What words do you hear people mispronounce that drives you nuts?

off TEN

Nuclear

YOU kraine.

It's u KRAINE.

And no "The"

verb tense ex: these clothes need washed

It's ESPRESSO, not "eXpresso."

I am a mental health nurse, and part of my role is to offer people help to stop smoking by referring them to a Smoking Cessation team. The number of people who call it the Smoking Sensation team....

It's restaurateur, not restauranteur.

I hate it when people get this wrong.

Somehow there are many people who say “text ‘tis” instead saying texts.

Val Demings I’m looking at you!

Expecially. And SAL-mon. Also, Scrimps for shrimp. WTF?

Prostrate.

My late mother used to say she lived in assistant living. Not THAT far off-base, really. But we laughed.

chloresterol

Bruce-ket-uh

Not brew-shett-uh

Real-a-tor (Realtor).

Nuk-u-lor (nuclear).

Thank you r7. Had no idea.

It's ask him, no "axe" him, unless you are planning to murder him.

[quote]The number of people who call it the Smoking Sensation team....

Try the new Smoking Sensation!

I do think there’s a difference between not pronouncing a foreign - usually food related - word correctly and botching one that is common, standard English language vocabulary.

Soviet Jewelry

Homage

It's ah-midge, not oh-magh

Qatar

Alex Trebek is a big one to pronounce it "cutter" even correcting people who pronounce it, "Ku-tarr". I even asked a guy I used to work with who was North African and he pronounced it the way I always did as, "Ku-tarr".

Niche as "nitch"

R19 - What’s with all the fuss and bother?

There are words I mispronounce because I’ve only seen them in print.

I always heard the city of Kiev in my head as “key-ev” but now on NPR I hear them discussing “keeve” (rhymes with sleeve.)

Irregardless

R20 Alex is closest. It’s pronounces “cutter” but with a deeper “k” sound and a softer “t.”

R23, KEE-ev is the Russian pronunciation. KEEV is the Ukranian pronunciation.

When Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, KEEV was pushed aside. Now that the Soviet Union is no more, KEEV is being restored.

[quote]R21 Niche as "nitch"

I think both are acceptable. The little voice on the Merriam (not Miriam!) Webster says it both ways.

European journalists, commentators, etc., who mispronounce Obama’s first name as “Bare-ick”.

"asterisk" pronounced as "ass-tur-ick"

"social" pronounced as "so-sull"

[quote]R26 When Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, KEEV was pushed aside. Now that the Soviet Union is no more, KEEV is being restored.

Thank you.

Crying as I type this...

I get annoyed at all the actors/newsreaders -- yes, even on NPR -- who mispronounce words. Just today I heard a guy on CBS This Morning pronounce Marseille "mars-EYE." In this day and age, if you read the news for a living, there is no excuse.

In elementary school there was 1 kid that always said the word library as li-berry. It used to drive me crazy. lol

^^^ Oops! -E. L.

Was watching Sky Sports the day Kobe died and they kept saying “helly copter.” You Brits and your funny words!

Ek-cetera instead of et-cetera. I hear this so much. Ugh

Chicken Kiev looks like it’s vomiting

ITS!!!!!!!!

BICEP is not a word! The correct term is BICEPS, as in "I tore my right biceps" Same with triceps.

I was listening to a podcast yesterday and they kept pronouncing Guillermo del Toro’s first name as “jill-air-mo” - surely the correct pronunciation is “khee-air-mo”?

R36 R37 You were right the first time. IT'S (it is)

Question about Kiev. Is the spelling "Kyev" Russian or Ukrainian?

It's Jewelry not Jewlery

It's Mischievous not Mischievios

R41 Since it's transliterated, there is no "correct" spelling in English.

Not a mispronunciation but rather a misspelling that drives me crazy because I am now seeing it constantly . . . and that's just on DL: "loose" for "lose."

Relator instead of realtor.

Ugh. I hate that one.

But I am loose

Plethora

Another vote for lie-berry.

Feb-you-wary (instead of February)

Docent (doe-sent instead of doe-chent)

[quote]R40 You were right the first time. IT'S (it is)

Yes, I panicked.

My Chicken Kiev in r36 looks like it’s loosing its lunch.

Uh R48

Docent IS pronounced do-cent. Look it up honey.

ath-a-lete

How do you pronounce [italic]FUCK Y’ALL! (?)

"Banal" mispronounced as "BAY-nul," with the emphasis on the first syllable, instead of the correct "buh-NAL,"

Gurl please...it's gurl, PUH-LEASE!

Drives me CRAZY!

The concept of Most Iconic.

Pundant instead of pundit

Thuh instead of thee before a word beginning with a vowel. The other day someone on NPR kept saying something like "thuydea" which made no sense until I realized she meant "the idea."

Integral

I was a math nerd and learned this word as “IN-te-grul” in calculus. Continued pronounced it that way when usI got it to define something as “necessary or central to the theme.”

When people pronounce it “in-TEG-ral” it drives me nuts. But I don’t think they’re wrong. But they probably use superfluous “-e”s AND say the word “oh-MAHJ”

PYOO lit sir instead of Pull it, sir

Artesian instead of artisan (Both are words, of course, but every now and then I hear someone talk about "artesian bread," and it irritates the fuck out of me.)

The concept of "more" or "most" unique.

Bucket is pronounced Boo-kay

Hanger with a hard G. Just no.

Supposably.

Not a mispronunciation, but Screenshotted. Give us a break.

Calling sandwiches sammies. Creeps me the fuck out. What adult talks baby-talk with a straight face?

R38 -- I never knew that. Thanks!

[quote] It's Mischievous not Mischievios

My partner used to have a Twitter follower with the screen name “Miss Cheevous” or something like that.

Pundit. The word does not have a second "n". It is not pundent.

gnocchi and Bruschetta (It's a hard "ch")

[quote]R64 Calling sandwiches sammies. Creeps me the fuck out. What adult talks baby-talk with a straight face?

Is “sammich” okay?

Only to those for whom "delish" is a word, r69. Or "veggie."

Is there an antidote for people who say it in place of anecdote?

"ridden" when they mean "written"

The glottal 't' heard all over the Northeast is right up there with vocal fry for hideous speech habits.

Impor'ant. Cer'ain. Bu'on. Moun'ain.

People that do that should be sent to Re-education Camps. They don't get out until quit their use of glotta 't.'

Known pronounced known.

I’ve heard people use the term “wistful thinking” for “wishful thinking”.

But I guess that’s a different can of worms.

The best one was on Judge Alex when a woman referred to a catalytic converter as a "Cadillac Converter."

The Judge asked her if it was something that converts your car into a Cadillac.

Thank you R73.

X-access instead of x-axis.

R20, the pronunciation of Qatar depends on dialect. In Gulf Arabic, where Qatar is located, qaf is pronounced closer to /g/, thus, gutter. In Maghrebi and Hassaniya Arabic, it is closer to /k/ but more in the back of the throat, cutter. And since Arabic script has inherent vowels, the vowel sounds can vary depending on dialect.

A whole nother instead of a whole other.

[quote]R79 the pronunciation of Qatar depends on dialect.

It’s pronounced “guitar”.

