Common Yet Irksome Mispronunciations

[wireless]

Came up with these while pondering the favorite words thread.
(I’m no linguist, just an amateur lover/defender of the language. And I’m not talking about accent-based differences in pronunciations, but actual wrong pronunciations.)

Mauve when pronounced “mawv” – it’s mowv.
Flaccid when pronounced “flassid” – it’s flak-sid.
Ask when pronounced “aks” (Egregious because it’s so willful. It’s only 3 letters, for Pete’s sake!)
Marquise (as in diamond) when it’s pronounced “mar-kee” – it’s mar-keez. Marquis is pronounced “mar-kee”, or mar-kwis if you’re more oriented towards British-English than American-English.
Coupon when pronounced “cue-pon” – it’s koo-pon.

Some of these have become so common (esp. the last one) that they’ve become acceptable/standard.

Of course that’s the beauty of an ever-evolving and non-standard language like English. (And having tried to read old- and middle-english poetry in college, I’m glad it’s evolved as it has.)

I suppose if it really bothered me (it doesn’t), I could move to France and live among the language cops. But I’d probably end up in the “prison du langue” for my own pronunciation transgressions.

Any to add???

[omniscientnot]

How could you forget the classic among classics: "nucular"?!

Armoi' also comes to mind (as well as pretty much anything else borrowed from the French language).

P.S.: Wireless: Tsk! Tsk! Tsk! It's "prison de la langue" (assuming that such a thing does exist )

[Gilligan]

Nucular - instead of nuclear
Tortillia - instead of torteeya (yes I really hear this)

I think these three may be optional, but for:
Route, I say root, not rowt
Often, I say offen, not often
Data, I say dayta, not datta

[voguevixen]

"cue-pon" just KILLS me. Arrgh! Also people who pronounce the game Uno like "You know" instead of the number "OOO-no" as in you SAY "UNO" when you have ONE CARD! See, 'cos UNO means ONE, dammit!

My mom was talking about her dining room suite and pronounced it "suit" and apparently has all her life. What tha? I said "exCUSE ME?" Weird.

[mr john]

prison de langage I had an ENGLISH teacher who actually (hey, there's one) said pronOWnciation!

[ChrisCTP]

I was disqualified from my seventh grade spelling bee because the stupid teacher pronounced coupon "cue-pon"... I had NO idea what she had said, so I just spelled what I'd heard, phonetically. (I don't remember how I spelled it.) Anyhow, I was a giant loser in seventh grade, so of course, being disqualified from the spelling bee was a big tragedy.

Mispronunciations that grate on my nerves:
Ruf (roof)
Ahn-velope (envelope...en-vel-ope)
Laundry-mat (laundromat...lawn-droh-mat)
Groshry (grocery...gro-sir-ee)
Gradge (garage...ga-razh)
Pitcher (picture...pick-tcher)
Furmilyer (familiar...fa-mil-yer)
Oviusly (obviously...ob-vee-us-lee)

I'm sure I can think of more. Just give me time.

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Veni, Vidi, Visa ... I came, I saw, I bought.

[hansel]

prawcess instead of pro-cess.

[Kat]

I hate people who "mispronounce" quotation marks as parentheses and vice versa.

[aseymayo]

reprise - mispronounced rePRIZE instead of rePREEZE

plethora - mispronounced pleTHORa instead of PLETHera

I'm thrilled, Wireless, that someone else knows how to pronounce "mauve" (our motto: it rhymes with "grove") but I must confess I learned "flaccid" with the double-s sound.

[Greg Charles]

How about mischievous as mischiev-i-ous? That one really bugs me.

Also, primer with a long I is a coat of paint. With a short I, it's a beginning text. Oh, one more: schism is pronounced like "sism".

I didn't know the correct pronunciation of flaccid though. Thanks for helping me firm up my English skills.

[Doug Bowe]

Hearing NPR radio announcers, and PBS TV announcers, introduce a song from...PLAACE-id-doe Domingo.
Pluh-CEE-doe, dammit!
Pluh-CEE-doe.
A very little thing that grates up my spine every time. And I don't listen to opera.
I just run across it.

