[Closed] Words you've always pronounced incorrectly

It is fun being Antipodean. A colleague of mine always loses it when I say "decade" he hears "dickhead" (Scotland). So I work this in whenever I can, including a very serious work conference about serious security stuff. Lots of people in NZ have decks of which they are particularly proud. There is a whole Aussie comedy sketch about it, NSFW but I will try and find it.

I think message should be pronounced mess-ahhge, like a massage. Actually, sausage sounds better like that too.

@Cougar

How would you pronounce "?

Frank Bruno’s Boxing

French counting

Sixty seven, sixty eight, sixty nine, sixty ten...sixty sixteen, sixty ten seven, sixty ten eight, sixty ten nine, Four twenties! four twenties and one, four twenties and two...

I'm sort of impressed really...

Sounds like you need clarification.

😃

Two words I mispronounce regularly are:

statistics = stastistics

fritillary = flitillaly

I can say them properly if I speak really slowly, but if I try at normal speed they just don't come out right.

Also, I say skel-ee-t'l – taught to me by a prof of muscle physiology ... most people seem to say skel-eh-t'l – which seems quite sensible based on skeleton. Finally checked the dictionary today and, if I'm understanding the phonetic symbols properly, it seems that both are fine.

and that his how “99” Flake came by its name.”

The apocryphal story I heard was the the 1/2 flake without a wrapper was item 99 on the sales sheet that Cadbury door to door trade sales used to use to reorder stock when going to news-agents, confectioners and so on back in the day  Head office noticed there was one beach front shop ordering way more than every one else in the country and a lacky was dispatched to find out why, and he saw the owner of the shop sticking them in ice cream cones...Light bulb moment: Star is Born

hmmm unless I’ve forgotten, I would’ve just called this an “inverted comma” back in the day. Bit of a mouthful, but it’s an example of something I’d read or type but never actually say in conversation! Probably just call them “quotes” these days I guess. What did you call them?

We had no idea what they were called, so we named them after the noise your pen made writing them. So they were duh-duts. Eg, "LOAD duh-dut duh-dut" Years later with the rise of the Web it turned out that this was pretty common, kids across the land had regional variations. Dit-dit, dot-dot and so forth.

SRAM

@Cougar ha, had no idea, very imaginative! 🤣

I don’t even know if it’s wrong but Mrs F always laughs when I say “I’m going to (tu)the shop” whereas she insists it is “Going too” which just sounds pretentious to me. Like somebody thinking they sound posh when it just sounds daft. Then again she’s from Cheshire and I’m from West Yorkshire.

Clearly I’m right on this one. Going too would be like saying “I’m going as well the shops” that’s just madness.

I always say donimo instead of domino.

Cocteau Twins fan?

I learned the word inventory from 1980s text adventures, I read it as “in-VENT-ry” – a near-homonym with infantry.

Never heard anyone pronounce it any other way than yours/ours.

Regardless of Bush Jnr, it will always by Nu-Clee-Ur.

You're wrong. I work in the industry, it's universally nu-clear, your version goes in the same sorting bin as al-oom-i-num

wasnt all that long ago (a year or two) i read

“to all intents and purposes”

I always thought it was

“to all intense purposes”

which, i appreciate, makes no sense at all, but it didnt come up often enough for me to appreciate it.

We had a work email from a manager that used "for all intensive purposes". I'm not sure what an intensive purpose is but I imagine it probably shouldn't be performed at work and especially around fuel flasks.

Living in Central Scotland, there are many “u”s added to words (girul, filum, etc.) and swapping of “i”s for “ai”s … gairul for example. Also, dropping of hard consonants … butter … jeepers, it’s not bu-er.

The butter example is a glottal stop, it's a peculiarity of the Scots language as spoken in English.

@nickc it's Gaelic, nothing makes sense because its a completely separate language branch with no relation to English.

Watch out for… great
(They rhyme with… straight

Like shit they do. Maybe if you’re 200 miles south of here.

And… card and ward,

They do though.

Lolwut? How do you pronounce them if great doesn't rhyme with straight and card rhymes with ward?

Quinoa
Go on then, without knowing what its supposed to sound like..
Kwin-wah
Kwin noa
I give up

superlative. It was for years super LAT ive in my head.

And schedule. I know it's SKed-yool like school, not SHed-yool yet every time I'm about to say it in a conversation (let's schedule another meeting in a couple of weeks' time) my brain goes into a weird paralysis and has to try both on for size, before inevitably choosing the wrong one.

Lolwut? How do you pronounce them if great doesn’t rhyme with straight and card rhymes with ward?

