’), but I’ve never seen something like ‘a men’)?” I always chalked it up to “a men” looking weird as basically “amen”, but this could be it instead.