I’ve always pronounced the word “Southern” to rhyme with howthurn. I know most people say it like “suthurn” instead. I didn’t realize that the way I pronounce it is considered weird until recently!
I’m fluent in both Spanish and English (obv). When speaking English, I’m conflicted on whether I should pronounce Spanish loan words in a shitty English accent like everyone else, or in a proper Spanish accent. So instead I pronounce them as horribly as I can.
Jalapeño is “yah-la-PEEN-oh”. Fajita is “fa-JAI-tah”. Quesadilla gets “QUAY-sah-dilah”
(As a joke of course)
Habanero is pronounced jabaññññero.
ah! WITH the doppler effect?
Overheard in a pizzeria:
Customer: I’d like a quattro sta… quattro shta… How do you pronounce it?
The Turkish and not Italian waiter: Shtuh gon ee (for stagioni)
My family is french/english and we like to do the same with french loan words
In the army it was “Qu’est-ce que le shake?” or so, for “what’s shakin?”
I worked with a guy who did the exactly opposite, in Calgary (and that may explain a lot):
- comPLETEly fluent in French
- would only speak French by imitating those early “Bonjour Pierre!” tapes with the over-done voice pitch.
It was both impressive as hell, and funny. And he’d do this for like a few minutes at a time as part of a conversation. We’d try and get him to break but his vocab was strong (for an anglo) and he’d never break character. I fantasize about him meeting my Parisienne friend and conversing back and forth, her a little stereotypical and him a little bizarre.
You should go the Tralerpark Boys route for pronouncing jalapeño.
I like it!
Quesadilla looks like there’s room to mangle it further:
KWEZZ-ah-dill-ah
or even
kwe-SADD-l’a
like there was saddle in there
As an American, it didn’t click for me until I visited London for the first time why names like Leicester and Gloucester were pronounced the way they are by Brits. My dumb American brain sees the names as Lei-cester and Glou-cester rather than Leice-ster and Glouce-ster.
Was on holiday in Scotland with my father. And bless this girl at the tourist information who realised that when we stupid Germans said “glennis law” that we meant Glenisla (glen ila).
Unfortunately our linguistic history is a huge tangle and there are few safe assumptions. Depending on where you are in Scotland, the places names might derive from Gaelic, Pictish, Welsh, Norse, or English, and then they probably got Anglicised at some point but it could have happened at basically time within the last five centuries. A substantial number of the non-Gaelic ones are doubly messed up because they got Gaelicised first and then the Gaelicisation got Anglicised. Glenisla is a good example - glen derives from Gaelic, and nobody is sure where isla comes from.
Still, Glenisla is a lovely area! Lots of good hikes there. I hope you had a good time.
It was awesome. Best vacation ever. We went to Glenisla for their comparatively small highland games. They had dancing competitions, bag pipe competitions and of course various sport competitions. Apparently one of the competitors was the reigning shot putting or hammer throwing or so world champion. Every time he threw something the judges went back extra far and still he managed to go beyond the field. He was huge. My father and I dubbed him Monster.
Wow, I’m certain I would’ve done the same. Think I’d make myself a cheat sheet for Scotland and Wales when I get around to visit. Knowing that Cymru is pronounced “com-ree” gave me anxiety about butchering names there if ever I’ll need to ask for directions.
We’ll usually understand if you get it wrong. There’s a lot of extremely counterintuitive ones. If you’re American, the most likely trap is Edinburgh - it’s not EE-den-berg, it’s EDD-in-buh-ruh or EDD-im-bruh.
I’ll also just have to ask that the same grace is returned when I inevitably fuck up basically any place name based on anything Native American, because I don’t know how any of those languages work
oh wow, you blew my mind
Living in Los Angeles as a white person, I refuse to pronounce street and city names that are Spanish the English-speaking way. Knowing Spanish since I was a kid from school and using it on a daily basis, my brain simply doesn’t butcher the pronunciation by default.
It’s caused confusion though for sure. I used to live near a street called La Tijera, but Americans pronounced it almost like Spanish “la tierra” which is a completely different word, and I couldn’t figure out where this street was that everyone was talking about.
There was a street in the town I grew up in that everyone called “Awkwee-estahh” . It was Aqui Esta, which is a cute street name, but if you pronounced it correctly no one knew what you were talking about lol
That is a hilarious street name, omg
Houston, Texas has a street called Kuykendahl (or something similar). People kept mentioning this ‘kirkendall’ street and I could never find it.