I heard someone on the news pronounce bio-pic as bi- OPIC

This thread makes me kindly flustrated...

R20 the arabic pronunciation is CUT-ter. With a strong k sounds, hence the Q.

Clique as "click".

I've heard that more than once, R82. Including from a youtuber who kept saying "modren" instead of modern. Maybe it was a subtil joke.

When "to" is pronounced "tuh." Sounds so lazy.

Jhondra for genre.

Subtopics to split hairs over -

A) when does a regional accent pronunciation become a mispronunciation.

B) If your family has an ethnic surname, do you pronounce it “correctly?” We don’t say our last name they way they would in Italy. Even my immigrant grandfather used the anglicized pronunciation.

Err. It rhymes with her, not hair. This is another one that is becoming accepted through constant mispronunciation.

Not necessarily a mispronunciation, but "irregardless".

Also, Daimler as in Daimler-Benz. Is it "Dime-ler" or "Dame-ler"? I've heard both all my life.

Dime-luh Bents in German.

[quote] PYOO lit sir instead of Pull it, sir

I’ve jerked off a lot of guys in my life and I’ve never heard them pronounce it pyoo it.

[quote] Hanger with a hard G. Just no.

Huh? How do you pronounce it, Han-jer?

NYC centric: "Port OF Authority" (there's no "of") and "Statute of Liberty" (It's not a law.)

And "salmon" where people pronounce the "l" like it's "salmonella"

Library, not liberry

I need to ax, is it "subposably" or it "supposably"?

My brother keeps pronouncing "Heinen's" (a local grocery chain in the Cleveland area as "Hymens". He's a shut in and a gay.

Not a soft G ( J) or a hard G, R94. Use the nasal consonant NG. There are better pronunciation videos, but here's one.

In New York, the Van Wyck Expressway takes us to JFK. Named for a mayor of NYC, the family says Van Wike, the same Dutch "yck" as in Wyckoff New Jersey. Traffic reporters call the road Van Wick.

R52, In the North "You can fuck me." Down South "Y'all can fuck me."

Era is correctly pronounced EER-uh. When TV folk say EH-ruh, it sounds like "error." Discussing "the Clinton EH-ruh," sounds like you talking about his mistake

[quote]B) If your family has an ethnic surname, do you pronounce it “correctly?” We don’t say our last name they way they would in Italy. Even my immigrant grandfather used the anglicized pronunciation.

How funny. I thought my family had to be the only one in the whole world whose members mispronounced their own last name. Also an Italian name. My father and I were the only ones who ever pronounced it correctly.

"I'm a" in place of "I am going to". So "ima put the sugar in next." Drives me crazy.

Also "ite" in place of all right.

These things always start with a simple shortcut and progress to incomprehensible. Ims started as I'm gonna. Ite started as a--ite. Just awful.

Americans insist upon Eye-Rack and Eye-Ran, though it isn't any more difficult to say Ear-Ock and Ear-On.

R56 After living in "Thee" US for twenty years,I have noticed most of you make no regular distinction. It would seem it's either on a whim when I hear it correctly, or a false, or sarcastic attempt at formality. There is seldom any consistency.

As regards the silent "L" in Salmon, or Almond, these funnily enough are [italiic] regionalisms[/italic] on both sides of the pond. I hear Irish and Scottish English speakers pronouncing the "L" much more frequently than the rest of us. (North Country people as well) BTW, we ALL do not say Bare-Ick O'Bomber or Pastor for Pasta!

casted

Wrong: "Lora Meredith was casted in Falucci's latest film."

Correct: "After Meredith was dropped from the project, Helen Lawson was cast in the film."

R106 - Was Lora Meredith casted in plaster?

So many people over the years mispronounced my surname that eventually my ancestors not only stopped correcting them, but actually effectively changed it to the incorrect spelling.

In Italian, the G before an L after a vowel is silent. So now instead of pronouncing it properly as “Boo-Lee-oh-see,” they pronounce it “Boog-Lee-oh-see” because that’s how everybody says it.

(That’s obviously not my real surname, but it’s the same concept.)

R103 here. One branch of the family did change the spelling of our last name to reflect the mispronunciation. In Italy, the name's final vowel can vary, but the spelling they came up with would never be found in Italy.

R95, "Port OF Authority" is heard from way bck. The original name of the agency in 1921 was "Port OF New` York Authority." Merging with the Garden State, it became the "Port Authority of New York and New Jersey"

I love pronouncing "gl" and "gn" in italiano, r108.

Words that drives you nuts, OP?

You did that on purpose, right?

herb

R108, When Joy Behar asked comedian Mike Berbiglia why he doesn't pronounce his name correctly, he said "Because my parents are Olive Garden Italians."

Worked with a woman who callers thought was Irish, she answered her phone "Miss Kelly." Maria's last name was Chelli.

Pahm

Ahms

NO L

My father used to call Saturday Night Live- Saturday Night ALIVE.

Last year he called My Big Fat Greek Wedding-MY BIG FAT GREEK MAMA.

R73, there's a female traffic reporter on New York TV who says Man-HA-in.

Rutgers is the State University of New Jersey. Most people say Ruckers.

Notary Republic

Pun-dint

Valen-times Day

Machinations.

I don’t even know why OP wants to know this stuff. When you get right down to it, it’s really irrevelant.

I mean it’s a mute point.

Notary Republic

Fe-boo-airy

Lie-berry

ChpoLte instead of chipoTle

and so many, many more.

I work with someone who calls the wifi “wifive.”

I have no idea why.

[quote]ChpoLte instead of chipoTle

and chipLote

Mispronunciations often produce a shift to a new standard. Language (especially the nimble English language) is always changing - the "Academic" standard itself changes over time.

Example, I always cringed when someone said orientate instead of orient... it's now an acceptable word. Impact was once only a noun, it now is also a verb.

Now what determines the entry into "standard" status... another question, not answered here.

R116: similarly, Sherlock Ho_mes.

[quote] ChpoLte instead of chipoTle

Bobby Flay used to say "chipoltay."

The other food-related one is "mar-scapone" (instead of mascarpone.

The tiny remark: K Y I V ( and K I E V - in russian pronunciation). I'm Kyiv-based and it's really funny because most of foreigners find this word very tricky to pronounce.

[quote]R117 My father used to call Saturday Night Live- Saturday Night ALIVE. Last year he called My Big Fat Greek Wedding-MY BIG FAT GREEK MAMA.

Parents’ foibles surely deserve a thread of their own, but my mom rewrites celebrities’ names, and also deems the ones I like to be my friends.

“I was reading about your friend, Faye Dunahugh...”

I think I’d get a huge kick out of your mother, r132.

Sounds like a blast!

Thank you R132, you made me chuckle. I love your mother.

For "palatable": mispronounced pa-LAY-table instead of PAL-atable.

Also, for epitome: mispronounced as EP-ee-tone instead of E-pit-oh-me.

There is no 'frez' in Fresnel, for my fellow science geeks.

I don't get bent out of shape about it, but Carnegie is not correctly pronounced CARN uh gee, it's car NAY gee.

[quote]Impact was once only a noun, it now is also a verb.