[Catrandom]

One that drives me mad: 'meatier" for "meteor." We had meatier showers earlier this summer in California, at least according to the TV reporters. I kept thinking of a Sumo wrestler's locker room.

Also "don" for "dawn" and "rayroad" for "railroad."

[Mr Thin Skin]

This one kills me:

"vish E swa" instead of "vish E swaz"(vichyssoise)

A waitress corrected me once on this and said that she had four years of french and knew how to pronounce it. I suggested she look it up in a dictionary, it's there.

[wireless]

OOOH, that nu-cue-lar one really bugs me, too. (Though still not a much as cue-pon.)

And we seem to have a theme going with the French words:
marquise
armoire
vichyssoise
and how about this new one:
chaise longue (long chair) pronounced shayze lownge. The shayze part’s not bad, but lownge?

(Ooh, could lead to a new thread – people using pompous foreign pronunciations when a plain english one will do: foyer pronounced as fwa-yea when foy-er – or perhaps foy-yea – is just fine.)

And thanks for the correction, Omniscientnot. Doh!

Follow on question – if someone you know mispronounces a word, when/how is it OK to inform them of the proper pronunciation? Not just to correct them, but so they don’t run the risk of suffering embarrassment in the future as a result? Sort of like “your fly is down”, or pointing out spinach on the teeth. I always would want someone to do this for me (in a thoughtful way, of course).

[manhattan]

Nobody seems to pronounce the implied ‘s’ in the word "you"
Nobody understands that the ‘t’ in contractions of "whatever not" is silent
Nobody understands that the ‘d’ in "understand" is also silent.

Phonetically, now:
What’s wrong with all youse people on the other side of the Hudson? Don’ you unnerstand?


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Livin' on Tums, Vitamin E and Rogaine

[wireless]

Another one – comes up every Christmas: poinsettia
Correct: poin-set-tia or (what I was taught) poin-set-ta (after its “discoverer”, named Poinsett)
Not correct: poin-see-etta, point-set-ta (and other combinations)
Although I confess I looked it up to make certain I was pronouncing it correctly myself.

Also:
pre-sep-shun (perception)
pre-cush-un (percussion)
pre-emp-tory (when one means peremptory. Difficult because both pre- and per- are words, but with different meanings.)
pre-vert (pervert)
etc.

[StStella]

How about "volumptuous" instead of voluptuous or "look at the beautiful fall foilage" instead of foliage.

One of the funniest examples I have is an instance when I corrected (very nicely, I might add)a friend's usage of a word and they got annoyed and told me that I was being "condensending". That was the topper I just about peed myself laughing!

[omniscientnot]

Wireless:

As far as "foyer" is concerned, the pronunciation fwa-yea is almost identical to the French one.

Also

From Merriam-Webster:

Main Entry: foy·er
Pronunciation: 'foi(-&)r, 'foi-"(y)A also 'fwä-"yA
Function: noun


BTW: A verification in a few dictionaries (Merriam-Webster and Collins English Dictionary) confirmed my suspicions that several of the pronunciations of words given as incorrect were indeed acceptable. More often than not, it's "a regional thing".

But it definitely isn't the case with "nucular", my favourite.

Another one I can't figure out (which was already mentioned) is axe for ask. Bit mind-boggling.

[cwofb]

This one makes me nuts "wersh" instead of WASH!

I can't tell if all of you are being serious, or not. But after looking some words up in my dictionary, I find that:

Reprise really is Re-Prize.
Pronounce really is Pro-nOWnce.
And Flaccid can be pronounced "flassid."

However, I've said "mischieveous" as mis-chi-vi-ous (4 syllables) my whole life. I never knew I was wrong.

Adam

[TheNerd]

I must confess that I get the pronounciation wrong on words often, but only because most of them I've never said or heard before. I read a lot (as I expect many other SDMBers do) so I've got a large vocabulary of words that I've never actually heard. Now, the ones that annoy me are:

nu-cue-lar
aks
libary
pellow (for pillow)

and one I've been called on:
in-TEG-ral for IN-teg-ral, how do you pronounce it?