Do I need to record myself speaking these?

Great rhymes with strait, neither of which rhyme with straight. Wholly different, though I get why they might be homonyms in some dialects.

What I don't understand is how card doesn't rhyme with ward in any accent.

Could be my age but is it daeta or daaaata ?

And schedule. I know it’s SKed-yool like school, not SHed-yool

One of those is British English and the other American English and I can never remember which way around it is. I think I mostly fudge it with a mongrel sound like the Scottish CH in loch.

I’m with you on straight and great not rhyming but ward and card sound very different when I say them. Ward is just war then d whereas card is car then d. Ward is Ford and card is yard. Totally different and would love to know how you say them @cougar. Language is ace.

Could be my age but is it daeta or daaaata ?

ward and card sound very different when I say them. Ward is just war then d whereas card is car then d.

THAT'S STILL THE SAME BLOODY THING!! How is war and car different?

Dogs and cats, living together. Mass hysteria.

No it’s not 😂 Ward sounds like Ford and card like yard. The a in ward is almost an o whereas card is an a sound. Ford and yard don’t rhyme ergo card and ward don’t either. Can you call me, I need to know how you’re saying these words?

Car

Not car

Ward sounds like Ford

You're a lunatic. (-:

See how you pronounce card and yard? Cross out the c/y and stick a w in there, that's how I'd say ward.

How is war and car different?

😂 can’t tell if you’re now trolling Mr Cougar. You pronounce war and car the same so that they rhyme. Either you’re a crow caw! Caw! or war sounds like a noise you make to make somebody jump (wargh!)

Honesty intrigued as to how you’re saying them both as I’ve never heard them pronounced so that they rhyme or sound similar tbh

Edit - Shit! Have I being saying ward wrong all theses years? I can’t have been though because everyone I know pronounces it like Ford with a W. Where are you from if you don’t mind me asking Cougar?

Just because I can, I like to pronounce Epiphany : Epi-fanny

Similarly I like to pronounce Cacophony : Cack-o-fanny

Have I being saying ward wrong all theses years?

I've no idea whether one is more 'right' than the other. I assumed regional differences.

Where are you from if you don’t mind me asking Cougar?

East Lancashire. Ey up and sithee nah then then.

it’s Gaelic

So what? The thread is titled words you've always mispronounced, not English words you've mispronounced

Cack-o-fanny

Ah, sir requires our Specialist menu.

Based on these last few posts, I think I'd need an interpreter to understand Cougar.

Strait and straight sound the same, and both rhyme with great.

Ford and ward rhyme, as do card and hard. I've never heard anyone say them any other way. Really want to hear a recording of his speech now.

I just asked my partner.

Take the letters w-a-r-d, how would you say that? "word"

Wait, swap the w for a c. "card"

For a y? "yard"

Back to the w: "word"

What the actual... you wouldn't get a prison worden would you?

"Worden! Where did you go to school?"

The same one as you you bloody maniac!

"No, you're the maniac!"

Screw you, I'm going to go argue with the Internet.

what about onward?

Bolognese. I know (or at least I think) the G should be silent (bol-o-nays) but it's either 'bol-og-nays' subconsciously or very deliberately 'Bongolese' for comedy effect.

Back to the w: “word”

But word rhymes with herd...

And the 'ward' in warden still rhymes with ford.

Strait and straight sound the same, and both rhyme with great.

Nah, I’m with Cougar on this but definitely not with ward and card. Straight is streight in Funkville whereas great is the same as grate

what about onward?

Onwud, same as I’d pronounce wood. This is fascinating. Mods, can we have an audio thread?

But word rhymes with herd…

She's just chastised me for this post.

I meant "word" as in w-oh-rd rather than the word word which is werd.

Weird.

As a kid moving from NornIrn to north east England I had to relearn a lot just to be understood, but I've stuck with watching fillums and I pause before saying Newcastle to think about which version to go with.

My favourite bit of accent shenanigans (sweary, but in a nice way).

but how did they get to us? aaron and shiobahn are both apparently hebrew origin, but if aaron came down through greek latin etc to us but siobahn took a branch line of language….?
(I dont know the answer but Im presuming its something like that)

For Siobhan -

Its a version of 'John' off of the Bible

John, Ian, Iain,  Euan, Johan, Yan, Juan, Sean, Shaun, Sean, Jane, Jean, Joanne, Shona, Siobahn, Joan, Janet, Janice, and many many or more are ways of spelling the Hebrew  'Yôḥānān' in different languages and inflected into masculine and famine forms - if theres a country where people read a bible there'll be a way that Yôḥānān will have been translated - and that'll be the basis of transliteration into popular names. So 'Siobhan' is a way of approximating a Hebrew name, in a feminine form in Irish-gaelic n the same way that 'Jane' is in English.