Not to me it isn't, buster. I'm a working editor and I never allow it to be used as a verb.

R138 And your editing impacts young writers positively...

East coast middle aged wannabe valley girls fraus's/Karen's pronouncing words like espresso as "AXEPRASSO" or the word fresh as "FRASH"

Their house is for SELL. No it's not, it's for SALE.

R137 the Hall on 57th Street mispronounces the name on their voice mail.

chasm

My gifted and talented teacher mispronounced it when I was in the fifth grade (ch sound instead of k.) She got mad when I corrected her and made me look it up. I showed her she was wrong, then she proceeded to tell me either way was correct.

I only recount this tale because it was the high water of my life, which I'm sure you already guessed since I am spending my night posting it here.

* high water mark

I think it's Al Michaels who always says "New Or-lee-uns Saints" and that bugs me. I say New Or-luns (which may irritate someone else!)

Chipotle is not pronounced chipoltee. And when people say mute instead of moot.

I just take bad grammar and mispronunciations for granite these days.

Some speak well, I speak weller.

Some speak well, I speak weller.

epenthesis[ uh-pen-thuh-sis ] noun, plural ep·en·the·ses [uh-pen-thuh-seez] . the insertion of one or more sounds in the middle of a word, as the schwa in the nonstandard pronunciation [el-uh m] of elm.

Real-uh-tor

Ath-uh-lete

[quote] I think it's Al Michaels who always says "New Or-lee-uns Saints" and that bugs me. I say New Or-luns (which may irritate someone else!)

“N’awlins”

Fustrated.

Sometimes I hear people say "assessory" instead of accessory. Is there a speech impediment that makes them unable to make a "k" sound?

In the U.S., lieutenant is pronounced as "loo-tenant". In the UK, they say "leff-tenant".

WTF? Where is the f coming from? Americans pronounce it closer to the word's French origin. The Brits sound pretentious. Another example is when Brits say "shed-yul" for schedule. Schedule is not Germanic. It came from Latin and originally derived from an Ancient Greek word. And they pronounce Los Angeles as "Los Angeleeze".

“Ek-cetera” instead of “et-cetera“.

And THIS; although not a word, but a phrase: “I could care less”, when they really mean I COULDN’T care less. 1,000 ffs, you morons.

Divisive

It's a "long-i" in the middle. Di-VY-siv.

It's not "short-i" Di-VIH-siv (or di-VISS-ive). Basic phonetic rules apply to this one.

[quote]Charles Elster (The Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations) devotes two cantankerous pages to the misguided “short-i” divisive, establishing the credentials of the “long-i” pronunciation by citing various dictionaries. [T]he first time he noted the nonstandard pronunciation in the context of politics was in 1989 in G. H. W. Bush’s inaugural address. Within fifteen years, “the erroneous pronunciation,” as Elster calls it, had begun to infect otherwise careful speakers, including Robert Siegel, cohost of NPR’s All Things Considered, who twice said [di-VIH-siv] during an interview that aired on August 30, 2004.

I noticed the sudden shift around 2007-08, when it became a political buzzword. Obama said it often, then talking heads followed. Now you only hear what would be spelled "divissive".

The added annoyance comes from people's thinking they sound smart when they're just parroting something they heard.

It’s across not acrost, and height is hite not hydth.

I’ve heard this, and it startles me.

Few dream of playing at CarNAYgee Hall some day.

Expecially. Sosseeology. "I'm axen you."

Crape instead of crêpe, you American pigdogs.

SimULar for Similar

Is it “St. Louisssssss” or “St. Louie”?

I worked with a woman who thought archive was pronounced AR CHI VEEEE. Dumb cunt.

r108 That's not correct. In Italian, you'd pronounce it boo-lyee-OH-see. The G is not silent, it makes "gl" into a sound that's different from just a regular "l" sound. ("lyee" doesn't do it justice, but I don't know a better way to transliterate it. It's sort of "ul-YEE") Same for G/GN. It's NYOH-kee, not NOH-kee.

Jalapeño as holla-PEEN-yo.

It's more like hah-lah-PAIN-yoh.

Several prominent Food Network types are guilty of this one. And Sunny Anderson annoys me with her pronunciation of "lemon" as "limmon."

Some mispronunciations have turned into (unfortunately) accepted variations. "Buck naked" has seemed to disappear in favor of "butt naked." Same for "set foot in" being replaced by "step foot in."

A little obscure, but "damning with feint praise" in writing seems to have become "damning with faint praise."

Woman in grad school said Johndra for genre.

When I first learned the word chasm in 4th grade, the teacher pronounced it shasm. Next year, different teacher said kazem. I always pause before saying the word and remind myself which one is correct.

I hate “commentate.”

Its ALLZ HI Mers. Not ALL Timers.

It’s supremacist, not supremist. A supremacist believes in supremacy. Supremist is not a word.

Arctic and Antarctic are not artic and antartic.

FWIW (as they're considered variants) ... I never heard 'homicide' pronounced HOE-micide or 'ideology' pronounced ID-eology until within the past decade on cable news. My entire life I've been saying HAHM-icide and EYE-deology.

[quote]when does a regional accent pronunciation become a mispronunciation.

When people start telling you it's wrong. "Axe" for ask, for instance, was perfectly fine during Chaucer's time: "I axe, why the fyfte man Was nought housbond to the Samaritan?" (The Canterbury Tales). And in William Tyndale's English translation of the Bible, it says, "Axe and it shalbe geven you." But there were also competing regional variants like "ask" and "ash", until the 1500s when "ask" supplanted "axe" and eventually became the standard form in Modern English. In the Scots language, however, it remains "ax."

More and more I keep hearing our youths pronounce singer as sing-ger. Is this the influence of AAVE in media?

And how about moun'en (t-glottalization) for mountain, kih'en for kitten, etc.?

I used to pronounce Palo Alto as PALTO Alto.

Someone on this board keeps writing "anti-climatic" for anti-climactic; presumably he mispronounces it accordingly.

Years ago, in Rockford, Illinois, a waitress asked someone at my table if he wanted parmesan cheese with his entree. She pronounced it par-MEE-zhun. The four of us at my table fought hard not to laugh.

After the meal, she pitched dessert and coffee. "Mexican Coffee" was on the menu, but without any explanation of what made it 'Mexican.' When asked, the waitress rolled her eyes and said, "Oh, it's just plain ol' coffee with some Teena Maria added to it."

How often does lightning strike twice? I love her to this day.

I see this all the time on DL, and saw it just now on the thread about Tim Tebow getting married: People always say "masseuse" to refer to a man.

Warshington and warshing machine.

R177, they also refer to some "blonde" twink when it should be blond. Also, a dark-haired man is a brunet, not a brunette.

[quote] "Banal" mispronounced as "BAY-nul,"

As in "surprise banal"?

Traject-ta-tory! I think I'm developing a tick bc I cannot correct the bipolar nutbag, egocentric psych patient of a boss, it's not easy keeping quiet.

In Iowa, the word across is pronounced acrossed. Oh lord make it stop.

[quote]Warshington and warshing machine.

That's a regional dialect heard in parts of Maryland and southern Pennsylvania, among other places.

Oar-eh-gone

Las Vegas: LAS, not LOS.

