Wallah or Voilà

Is the spelling Wallah or Voilà?

An Australian Celebrity/Influencer has been hammered for her use of the word ‘Wallah‘ on one of her posts from August 2020 (pictured below).

She didn’t specify her meaning for the use of the word, but twits twitter readers have said she must have miss-spelled the French word Voilà.

Wallah or Voila

The news headline was

Model Elyse Knowles roasted over spelling mistake

perthnow.com.au

Celeb Spellcheck is a page dedicated to exposing typos and spelling mistakes from Australia’s influencers and suggested that Knowles was trying to spell the French word voila.


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But, who added this wording to the original image?

I first thought that maybe she was trying to infuence the Australian spelling for the French word, but after doing some checking, it seems she might be using the American spelling for the word, which might have been first used back in the 1960/70s, and became more common in the 2000s, according to a post on gramaphobia in 2016.

The question wording in 2016 was: “I suppose this because Americans are ignorant of other languages, and so use an American English pronunciation and spelling for foreign-sourced words”.

“The use of “wallah” for “voilà” seems to have shown up in print in the late 1990s. (A reader of the blog recalls hearing it in speech in Indiana in the 1960s and ’70s.)”

In early 2006, the use of “wallah” for “voilà” came to the attention of the Eggcorn Forum, a language discussion group. – The forum’s first of several “wallah”-vs.-“voila” threads began with this Jan. 5, 2006, comment: “As in, ‘be sure to beat the eggs thoroughly before you add them to the pan, and wallah! Your omelette will be perfect!’ ”.

Rather than complaining about possible spelling mistakes, maybe the correct translation should be considered, for the Australian version of the foreign word.

Do we use the American “Wallah” or the French “Voila”, for the Australian language?

To some people, it is more important to spend time trying to put people down in public.

Another twitter said the complainer was: spending an unhealthy amount of time think(ing) about how this influencer spelt ‘viola’.

How do you Pronounce the French word Voila?

Pronunciation
vwa.la

Origin
From vois (“see!, look!”), second-person singular imperative of voir (“to see, to look”) and là (“there”), literally meaning “look there!”.

English:
Voila is the alternative spelling of the French voilà.

American:
It appears this might be changing from the original English version.

Australian:
Most still use the English, but some it seems, are using the newer American version.

The Americans do seem to change many spellings from the original English.

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