So, do you call it “Loss Anjeless” or “Lōs On-hay-lays?”
Low’ En’hee-lews
Herb with the H. I just have to pronounce it with the H.
spoiler
My favorite Youtuber Jacksepticeye also agrees with me
Also, Ark-Kansas. Anything else is weird.
Its literally Kansas with an AR
ARK-KANSAS
simple
I just say ‘Orb’
I’m German. One day my house was being renovated and they were working with jackhammers to remove parts of the facade. It was incredibly loud and I couldn’t bear it. I lived close to university and had recently stopped working in one of the institutes. I knew though that my former colleagues had couches in some of their offices so I thought I’d give them a visit. I walked over to the institute and greeted my Australian former coworker. I explained about the noise in my house and said I was “looking for asylum”. Knowing the word “asylum” only from written language, I had no idea it was not actually pronounced “ay suh lum”. He asked “you’re looking for what?” as he obviously hadn’t understood. I repeated “ay suh lum” confidently and he politely said “ah”. Not long after, I learned the correct pronunciation of asylum and that memory has haunted me ever since. It’s been almost 10 years but I still cringe about it.
I understand the feeling, but that fear of being wrong is a plague, it prevents learning altogether. Especially languages ! we should be brave enough to proudly make mistakes and learn from them. Proudly. With pride
English is a bastard language without phonetics so you’ve just got to memorise every word, every phrase, and of course every idiom since half the language is just archaic expressions cobbled together without rhyme or reason (e.g. “rhyme or reason”)
That being said, German has a lot of traps to. The pronunciation of “ee” in himbeere and beerdigung, and guessing the spelling of words using “e” vs “ä” is a nightmare
US American. I’ve lived overseas a long time and pronounce the ‘h’ in ‘herbs’ because, as Eddie Izzard once said, “it’s got a fucking ‘h’ in it”. I don’t know when I switched but my mom laughed at me when we had a call recently.
One I only noticed a couple years ago: turmeric (was saying, and still frequently hear) ‘toomeric’.
I tend to say Wensleydale, Tuesleydale and Thursleydale as the days of the week. It started as a thing I said to myself because I found it funny, but occasionally I’ll slip and say one of them out loud when I’m tired.
I pronounce azure as “uh jzer” with emphasis on the second syllable and most other people say “aa jzer” with emphasis on the first.
Huh. I always thought the colour had the emphasis on the second syllable and had no idea about the software, but it turns out I’ve been wrong all along.
I’m going to blame “Azores” (which can be either, apparently) and “assure” (which is always emphasis second) for this as being the model(s) for my mistake.
It’s Helico-Pter not Heli-Copter. It’s a greek word from hélikos (screw, spiral, winding) and pterón (wing).
And since I’m fun at parties, I consequently pronounce it with a slight pause before and stress on the P and not a miniscule pause after the I and a slight stress on the O.
Bona fide. It’s latin, you say it Bow-nah Fee-day.
The mountain range on the eastern side of the U.S. is the ‘apple-at’chans’. At least nearly everyone from the southern end of them say it that way (source: I’m from there).
‘Apple-ay-shuns’ is just as strange as saying ‘Nor-folk’. Immediate indicator of you’re an outsider.
Huh.
I’m from the PNW and I’ve always pronounced it Apple-Ah-Shuns.
For Norfolk… I’d basically pronounce that as Nor-Fuck.
Yeah, I’m saying a whole lot of people say it with a “shun” at the end. I blame the media and people originally trying to differentiate themselves from a perception of being an ignorant hillbilly. The hillbilly prejudice is much better now, but I was still personally encountering it even in the aughts. And the pronunciation has stuck because "that’s the way you’ve always heard it said. "
Everyone who lives in those hills (with the exception of a few pockets of yankees) says it “at-chan”.
“It is called ‘baggel’. I lived in New York.”
Yosemite rhymes with Vegemite. Change my mind.
I’d never heard it pronounced until recently, and until I did I mentally pronounced it as if it’s a very street way of greeting Jewish people.
vuh-JEH-mi-tee
Hey that’s pretty cool. Not sure if you’ve changed my mind, but I’ll try it out.
As a marmite loyalist I might have to start doing it too
Same. Anemone and all these words with fancy quirky e’s can kindly fuck off
YouChyoob.
Baggel for Bagel.
It’s “boggle” in my household. Wife and I are confirmed dorks.
Baggel and Beggel drive me nuts! Bay-gull or GTFO :)
God dammit Britta