R183 It's quite prevalent in the NW also.

I HATE when people pronounce mayonnaise MANNaise. They are too lazy to say MAYOnnaise.

Heinous rhymes with anus, but some people are obviously too focused on that scary similarity, so they say "hee-nus" or "highness."

[quote]Niche as "nitch"

Don't be silly. Only pretentious people say "neesh".

[quote]Its ALLZ HI Mers. Not ALL Timers.

Wrong. It's "Old Timers' Disease".

Pretentious public broadcaster here has its employees say Michelangelo as "Mee-kel-angelo" instead of "Michael-angelo". And both A's in Pakistan are pronounced like the letter A in "what", not the letter A in "cat".

[quote]Its ALLZ HI Mers. Not ALL Timers.

Speaking of which, when it is a German surname like Alzheimer or Mozart, I tend to pronounce the 'z' as a /ts/ as it is pronounced in German AND as per the dictionaries. However, too often I hear people pronounce these names with an English 'z.'

You're doing God's work, R138.

In Abstentia for In Absentia

Partial Post for Parcel Post

I worked with this dumbass for 15 years without killing him and tossing his pasty body in the incinerators. Yes, I am a patient person.

Birfday = birthday

axt = asked

libary = library

"Picture" pronounced like "pitcher".

R166, I can’t find any reference online to “damning with feint praise” except to note it as incorrect. I think the original and still correct phrase is “damning with faint praise.” Or did I misinterpret your comment?

Speaking of which: mispronouncing "interpret" as "interpit".

rod iron

chester drawers

R192, I was told easy way to remember saying Alzheimer's is to think of Halt, and drop the "H."

[quote] Las Vegas: LAS, not LOS.

Very similar mispronunciations in LOS Angeles, which I hear everyone pronounce LAS Angeles.

I had a boss once who pronounced pseudonym as SUEDO-name.

I wish I was making this up.

We've tried to say button and kitten, with the “T”s in the middle, instead of glottal stops. But we just can’t bring ourselves to. Battery, yes. Button, no.

So true, r202.

I don’t know what it is either, but to say kiTTen just doesn’t sound right.

Because you're stupid. Lazy and stupid.

Kitten is correct. Not Kih'en. And you announce your ignorance every time you use your glotta 't.'

People who say "shedule" are full of skit.

“Begs the question” does not mean raises the question.

Also I see this a lot: just desserts.

I knew someone who pronounced "facade" as "fuckade"

I want to go to the fuckade, Daddy! Take me to the fuckade!

R202, R20e, Do you guys says KIT'n, with a flap t, or KIH-en, with a glottal stop?

[quote]“Begs the question” does not mean raises the question.

Yet you fucks who know what it means never manage to give us a definition that doesn't require a degree in philosophy to understand. So I'm going to continue to use it the way that sounds as if it makes sense.

[quote] Because you're stupid. Lazy and stupid. Kitten is correct. Not Kih'en. And you announce your ignorance every time you use your glotta 't.'

How very dare you! I haven’t used my glotta t since I was a teenager. It’s all online now.

[quote] Do you guys says KIT'n,

I do. But not KIT-ten.

You announce your ignorance every time you misuse caps, Mr. “Re-Education Camps,” r73/r204.

Sincerely, r202

"Supposably."

Saorise Ronan's charachter said 'everythink' in the recent Little Woman film.

Thank you, R211, for underscoring the need for an edit function on this Model T era site.

I pronounce New Orleans NEW ORLEENS. But at least I know I'm pronouncing it wrong.

Oh I sometimes mispronounce things on purpose just to get under people’s skin.

Someone above mentioned Chipotle.

I sometimes pronounce it Chee-pottle or CHIP-it-Lee to get a rise.

There was a supermarket in my area called IGA (an acronym, pronounced using the letters I-G-A). I have my mother convinced it’s pronounced ihg-a and she still calls it that.

OFF-ten for “often” became really noticeable just a few years ago. Is it an ignorance thing or an age (young) thing?

[quote]There was a supermarket in my area called IGA (an acronym, pronounced using the letters I-G-A). I have my mother convinced it’s pronounced ihg-a and she still calls it that.

Acronyms by definition are pronounceable (e.g., NATO, SCUBA.) "IGA" is an initialism, not an acronym.

R221, is that the best you have to offer on the day the EU fractures and democracy ends in America? It's not helping.

Never heard of a flap “t” r209.

But we say kit'n, but’n, not with an articulated “t,” but with a little catch in the middle. Not “ki'en,” with a full glottal stop and added syllable, like they say it over in Jersey.

All those words uttered ever by all of the annoying Poshmark commercials’ spokeswomen.

R153 You're certainly welcome to your peeves. (of which, I'm sure there are MANY) however, differences in British English don't strike me honestly as "mispronunciations". You would only assert this due to extreme feelings of superiority or nationalism. English 2.0 (American usage) is the only CORRECT version in your opinion I gather. Many posters love to tell tall tales how pompous or inordinately proud we Brits ate, but I find nothing quite compares with Americans who revel in attempts to correct or criticise British English.

Another I shall toss out here is people's penchant for saying Fur-tography, Fur-tographer (some Brits do this, not specifically an American problem) These words, along with Fuss-trated really chafes my arse for some reason.

To the many posters who have commented on NE/NY, glottal stop or inarticulated "T", I shall add these often sound similar to the "D" sound in place of a strong "T" i.e. Bridish accent, impordant, etc...

These D sounds come off as very uneducated to foreigners as well as British speakers. This is especially so when there's a hint of a southern drawl or twang, as in speakers from Virginia or the Carolinas. It conjures up memories of the film [italic] Deliverance [/italic] for me.

Oh, that's teddibly teddibly interesting.

Pip, pip! Cheerio!

[quote] like they say it over in Jersey.

You mean Joisey.

I HATE when people say OR- ange instead of the proper ARE-ange.

Ornge is the worst.

R108 do you also roll your R then? If there’s one in your name, that is..

R227 Obviously you found it interesting enough to take the time commenting on it. Odd how you stated upthread you also feel the same regarding glottal T's. I suppose you simply must feel the need to be cuntish!

"Damning with faint praise" is correct, R197, but some have argued that the phrase originated as "feint" (as in feigned) praise.

As R105 said, the one that drives me crazy is the pronunciation of almond as ALmond - the "L" is supposed to be silent, darlings.

The first time I heard ALmond was 30 years ago by someone whose first language was not English. Now its infiltrated throughout the language and every other person says ALmond. The other thing that drives me crazy is the use of the word "at," as in "where we're at" instead of the correct "where we are." Or "where's my coat AT?" instead of simply "where's my coat?"

'Chomping at the bit' instead of 'champing at the bit'

When did "concerning" become a word? That's not a word.

In the adjectival sense, e.g. "This is very concerning..."

"Running the gauntlet" instead of "running the gantlet."

[quote]In the adjectival sense, e.g. "This is very concerning..."

Welcome to DL, Susan Collins.

R236 I beg to differ, it most certainly is a word. Consult a dictionary.

R237 and r240 are very annoying.

R236

/kənˈsərniNG/ preposition

on the subject of or in connection with; about.