[wireless]

Just to clarify a few things:

Omniscientnot: I didn't say fwa-yay was wrong, just perhaps pompous.

ARG220:
It it proNOUNce, but it's not proNOUNciation.

To my knowledge, "flassid" is an example of a (former) mispronunciation making its way into the dictionary after years of common (mis)use. (Ditto for cue-pon. Sadly, it's now in the dictionary as well.) Either way you choose to pronounce it, I hope you don't have much cause to use the word.

Not trying to pick nits, just contribute to the discussion.
Thanks for keeping me on my toes.

[AuraSeer]

ChrisCTP, your story sounds familiar.

In sixth grade, I won the spelling bee for my class. I won for the grade, too, then for the school. I went to the regional championships.

And on my first word, the idiot behind the microphone said, "in-FAK-choo-ate". He said the same thing when I asked him to repeat it, and use it in a sentence. So I spelled "infactuate", which was of course wrong, because there's no C in "infatuate."

I'm still bitter, because I watched the whole rest of that competition, and then the nationals on TV, and I knew every single word that came up after that point. I woulda been da champ...

::grumble whine moan complain::

By the way, don't ya hate it when people mispronounce "forte"?

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I'm not a warlock.
I'm a witch with a Y chromosome.

[aseymayo]

Adam said:
"Reprise really is Re-Prize"

No, it's not - are you sure you didn't look up "reprisal"?

Another word commonly mispronounced: bade.

[kknick34]

February.

It bugs me when people say Feb you ary instead of Feb brew ary

[mr john]

LaundrO-mat is a registered trade name,which has become generic. Based on the registered Auto-mat , which is also generic.Down here we got laundrA,laundray(All Day Laundray{shudder}) and others all registered and of course the KWIK-Wash (with the KWIK upside down on purpose {covulsions}) They is just all places weuns go to wArsh are close.
VolUMPtuous is almost the same as voluptuous,just more UMPH. (hyperbole)
sway do or even sue ay doh for psuedo. Nom de Plume! I know three people who say that.
deh CORE uh tiv for decorative (DECKrehtiv or even DECKruhtiv) ahhbsuerve the decoreuhtive art in the fwahyay.
OK, THE deCOREuhtiv Arts, I can take, but even that is preetindseeus.

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FREE THE PIXELS!

[Mr Thin Skin]

four head instead of for'id (forehead).

[Gayle]

I worked with a woman who often referred to someone else as being the "blunt of the joke." That missed on so many levels, it wasn't worth trying to rescue.

What really makes my teeth grind is usage errors. Effect/affect, fewer/less, their/they're/there, hear/here, etc. I'd like to meet the person who turned disrespect into an active verb. I will probably have a coniption fit the next time I hear someone say "myself" when they should say "me". "He's going with me.", not "He's going with myself." Give me peace!

[Carl Berry]

The 23d letter of the alphabet. NOT "dub-ya", double u....Sandwich. NOT "sammich" Florida. NOT Flor-da Penn-syl-van-i-a. NOT Pennsylvan-ya

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Zymurgist

[mr john]

Here is a great place from my liberry of online dikshyounerries.
http://www.linguistics.ruhr-uni-boch...099/index.html
only trouble is I can't get it to work for me from the home page. So what I do is go here,
http://www.onelook.com/ type in my word, click 'general' then 'look it up'.On the list that appears I go to Collins Cobuild Student Dictionary (usually number two) click the high lighted word, turn up the speaker and click the lips. hit toks raht good.

[Pete]

Sorry, Doug Bowe, but the tenor's name REALLY IS prounounced PLAHcido Domingo.

Perhaps you have the pronounciation confused with that of the word "placenta."

Oh, and the pronounciation of your brow depends on the spelling. It can be spelled and pronounced farhead or it can be spelled and pronounced forehead. I don't know what planet "for'id" (rhymes with torrid??) comes from.

I'll personally add the word "idea" to this list. I hate when people say "I have an ideer."