Aaron doesnt seem to have caught on so much in European languages - but around the world typically starts with an H - Haroon / Harun

And schedule. I know it’s SKed-yool like school, not SHed-yool

I think you're wrong there

it's shibboleth, for me

cougar - I assume you'd go stret om instead of straight home, would you

And schedule. I know it’s SKed-yool like school, not SHed-yool

I think this is a US/UK thing, SKed-yool being the US pronunciation.

picture sque

scones

my wife says dayta, I say darta

my wife says foyay, I say foyur

Asterix instead of asterisk annoys me… mildly.

The only one I remember doing myself is Belvoir, in a presentation to lots of people. Somebody corrected me afterwards.

I've heard ciabatta pronouced Kiabatter rather than Chiabatta...everybody knows how to pronounce Ciao don't they? But then chiaroscuro starts with a K sound, vecchio has a K sound as does Como. Pretty weird! "gne" isjust an english "ng" I think.
German "S" sounds are "Z" at the start of words except when they become "sh" as in Stange. "Z" at the start of a word is a "Ts"sound eg Zeitung is "Tseitung". Why are "V" sounds and "F" identical (to my ear at least)? Schwalbe is pronounced "shvaalbeh"!
I'm borderline dyslexic with english though!

Kinda related, my school German teacher pronounced Poem as “Poy-yem”. “Po-em is right? Thought it was just her, then met MsJimmy and she says “Poy-yem” too.

My wife pronounces it 'pome'.

Also the thing you see reflections in is called a 'meer'

My job used to involve occasionally dealing with the Duke of Rutlands estate at Belvoir (Beaver) Castle.

It also involved dealing with with a bunch of pretentious **** estate agents at various branches of Belvoir (Bell Vwar)

It was mostly names for me. I thought Siobhan was See-Ob-Han not Shiv-Awn.

I once spent a night in hospital when I was about 18 and was in a bed next to a bloke with a sign on his bed saying “Nil Orally”. I kept calling him Nil assuming it was an Irish derivation of Neil whilst simultaneously wondering why he didn’t have an Irish accent.

My wife (at work) was using the expression 'I can't be asked'.

Chore -it-so

cougar – I assume you’d go stret om instead of straight home, would you

I'd go streyt ohm. My grandparents would've told me, "thasll avta get thisen streyt ooahm."

I've shed a lot of it but broad Lanky still creeps into my vernacular at times. Be reyt.

I think this is a US/UK thing

Another one (from a recent conference): foci. I would say “fo-kee” with a hard c, but US speakers say “fo-sigh”.

my wife says dayta, I say darta

Only if it’s plural, of course… 😉

foci. I would say “fo-kee” with a hard c, but US speakers say “fo-sigh”.

Really? Foci is the plural of focus. Do they take photos in sharp fo-suss?

(And surely, folk-eye not folk-ee?)

How about Edward Woodward would?

Foci is the plural of focus

Indeed, some cells can have more than one focus of amyloid nucleation.

And surely, folk-eye not folk-ee?

Yes, that’s better than my attempt. 🙂

How about Edward Woodward would?

I think the pronunciation guide given by Noel Coward was that 'Edward Woodward sounds like a fart in the bath"

My wife (at work) was using the expression ‘I can’t be asked’.

Your other wife (at home) is going to be furious

On the Siobhan, Niamh, etc. thing, in Irish, there are quite a few less letters in the alphabet than in English. “Missing” are, j, k, q, v*, w*, x, y and z.

*These two are key here.

The v and w sounds are used loads in Irish and but are made by adding an h to b and m respectively. Just to confuse matters, sometimes “bh” is a w sound and sometimes “mh” is a v sound (as in the name Niamh). Just depends on combination of letters that come before or after, and sometimes it’s dialectical.

On the Siobhan, Niamh, etc. thing, in Irish,

My daughter has a Welsh name as MrsMC refused to entertain my penchant for unspellable Irish names

I remmber Radcliffe and Marconie talking about how the BBC has a 'Pronunciation Unit' - the authority presenters and editors check with on a broadcaster-wide agreed pronunciation when an Icelandic volcano erupts or the leader of splinter group of a faction of ISIS kicks the bucket.