"dreadful stories concerning a horrible beast"

Similar:

about

regarding

on the subject of

relating to

OED

There is one, r231, and no I don’t roll it.

R242, R236 was referring to the annoying usage that was clarified in the very next post: the use of "concerning" as an adjective, a totally unnecessary synonym for "worrisome".

I looked for that origin, R233, but couldn’t find anything online. Maybe I didn’t look hard enough, but the sites I found all said the phrased originated as, and still is, “faint praise”.

R209, so the “flap ‘t’” is when the tip of the tongue touches the back of the teeth but doesn’t make the full … I think it’s called “plosive” … somewhat aspirated sound of a “t” as in “to”. Right? Because that’s what I do. To use the full “’t’ as in ‘to’” sound with kitten, certain or button sounds ridiculous over-pronounced to me.

On the other hand, a glottal stop - entirely in the back of the throat, no tongue touching the teeth - does sound ignorant in words like "kitten" et al.

^^^ ".... ridiculousLY over-pronounced ..."

It's sher-BET, not sher-BERT. There is no Ernie, and there is no BERT!

[quote]I looked for that origin, R233, but couldn’t find anything online. Maybe I didn’t look hard enough, but the sites I found all said the phrased originated as, and still is, “faint praise”.

If you're using Google, R245, it will automatically turn your request for "feint praise" into one for "faint praise." You need to click on "search instead for feint praise."

Bullshit, r248!

[quote] I HATE when people say OR- ange instead of the proper ARE-ange.

Are-ange is a NY / NJ thing. Donald Trump would probably say "are-ange."

I’ve heard some say they have a photogenic memory.

Must be beautiful.

R251- I watch this Black Cap Capuchin monkey called BOO on youtube. His human daddy is from North Carolina and he says ARE-nge too. All people from the UK pronounce it ARE-nge too. It's NOT a New York accent pronunciation.

Oh really, R253?

Al dante instead of al dente.

[quote] I watch this Black Cap Capuchin monkey called BOO on youtube. His human daddy is from North Carolina

WTF did I just read?!

[quote]r255 Al dante instead of al dente.

We could create the pasta dish Al Dente's Inferno.

R257 You beat me. I was going to suggest, "hellacious pasta."

People saying "shit" wrong. It is pronounced "Trump".

Bouquet pronounced BO-KAY

supposebly rather than supposedly. prostrate instead of prostate

R252 can be difficult to forgive and forget

The way Englush people pronounce foreign words, like pass-tah instead or pahs-ta, or tack-ohs instead of tah-cohs. Bastards.

Some black folks will pronounce words like funeral and jet fuel like "fruhnerul" and "jet fruhl"

Coupon should be coo-pon. Not Q-Pon And to go against the logic of this thread....I hate when people pronounce all the syllables in "comfortable". This mattress is quite come-for-ta-ble. Sounds pretentious.

“That’s so cliche”. No it fucking isn’t, you twit!

The "feint praise" troll is truly trolling.

This thread is so funny, just a bit of brightness in a dark and crazy world. I love grammar and pronunciation critics. When my sister and I learned to play Monopoly at a young age, we had no parental input on the names of each property and just sounded out the words as we thought they were. The property I remember the most was Pennsylvania Ave. and for several years we called it Penny-SYLvia Ave. My grandmother was a teacher and I'm sure got a kick out of this. My mom was a grammar nazi and I still can't belive she let that go for so long. I have learned a lot from this thread. Y'all are entertaining.

I like your mom, r268.

I think she was fucking with you too, which makes it all the more hilarious.

How about people who pronounce the word sale as "sell"?

IN-sure-ance, with the accent on the first syllable.

AM-bah-lance.

Anything a black says. That is the worst.

[quote] AM-bah-lance.

Or amber-lamps.

R272, you could’ve heightened your joke as an “eldergay” by saying ‘colored.’

R225: Oooh, touched a nerve, didn't I? You didn't give any explanation why those words I mentioned are pronounced so irregularly. You couldn't refute my point, thus you resorted to a personal attack (the typical tactic of someone with nothing to say). Your assumptions of me are quite a reach. I see you are willing to pull any kind of crap out of your ass. Have at it with your conjectures, if it soothes your thin skin and delicate sensibilities. I find it mildly amusing.

Was I even saying every single British person [bold]is[/bold] pretentious? No. To paraphrase from a novel: "I described a general garment and you claim it's cut to your size."

The UK pronunciation of schedule ("shed-yul") is a strange aberration. It's not Germanic in origin. If it were, then the "sh" sound would be justified. As I already mentioned, it comes from Latin. Another Latin-derived word, scheme, is pronounced with an "sk" sound. The same "sk" applies to school and schooner, two words that came from the Dutch.

Schedule is the only word beginning with s-c-h that you Brits pronounce differently. It doesn't follow the rules, so it's really an affectation. As affected as schedule sounds, perhaps it's understandable because many English words came from Latin.

That reasoning doesn't work when it comes to foreign words that were borrowed for – and not developed in– the English language. You gave no justification for why the French word, lieutenant, is pronounced with an "f" in the first syllable. That's because it is a [bold]glaring[/bold] affectation. There's no other reason. You pronounce your brand of luxury car, Jaguar, as "jag-yoo-er". The word originates from Portuguese and it's properly pronounced "jag-wahr". In American English, it's pronounced close to the original. You pronounce Los Angeles like it's a Greek name (that insincere lardass, James Corden, does this all the time).

So, the English have a tendency to say foreign words in whatever way they please, damn the rules. Some Americans are similarly guilty with their mispronunication of Iran and Iraq (as R105 pointed out). I suspect they do it more often from ignorance rather than the haughty pretension of a former colonizer. Americans got the vowels wrong, but at least they're not including nonexistent consonants in their pronunciation, like "leff-tenant".

Toodle pip!

GoverNment, Margyareet/margyareetas

I giggle when someone pronounces the name Regina so it rhymes with vagina.

(It only happens about once a decade, though.) (Not a very popular name.)

Do they also say “vah-JEAN-ah” ? ?

[quote] Margyareet

But based on the spelling, I think the person whose name it is can pronounce it any way they want.

Jacqueline Kennedy’s biographer has said she pronounced her name Jac-LEEN, so it rhymes with queen.

I had an acquaintance (dare not call her friend) who was having her third kid. She couldn’t afford the first two and was on welfare and told the doctor this one was an accident.

She was very offended when the doctor suggested she get a “tubal litigation.”

R275 No, you didn't touch a nerve at all. I don't quite understand why I need to give justification to your gripes reallly, or defend several individual pronounciations. I didn't bring them up, address them, nor state any interest in your examples.

My point is rather simple: whether within American usage, British, or the world over, if one variant is only deemed acceptable, then one has a mispronunciation each time anyone deviates from it. (known as a standard) If there are several acceptable pronounciation defined as standard usage, it's only a fussbudget with some sense of "specialness" (i.e. American exceptionalism perhaps?)

My comment about many posters on the forum who have make comments that British usage is pompous or affected, and we think we're superior, was never directed at you personally. It was a general reference.

S-i-n-g-e-r

I just lose it when Nick Cannon says Singer on the Masked Singer.

