potayto, potahto

English

Etymology

Supposedly uses the American English and British English pronunciations of the word potato, by analogy of tomato (see tomayto, tomahto). Unlike tomato, only the former pronunciation is used in either American or British English. Allusion to George Gershwin's song "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off": "You like potato (/ˌpəˈteɪtoʊ/) and I like potato (/ˌpəˈtɑːtoʊ/)".

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˌpəˈteɪtoʊ ˌpəˈtɑːtoʊ/

Interjection

potayto, potahto

1. (informal) That is a distinction without a difference.
   • 2001 August 31, Robert Hickey <robhic@bellsouth.net>, “Re: Vegetarian (fruitarian?) all raw food diet - Ca-AEP”, in alt.support.mult-sclerosis (Usenet):

     "He says he has never had a **remission**. You thought he was being smug about 'lack of relapse(s)'."
     I think it's more like "potato - potahto." No remission to me says unchanging and, hence, no relapse.

   • 2002 July 2, Dave Witzel <dwitzel@nyc.roadrunner.com>, “Re: beers in NYC”, in alt.beer (Usenet):

     "Who's whining, pissant? I'm berating!"
     Potato, potahto.

   • 2004, Elaine Cunningham, Shadows In The Darkness, Tor/Forge, →ISBN, page 49:

     What he liked to call helpful, however, was more like Gwen's idea of controlling and manipulative. Potayto, potahto, and don't let the door hit your ass on the way out.

   • 2007 October 7, David Rush <kumoyuki@gmail.com>, “Re: Nested Lambda function gives error in common lisp, guile, emacs lisp but works in scheme. Why?”, in comp.lang.scheme (Usenet):

     "In Common Lisp (and presumably Emacs Lisp), functions are as first-class as in Scheme and elsewhere. You just have to do a bit extra to use them as first-class values, that's all."
     Potayto, potahto. That 'bit extra' is what makes them 'not first-class denotable' in my book.

Synonyms

• same difference
• tomayto, tomahto

Translations

to suggest a distinction without a difference — see tomayto, tomahto