I also hate when "plebeian" is pronounced "pluhBEEan."

And yes, data is Dayta, NEVER dahta.


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I don't know who first said "everyone's a critic," but I think it's a really stupid saying.

[omniscientnot]

Data is Dayta, NEVER dahta.
Hmmm. Perhaps in the U.S. but certainly not for the British (and some Canadians).

[Mr. Blue Sky]

I'm surprised these haven't made the list yet:

strength (STRING-th, not STREN-th)
length (LING-th, not LEN-th)

Both pronunciations are acceptable, but that doesn't make them any more pleasing to the ear.

[dougie_monty]

Has anyone heard Dennis Miller's monologues? He asked the question: "Is it 'NOO-kyoo-lar' or 'NYOO-klee-ar'? I once heard a Senator on C-SPAN say 'NOO-kyoo-lar.' Color me reactionary, but I think we should get together on this [expletive deleted] before we vote on it!...I would hate to spend my last few moments on this earth mired in a syntax discrepancy!" My Random House dictionary suggested that the incorrect pronunciation imitates "molecular."
I have always elided the "th" sound before a "z" or an "s"; so I say "Wi' sunshine above," etc. My older brother, as bellicose as ever, recently criticized me for prounouncing "wash" as "woish," although I have prounounced it that way all my life (I'm from Indiana).

[Rodd Hill]

aunt is pronounced with a short 'a' not "awnt".

Also it's "herb" ('h' pronounced) not"erb".

[AuntiePam]

Re-la-tor instead of real-tor

Joo-lar-ee instead of jewel-ry

My mom is the queen of malaprops. (Gotta love her.)

Here's her advice on getting rid of a nest of wasps. "Now Pammie, wait to spray the nest until early morning, when they're not very active, they'll be real nostalgic and you can sneak right up on 'em."

So I went out early in the a.m. and played some Sinatra tapes. Worked like a charm on those lethargic little devils.

[kanashimi]

Oh, you guys. Regional pronunciations shouldn't matter - I think it makes our country cute. I've purposefully adopted a few because every time I say those words, I think of the dear folk I learned them from ("mebbe" for maybe, and "sammich" come to mind).

The "axe" for ask is a common pronunciation for folk of African descent. It, and a TON more peculiar pronunciations, have to do with how new African slaves learned English by using (usually) West African language rules. Many pronunciations are pidgin English holdovers. Centuries of segregation have cemented them into the culture. I for one love the sound of them, and while I don't necessarily agree with teaching them as a "second language", I fully believe in their validity and contribution to American culture.

That being said, MY all-time winner is "onery" for "ornery".

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"With enough courage, you can do without a reputation." - Rhett Butler

[Sue Duhnym]

The one that really bugs me is "melk".

It's MILK dammit!

[Markxxx]

HERB IS pronounced erb not herb

I hate people who say:

ISRAEL it is Is Ra El (three syllables) not Is Real (two syllables)

SAUDI it is SAW OOO DEE (three syllables) not Sawd EE (Two Syllables)

People also pronounce the "L" in the following words

CALM, PALM, ALMS, PSALMS, SALMON it is silent.

[Doobieous]

See, all of this discussion is what happens when you put constraints on languages! .People will always pronounce things as they damn please! No amount of correction will change it. Bostonians will always pronounce "car" like "cah", Midwesterners will always say Spanish words like "San Jose" as "Sahn Joe-see". You also get overly anal people who cringe at simple mispronounciations LOL.

One nitpick:

Aunt can be said like: ant, or awnt (it's in my Websters Dictionary). What isnt permissible is saying it like uhnt. I actually had a friend in high school who said it like that.

[ChrisCTP]

Midwesterners will always say Spanish words like "San Jose" as "Sahn Joe-see".

Not me, baby. Sann Hosay. See? I DESPISE common midwestern dialect, and though our (Iowan) accent isn't nearly as thick as Minnesota or the Dakotas, hearing it makes me cringe. However, I can mimic it really well... I have a whole stash of accents (it's a small thing, but none of my friends can do it!)