R272, add PO-leece and DEE-troit to your list.

R274 I think you mean "cullids." And "we're doing this for the little "chirren."

[quote]My comment . . . was never directed at you personally.

Not true. Have you already forgotten what you wrote?:

[quote]You're certainly welcome to your peeves. (of which, I'm sure there are MANY)

[quote]You would only assert this due to extreme feelings of superiority or nationalism. English 2.0 (American usage) is the only CORRECT version in your opinion I gather.

You didn't have to respond to me in the first place. You did anyways, not to add clarity, but to make assumptions. I wasn't taking you to task for the whole English language. Why would I? English originated in your culture. I pointed out foreign words that aren't native to the UK, which were pronounced in such a haphazard way.

If you are going to label Americans as having an attitude of specialness or exceptionalism, well, the Brits are guilty of the same. And they have been doing it for far longer (having had a lengthier history on this earth, of course).

R275 I suffered an editing problem in my second paragraph, as my last sentence wasn't quite complete: anyone calling those differences out as mispronounciations is being a fussbudget. I think it's petty to object to any English speakers in the world using British English, as it it happens to be "English 1.0 is all really.

Not all British people, or Australians, Canadians, etc mispronounce "foreign" or borrowed words. Many of us find them embarrassingly funny (myself included) especially when they are proper nouns or people's names. I strive to pronounce people's names as they choose to pronounce them out of respect. Many cosmopolitan speakers of British English do this as well. I'm a "foodie" as well as an obsessed cook; I don't choose to use standard British pronounciation for many food items, and I'm not the only one. I also happen to speak other languages, so perhaps I'm not a good representative of my countrymen in that regard.

I never did resort to any personal attack or insult of you either. I've simply disagreed, and suggested there is an American tendency toward feeling their usage is superior.

[quote] verb tense ex: these clothes need washed

That's specific to certain parts of the country.

R273, R283, I used to work with an African American lady who would pronounce those words like that: am-buh-LANCE, PO-leece, and thee-EY-ter, etc. and it would set this older male Caucasian colleague off. He would turn bright red and get steaming mad. So whenever she'd make these utterances, I would think, "Uh-oh" and turn to him to see his reaction.

Black English has many sources - southern English, a combination of other languages, strong Creole and Gullah influences.

R285 I find the differences in our language interesting, and feel certain things just happen to be the natural resort of being different cultures. Not one is superior to the other.

As regards the car marque, I would defer to British pronounciation, as it is both a name and a proper noun. That company is British (or originally was) so despite it sounding funny to many, one should pronounce it as the culture does from where it came. I use the same principle for national cuisine or foods. As I mentioned upthread in R105 I do not say pass-tah or pastor. Pastor to me is pork in Mexican tac-ohs or pork in Spanish foods.

"Secret Agent Man" was a big hit. The singer (Johnny Rivers?) sang "Secret Asian Man."

R279, it was a Golden Girls reference.

Wrong R20. Homage is pronounced haw-midge.

People who don't pronounce the o in "women" as a short i. ie. wi - men

Burial should be pronounced bair-yull, not burr-yull.

People who pronounce boutique as bow-teek instead of boo-teek.

For homage, there is (h)a-mij, for when you acknowledge or pay respect to someone of high regard; and then there is oh-mazh (derived from French "hommage"), for an actual work done (usually artistic) in honor of someone; a tribute.

"With this film, I am paying homage [(h)a-mij] to Fellini."

"This film is an homage [oh-mazh] to Fellini."

Very subtle differences but people seem to be using them interchangeably these days.

A current TV commercial mispronounces Bruschetta. In Italian, "ch" takes the "k" sound - bru-SKEH-tuh. In a JCPenney commercial the women says KEW-pon. They must think their customers say it that way. Rakuten makes sure we know how to say it. They ask several people, then correct them.

It's really more bru-SKAY-tuh, r295.

Recognize as "recka-nize."

I know more than one person who uses "suppoesbly" instead of supposedly. Its appalling.

Conscious when they really mean conscience. I hear idiot tv pundits doing this often.

So many people have mentioned that, r289. Must be a ton of people who say it that way. From my experience, there is.

Grates on my nerves too.

None, I am already nuts.

"GoverNment"

I say govament. I also say neighbahood.

I say gub’mint.

I've heard people sincerely say their parents suffer from "Old Timer's Disease" not realizing that is a goof on Alzheimer's.

My sister in law says "all-shymers " desease. And elemenTARY school. I cringe when someone says they want to have a campfire with SHmores.

My best friend screws up everything. My favorites of hers were when she told me she was going to candlelight vigilante and had a recipe that called for canine pepper. Very book smart but wow.

[quote] when she told me she was going to candlelight vigilante and had a recipe that called for canine pepper.

I don’t mean to be mean by laughing at your friend, R305, but that is hilarious.

Why are you dancing around my questions?

You’re invading the issue.

When I was about 10, a local bully began calling me names and finally arrived at the winner: "You're just ignanant!"

I laughed faintly and said, "I believe you mean ignorant..."

He beat the cwap out of me.

[quote] I say gub’mint.

Gub'mint cheese!

And don’t forget your gub’mint name to get the gub’mint cheese!

Pronouncing the word “cavalry” as “calvary.” Cavalry is the name given to an elite, lightly armored reconnaissance military unit; Calvary involves nailing an otherwise peaceful Israeli man to a tree.

So caav-uhl-ree is the pronunciation you want to say 99% of the time, and cow-vuh-ree is what you want to say on Easter.

The most frustrating and ironic to me is people mispronouncing "pronunciation". This is something that particularly happens among the language learning community which is even worse. People who are meant to teach others skills for picking up other languages talk about how to improve "proNOUNciation". I know why it happens - people take the verb pronounce and make a noun out of it, but it seems so silly when it's done by people who are apparently experts in their field.

My brother in-law says Democrat Party instead of Democratic Party, not knowing that two nouns don't belong together although I know for a fact that he graduated third grade... oops, that's another thread.

[quote]I've heard people sincerely say their parents suffer from "Old Timer's Disease" not realizing that is a goof on Alzheimer's.

My mother says "Old TImers' Disease" but then again English is her second language.

I always roll my eyes at people who order a baggle and cream cheese.

A work colleague the other day: I’m pacifically arksing you about this point as it’s very impordent.

WTF.

"Datalounge." It's so plebeian to say it "DAY-tuh-lounj." Please at least attempt the more refined, continental-sounding "dah-tah-LOONJ."

I'm listening to an audionook right now where the narrator keeps pronouncing "homage" phonetically. As in "ho" and "mage."

So many people say they are shopping for grow-SHER-ies instead of gro-SIR-ies. It's based on the word grocer, not grosher.

Any current or former Detroiters out there....?

Lahser Road prounounced LASH-ER.

r319 I shay grosheries!

I know a few people that keep pronouncing Chik-Fil-A as "Chik-A-Fil"

"Irregardless" - It's not even a word!

My dad always says "a quarter of" instead of a quarter till when he's talking about what time it is.

Chef John over at Foodwishes. It drives me nuts the way he pronounces "freshly ground black pepper". Instead he always says "FRESH-ly ground black pepper.

