sireen
(saɪˈriːn)
Also syreen.
Repr. colloq. (now chiefly U.S.) pronunc. of siren n. (esp sense 7 b).
| 1915 Kipling Fringes of Fleet 11 Five damned trawlers with their syreens blowing. 1940 Economist 28 Sept. 398/2 The air raids have produced some more new war words... A quite inexplicable new word is the ‘sireen’, which has widely ousted the siren. Its slight resemblance to Eileen and Doreen suggests that it may have arisen from a desire to give the noise a feminine personality. 1943 G. Greene Ministry of Fear i. i. 16 This time of night... It's the sireens. 1957 W. Faulkner Town xxiv. 363 Mr. Connors went to his [car] that had the red light and the sireen on it. 1977 J. Cleary Vortex i. 20 The siren began to wail again:..‘I wish he'd blow up that goddam si-reen.’ |