A couple more:
Menastrate (menstruate...men-stru-ate)
Rilly (really...ree-lee)
Lightening (lightning...lyt-ning)
Any word beginning with "wh" (which, where, when) DO NOT pronounce the "h". They should be pronounced "witch", "ware", and "wen".

BTW: I say data (first "a" sounds like alligator)... dayta just sounds WRONG.


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Veni, Vidi, Visa ... I came, I saw, I bought.

[Stoid]

Most of these are very common errors made by the marginally educated.

My personal peeve, even though both pronunciations are accepted, is

karaBE-en for Caribbean (ka-RIB-e-en).

The usage error that STILL, zillions of times later, is like nails on a chalkboard to me:

"continue ON" AAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE ...I'm hearing newscasters say it, and when that happens, it's all over. (Although why it should be is beyond me, since newscasters are notoriously illiterate. But when the big national guys and gals start doing it, we're doomed)

And of course, the relentless modified "unique". (For those who can count yourselves among the uninformed, it is never proper or even logical to modify the word "unique". A thing cannot be "very" unique or a "little" unique, or any other gradation of unique, because to be unique is to be a singular thing unlike any other, and you cannot properly say that a thing is "very" singular, unlike any other. It either is or is not. So STOP IT.)

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*************
He who laughs last thinks slowest.

[Stoid]

By the way, for those of you who may have missed it, search the archives of Cecil's columns for this topic...I think if you load the page and look for the word "grammar" it comes up. Some pretentious illiterate imbecile wrote Cecil about some grammar usage that was not, if I recall, even improper, and in attempting to sound knowledgeable ende dup making a total ass of herself because her own usage was such a hopeless mess. And of course Cecil sliced and diced her. It is SWEET. I would have loved to have seen the remarkable shade of red that came to her face as she read it.

[Harmonious Discord]

E-de-ot Idiot
Buff-fet Buffet
Fon-jewel-lac Fond du Lac
I-deal Idea

[glee]

I'm British, used to program computers and I say it 'dayta'...

Actually you American chaps (no, we don't really talk like that!) have a tremendous influence, mainly thru (through) TV and films.

What does 'diss' mean? (US talk show)

Most of your spelling changes seem quite logical to me:

centre to center
colour to color

I agree it's vital to preserve meanings:
(imply/infer; uninterested/disinterested)

Finally in the centre of London, there's a tourist attraction spelt Leicester Square (Midlands city of same name too). For some archaic reason we say 'Lester'. Why shouldn't it be 'Lie - sess - ter' as you say it?

[middsy]

I like the way we pronounce some words different to Americans:

Examples:

Tomato: English-tu-matt-o, American-to-mate-o

Aluminium: English-Al-loo-min-ee-um, American-Al-loo-min-yum

Schedule: English-Shed-yule, American-Sked-yule

Who is wrong and who is right?

[Pooch]

After growing up in California I moved to the East Coast. They said I talked funny. Later I moved to the South. They said I talked funny. Finally, I returned to California....and they said I talked funny. You all talk funny.

However, we were a 'ketch-up' family. One day my brother starting saying 'cats-up' just to irritate everybody. We beat him up. Indian rubs, royal stretches, charlie horses....it's ketch-up, damnit.

[C K Dexter Haven]

I'm with you, Aura, on "forte" which has only one syllable (pronounced like "fort", not like "fort-ay").

If we get into British English, Leicester Square is nothing compared to Cholomondely (pronounced "Chumley").

[Gaudere]

I hate it when you pronounce a word correctly ("forte" as "fort", in my case) and people get this superior little look on their face 'cause they think *you're* wrong.

My biggest pet peeve is "could of" "should of", etc. You just *know* they're saying "could of" instead of "could've". Oh, and I think everybody knows by now that "wherefore" means "why". So why do we still have Juliet saying "wherefore art thou" and making gestures like she's looking around for him?!

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"Eppur, si muove!" - Galileo Galilei

[stf]

dis --> disrespect

but then again i'm a white guy, so who knows?