He also pronounces "always" as "o-ways"

Another annoying one - and I hear this a lot in corporate environments - is people (mainly white guys in upper management/director positions/c-suite) pronouncing "forward" as "foe-ward".

R317 DAY-tuh in America. DA-tuh in the UK.

Barnes and Nobles

Williams and Sonoma

Off Ten is something I hear all the time now from young people. I guess their teachers got tired of correcting them. If indeed they were ever corrected. Hurts my ears. It sounds ironically very pretentious rather than incorrect.

The British love to destroy foreign words. That's what comes from living on an island.

Pasta = British PAH-sta.

Also, R 197, "feint" makes no sense in this context. The phrase means that mild praise is damning when high praise is expected.

Feint means pretended. So it would change the who meaning of the phrase.

Perhaps R233 is not a native English speaker and does not understand idioms. Perhaps "feint" is closer to some trope in his native tongue?

This is all ridiculous.

[quote]”Irregardless" - It's not even a word!

Unfortunately, it is now. It permeated the language and is now recognized as a word.

Downs Syndrome .. No "S" in first word.

R322, I pronounce it Chick FILL-it, just to piss people off.

[quote] Downs Syndrome .. No "S" in first word.

But you can’t hear that in a pronunciation.

People (not Liza) who pronounce S as SH - is that a regional thing? There’s a TV reporter here who says shtreet for street, shtore for store, etc. I think she’s from Pennsylvania.

Specialty pronounced as speCIALITY.

Not a pronunciation thing per de, but chai tea, naan bread grate on my nerves.

Aks

Flustrated

[quote]Instead he always says "FRESH-ly ground black pepper.

What's wrong with that? I'm pretty sure the accent is on the first syllable.

Expresso. I see it on signs too.

"one in the same" instead of "one and the same"

or-e-GAN-o instead of o-REG-a-no

Nike pronounced to rhyme with Mike instead of Mikey

offten

Heard this before, but just watched a guy on Judge Judy say, “It’s a doggy dog world.”

It’s dog eat dog ! Yeesh!

I heard an Englishwoman say "O-re-GANO. I say o-REGA-no.

"My dad always says "a quarter of" instead of a quarter till when he's talking about what time it is."

Yeah, so?

Axed = asked

I have heard teachers say this. Ebonics is a legitimate dialect or some nonsense.

How about EXcape instead of escape?

r335 That's how it's spelled/pronounced in British English. Same goes for aluminum/aluminium.

[quote]I know a few people that keep pronouncing Chik-Fil-A as "Chik-A-Fil"

I know someone who doesn't know how to spell CHICK-Fil-A.

Reese's peanut butter cups pronounced REESEE's drive me nuts.

R334 In a similar fashion, a close friend's step-mum in Western PA innovates her own dipthongs... i.e. Duhz-she for does she? There are others, but that one stands out. Lovely woman, but very unusual manner of speech. I'm British, so unable to declare that one a regionalism or not.

R335 If I may add to your list of redundancies, tuna fish has always struck me as wholly unnecessary. Someone on another thread brought it up recently, and I wonder how that came to pass.

^ more like Duh-zh she

When I lived in the Coal Region of Northeastern Pennsylvania, people pronounced mine as my-un.

"geegaw" How hard is it to just pronounce it correctly? I am so tired of this being pronounced wrong almost everywhere I go!

Whore - it's pronounced "hoor", rhymes with "lure".

r351 I'd love to know what circles you're traveling in where that word comes up a lot.

"Notions" meetups, r353.

I don’t even know what word he’s talking about.

R350 That sort of reminds me how the Irish add an extra syllable to film: fill-um!

New Zealanders and their fucking aversion to the short “e” sound. “Wilma & Beety played pranks on Freed and Barney.”

White women who think it's cutesy and girly to pronounce "button" as "buh-en"

They also pronounce "fresh" as "frash"

R357 Bacon and E-e-eggs always gets me.

Supposively instead of supposedly. R357 I don't get the E-e-eggs. Must be regional?

R20 [quote]Homage It's ah-midge, not oh-magh

Actually it's both, depending on how you're using it.

I'm hearing 'for all intensive purposes' more than the correct 'for all intents and purposes' -- particularly on cable news shows. The people claim to be reporters and journalists; where the hell did they go to school?

Actually heard this when some het was recounting a sexual encounter:

“She was squealing like a stuffed pig!”

I hear people mispronounce asshole all the time. For some reason it comes out sounding like president when referring to Trump.

I seen... It's "I saw..." ☹

People who pronounce the 'p' in "receipt."

Sake isn't pronounced like sah-ki or sah-kay it's like sah-keh. The e is like the e sound in pet.

The way New Jerseyans pronounce "water". The "a" sounds something like the "oo" in "wood".

Nothing gets me going like the misuse of 'who' (which is used sub-ject-ive-ly, i.e., NOUN/verb) by substituting 'whom' (which is properly used in the ob-ject-ive, i.e., verb/NOUN) in misguided attempts to sound smarter and/or sophisticated. The poor little dears.

Ex: Who gives a fuck? vs I give zero fucks to those deplorables whom Trump counts as his base.

water - wooder

sea mint (cement)

Mischievous is the one that gets me. Oh, God.

Whom was created for people who want to talk like a butler

fuh baw

People from Maine who refer to themselves as Mainiacs instead of Mainers.

My Dad did not enunciate and had a business. A customer came in and complained...

Customer: I talked with that contractor

Dad: I heard he disgusted with you. (“discussed it”)

Customer: He’s disgusted with me? Well I’m disgusted with him!

It did not go well, but Dad got a good story Out of it that lives on.

Walmark. It's an odd rural Illinois thing, as I've heard it said by 3 ppl from there.

Walmark. It's an odd rural Illinois thing, as I've heard it said by 3 ppl from there.

People who say elecTORal instead of eLECtoral. Chuck Toad says it the wrong way, another of his many deficiencies.

r378 I have a Mexican-American friend here in Calif. who says that as well.

R350, I worked in LA city government with a woman from Philadelphia who kept pronouncing Councilman Dennis Zine's surname as Zion. It drove me nuts how she kept adding that extra syllable. It is a simple enough name to mangle.

R370. Are you from Baltimore?

Blacks here say 'gwy' instead of 'go'.

"I'm gwying to"; "Gwy ahead"

Laura San Giacomo. It's not "Gee ah ko mo," it's more like "Jacques oh mo." San Giacomo is Italian for Saint James.

I'm not sure she mispronounces it, but I know many others do.

I've heard people say "He got a [italic]doctorial[/italic] degree in that."

R385. Yes, this sorta drives me nuts. Italian consonant cluster 'gi' is pronounced like English 'j,' and is as treated as one sound, so when it is followed by a vowel, the 'i' is not pronounced:

giorno - jorno

Gianni - Johnny

giudice - joo-dee -cheh

Let's not forget JAH-dah DeLaurentiis. Not gee-AH-dah.

R375, is that a glottal stop you're talking about? I hear "foo'ball" (with the "l" enunciated) more often that "foo'baw". Either way, it should bother me, but the speaker is usually a football player wannabe - a big, hairy, muscled but slightly paunchy straight white guy, just my type - so I actually find it hot.