As part of the continuing decentralisation of the BBC its now based in Salford - where the local accent is typified by over enunciated vowels - so you call up to ask how to say Eyjafjallajökull and the phone is answered with a nasal 'Allo, Prownownseation Yownit'

diptheria when its diphtheria

On the Siobhan, Niamh, etc. thing, in Irish, there are quite a few less letters in the alphabet than in English.

There are also letters that have disappeared from the English alphabet. So we also use letter combinations to create sounds for those missing letters. 'Ye olde pub' is pronounced 'The old pub' not 'Yee old pub'. Early printing presses didn't have a 'thorn' - þ - the letter that denoted the 'th' sound, They used 'Y' in its place as at the time the cursive handwritten versions of þ and y looked very similar and as a result þ fell out of use. But the result is we now have an imagined medieval 'accent' because we mis-read the letters they used.

I can't say Cutlery. My Dad couldn't say Statistics and my daughter can't say Position, She says Podigion.

Years ago there was a bloke on the local telly news who said that something was the ‘Eppi-tome’ of bad taste.
I’ve been saying it that way ever since!

In Oz people often pronounce the w in Known, shown etc. I think it makes them sound a bit simple.
Also they pronounce the E in Derby. So wrong.

Saw an English newsreader pronounce Macabre as it’s spelt the other day rather than macarbe.

Mayor is a funny one. Some say Mair.

The brummy Tooth (t’th) is annoying.

Is it keen-wa?

ransos
Free Member

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you,
On hiccough, thorough, lough and through?
Well done! And now you wish, perhaps,
To learn of less familiar traps?
Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard and sounds like bird,
And dead: it’s said like bed, not bead—
For goodness sake don’t call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
(They rhyme with suite and straight and debt).
A moth is not a moth in mother,
Nor both in bother, broth in brother,
And here is not a match for there
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,
And then there’s dose and rose and lose —
Just look them up – and goose and choose,
And cork and work and card and ward,
And font and front and word and sword,
And do and go and thwart and cart —
Come, come, I’ve hardly made a start!
A dreadful language? Man alive!
I’d mastered it when I was five!

Wonderful

And written by a foreigner IIRC.

@Cougar to refer back to my previous visual aid, car/card like Carr, war/warden like Corr. No ****in' idea where ford comes into this mind you.

[why is **** censored? It's a pre-watershed word! (Father Jack's favourite word. After drink.)]

Ford

So what? The thread is titled words you’ve always mispronounced, not English words you’ve mispronounced

Well why ask a question you don't want to know the answer to?

how is a word spelled Siobhan pronounced Shevhaun. And how do you get Ee-fa from Aoife, and don’t get started on the weird ones like Grainne (Graun-Yuh if you’re wondering) .

It's Gaelic which, as I said is a completely unrelated language (just about as far away as you can get) so trying to apply the same rules* as English is a hiding to nothing.

*in as much as there are any

I was blown away recently when I realised people pronounced the H in vehicle. At that point my whole understanding of the English language was reset and I no longer know what's real.

Is it keen-wa?

No. That's Tabitha and Alasdair's little boy. He'll be joining Octavia at prep school after their summer in their  chateau in the Dordogne. Poor little thing.

people pronounced the H in vehicle.

That can’t be the right way though can it? I’ve never heard anyone pronounce it that way.

Arkansas
Someone I unfortunately worked with said 'Ar-Kansas', instead of Ar-can-saw.
True story.

@funkmasterp - many Irish and American people say vee-hee-cull

Haven't you noticed before?

It’s Gaelic which, as I said is a completely unrelated language (just about as far away as you can get) so trying to apply the same rules* as English is a hiding to nothing.

The rules of what letter makes what sound are different in different languages. It's amazing how many anglophones don't get that. And in some languages they have different letters altogether!

Someone I unfortunately worked with said ‘Ar-Kansas

I spent a week with some West Virginians last autumn, and I discovered that there are two pronunciations for the Appalachian mountain range.

App-A-Latch-Un

App-A-Lay-Shun

On enquiring which one they'd use them themselves one turned to the other and said "Jimmy what's the difference between people who say AppaLatchun and AppaLayshun?" The reply was "God's people and cock suckers"

Now you know

@funkmasterp – many Irish and American people say vee-hee-cull

Haven’t you noticed before?

Never come across it. Or if I have it just hasn’t registered.

Never come across it. Or if I have it just hasn’t registered.

Never watched the Dukes of Hazard?

I'm trying to start an alternative pronunciation of tennis marvel's surname Emma ReDACanu.

It hasn't taken off yet, even though I've mentioned it twice to my wife in conversation.