This is a phrase rather a word but it drives me batty when people say ON accident rather than BY accident. I feel like ON accident began cropping up within the last 5 - 10 years. I had never heard it before then and to my ear it just sounds … wrong.

That and All THE Sudden when it should be all OF A sudden.

I just re-read my post at R387, and realized my errors. First, 'gi' isn't a consonant cluster, just a cluster. Second, remove the first 'as.' I wish this site had an edit function.

[quote]That and All THE Sudden when it should be all OF A sudden.

Paula Deen always said "one at the time" instead of "one at a time" (when talking about adding eggs.)

And Nancy Fuller always calls confectioner's sugar "confectionery sugar."

[quote]OFF-ten for “often” became really noticeable just a few years ago. Is it an ignorance thing or an age (young) thing?

Most likely a regoinal thing. I only heard "ofTen" and "ornge" while growing up in northeast Ohio. When I moved to L.A., I erroneously assumed the people who pronounced them otherwise were uneducated.

Ugh, *regional

Muriel, wtf? It's the 21st century but STILL no edit feature?

[quote]Downs Syndrome .. No "S" in first word. [quote]But you can’t hear that in a pronunciation

You can if you speak distinctly. Down Syndrome sounds correct if there's a pause between the words. Say, "Downs Syndrome" slowly, with the pause, and you'll hear the extra S sound.

20, as in she owes me Twen-tee dollars.

I hear tweneee all the time at work. 😫

R396, along the same lines, "hunnert" for "hundred".

When we did ELEC-toral and PAS-toral, become elec-TORAL and pas-TORAL? Sounds like an NPR thing where they create pronunciations to sound higher-class than the listeners.

R390, I thought "ON accident" was correct when I was a child in the 1950s. I thought it was the opposite of "on purpose." It wasn't a localism, as my parents didn't say it. My mother corrected me the first time she heard me say it out loud.

I have to admit, since I stopped watching or listening to the news, and watching any entertainment news programs, I don't have any idea how to pronounce certain "celebrities"' names.

R390, it’s the continued “cutesy” infantilization of our language, mostly by fraus. As noted above, kids usually mistakenly say “on accident,” so adults say it to be “cute.” Then it seeps into the language like puss from a boil and suddenly it becomes the norm.

See also, irregardless.

A TV reporter at Penn Station in New York said "passengers are waiting on trains to New Jersey" It was clear with hundreds in the station they were waiting "for" trains. Unless you're in a service industry, you don't wait "on" anyone or anything.

R402, thank you. That "waiting on" business drives me nuts. Do people who say this not hear others saying "waiting for"? Or do they think the others are wrong, or that it's simply a variation?

More than once I've heard witnesses to an assault on the sidewalk say "he was on the floor." Why do they think a floor in a building is the same as a public street?

I have given up trying to explain the difference between ground and floor to L.A. natives. Everything is floor to them, inside or out.

I cringe when I hear people say "graxy." Especially if they over-pronounce the quotation marks.

There's a commercial that comes on from time to time for Kinder's Bueno. The way the announcer says "buey-no" drives me nuts. It reminds me of Lucy Ricardo's mangled Spanish.

[quote] That "waiting on" business drives me nuts. Do people who say this not hear others saying "waiting for"? Or do they think the others are wrong, or that it's simply a variation?

I think it’s a regional thing. I’m from New York and say waiting on sometimes. Frankly never thought of it until it was brought up here.

“What are you doing here?”

“I’m waiting on my friend.”

“Want to go to breakfast?”

“Yeah, I’m just waiting on an email from my boss.”

There's this:

In contrast to people who use floor outside instead of ground, how about the ones who say ground for indoors?

[quote]I have given up trying to explain the difference between ground and floor to L.A. natives. Everything is floor to them, inside or out.

I think that has something to do with the influence of Mexican-Americans and other Spanish speakers. In Spanish, both inside and outside are called "piso." If you say something is "on the ground," it would be "en el piso." Another example: they always call a fireplace a "chimney," because the Spanish word for fireplace is "chiminea."

Using 'of' instead of 'have' --i.e., "couldn't have happened" becomes "couldn't of happened"

intents and purposes becomes intensive purposes

R412 "could of"/"would of" instead of "could've"/"would've" is increasingly widespread. I see in casual writing by people who otherwise don't seem ignorant or poorly educated. I suspect, in a few decades, it will be deemed acceptable as an alternative to "could've" despite making no sense whatsoever. It's awful, but I don't know that it can be stopped.

Another frequent culinary mispronunciation: ratatouille.

It's a fully French word and should be pronounced as in French, with equal stress on all syllables.

It's definitely not "ra-ta-TWEE", which is cringeworthy.

"ra-ta-TOO-ee", as though it were spelled "rattatooey" is slightly less grating but still wrong.

I don't know, R414. If you type "ratatouille" into google translate and then click on the speaker icon, it sure sounds like ""ra-ta-TOO-ee" in French.

It's ratatolha [ra ta TOO lyo] in its original Occitan form, so pronounce it like you're from le Midi.

"draw" instead of drawer.

R397 Here in Chicago, as in other parts of the midwest, or upper midwest, "Hun-drit" is remarkably popular as well. To my ear, most natives to the region also say "Twunny".

What about "fiddy" for fifty, r418?

Just heard an attorney say “flaunting” the law rather than flouting the law.

Haven’t read thru all these but CROISSANT as crissant. For fucks sake.

R106 Casted! I can't stand it!

How are these pronunciations of "ratatouille," r414?

British pronounce fillet (fillay) as fillet ,,, hard T. As in ‘beef filleT’ .. I know someone who ruined a great relationship over something this petty. I don’t care if you say ’hundred’ as ’hunnerd’.... I will keep you from saying that in public all the while loving you in our private heaven.

"Shrimps". While not technically incorrect, I'm in the US and it just sounds odd when I'm watching cooking videos where they call for "shrimps" instead of just saying shrimp. "This recipe calls for a pound of shrimps".

[quote]British pronounce fillet (fillay) as fillet ,,, hard T. As in ‘beef filleT’

The British also pronounce often with a hard T instead of the silent T.

“Verse” for “versus”

R412 don’t know why, but I find it cute.

I hear sportscasters constantly pronounce the Jacksonville football team " Jag-wires."

Asterick

Eck cetera

Both make me cringe.

It's usually "Ex Cetera" isn't it?

Heard a woman tell a friend she has "Call is Waiting."

R425, speaking of fish ... Scallops is correctly pronounced SKAH-lups, not SKA-lips. .

My local small grocer's son did a price-check on a few tomatoes I bought, asking if they were "HAIRlooms."

I didn't correct him. He's young and cute.

“Championchip” instead of “championship”

There is a radio ad I've heard a couple of times in the last week or so during which "apropos" is pronounced, more than once, as "apropose" -- and there isn't any indication contextually that pronouncing that last "s" is being done for laughs.

[quote]That and All THE Sudden when it should be all OF A sudden.

R390, this makes me cringe as well!

I also agree with the poster(s) above who

^^ Oops, that last line was an aborted thought that I forgot to delete before posting! 😂