# Hyundai, bloody Hyundai **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 10, 2016, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702 "2016-01-10T17:26:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2016, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/21 "2016-01-12T15:16:07Z")
> [@Horatio\_Hellpop](#): > > I lived in Korea pretty recently and we just heard “HUN-day.” That sounds pretty definitive. ---
**Author:** ![Gary\_T](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Gary\_T](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_T)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2016, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/22 "2016-01-12T15:28:55Z")
As a tangent, the confusion apparently stems from the way Korean is transliterated into English. It reminds me of the oddity of transliteration from Chinese, where “feng shui” is pronounced _fung_ (rhymes with rung or sung)\* _shway_ (rhymes with say or day). I’m sure there’s a reason for that, but I suspect it’s a stupid reason. 😉 \*I believe the _u_ is properly pronounced like the _u_ in “put” or the _oo_ in “good,” but I usually hear it as I described. ---
**Author:** ![Gunslinger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4491bb/32.png) [@Gunslinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gunslinger)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2016, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/23 "2016-01-12T15:45:54Z")
> [@Horatio\_Hellpop](#): > > I lived in Korea pretty recently and we just heard “HUN-day.” Judging by comparison with kpop starlet Hyuna (whose name is pronounced basically “Hunna” and sometimes “Hannah” depending on the interviewer), Koreans kinda half-pronounce the y, but Americans don’t really know how to make that particular sound (it’s not hy-un, it’s h-yun, if that makes any sense at all – sort of like the Spanish n-with-a-tilde, except with an h), so “hunday” (i.e., rhymes with the first day of the week) is close enough, as Horatio said. And, as usual, the Brits just do their own thing. > [@snfaulkner](#): > > Anyway, since I’m here…My sister had an 89 Excel as her 16th bday present. Nobody in our house would pronounce it the same way twice for the first year of having it. Though eventually settled on “your sister’s car” or “the red car”. A year after that and 25k miles, we traded it in for $600. You could’ve just called it “the Excel,” pretty sure you can’t screw THAT up. Or you could’ve said “the shitbox” because IIRC Korean cars didn’t get good until the mid-'90s at the earliest, just like VW didn’t take off until the late '60s, Honda and Toyota were a joke from the '60s-mid '80s and Chinese cars will probably stop being total deathtraps around ten or 15 years from now. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2016, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/24 "2016-01-12T16:29:34Z")
Bravo on the thread title. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2016, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/25 "2016-01-12T17:47:11Z")
In the US, it likely depends on where you live. In some enclaves, they pronounce Toyota as Tie-oh-tuh, with accents on the the first and second syllables. It’s probably meant to be derogatory or just over-the-top Southern, as in “One a them Tie-o-tuhs.” ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2016, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/26 "2016-01-12T17:53:25Z")
Best damn Hyundai commercial ever. 45 seconds long. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2016, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/27 "2016-01-12T18:07:49Z")
I’ve always heard pronounced, correctly or not, as Hun-day, rhyming with _Sunday_, as the OP says. The Village of **Nunda** , New York, not far from Rochester, derives from an old Seneca name. It isn’t pronounced the way it looks. it’s pronounced “None-day”, so it ought to rhyme with Hyundai in that case. I always thought that there ought to be a **Nunda Hyundai** , if only to confuse the hell out of people trying to pronounce it. Sadly, although there are Hyundai dealers in the area, there’s none in Nunda, or named after the town. Another opportunity missed. > **[Nunda, New York](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nunda,_New_York)** > > Nunda (pronounced "none-day") is a town in Livingston County, New York, United States. The population was 3,064 at the 2010 census. Nunda welcomes visitors with signs stating "Welcome to Nunda, a Nice Place to Live." The name is derived from Nunda-wa-ono, the name given to it by a group of the Seneca people who once lived in the hills and valleys along the Genesee River and Keshequa Creek within the present-day town. In the Seneca language, "Nunda" relates to hills, and a popular translation i Nu... ---
**Author:** ![Greg\_Charles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/839c29/32.png) [@Greg\_Charles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greg_Charles)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2016, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/28 "2016-01-12T19:16:31Z")
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0UovyM8Ni0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0UovyM8Ni0) So, not exactly Hun-day, but that pronunciation is closer than Hi-un-die. ---
**Author:** ![snfaulkner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snfaulkner/32/433_2.png) [@snfaulkner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snfaulkner)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2016, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/29 "2016-01-12T22:47:49Z")
> [@Gunslinger](#): > > You could’ve just called it “the Excel,” pretty sure you can’t screw THAT up. Or you could’ve said “the shitbox” because IIRC Korean cars didn’t get good until the mid-'90s at the earliest, just like VW didn’t take off until the late '60s, Honda and Toyota were a joke from the '60s-mid '80s and Chinese cars will probably stop being total deathtraps around ten or 15 years from now. Yeah, it was apparent pretty early on that my sister’s car didn’t excel…at anything. So we all couldn’t bring ourselves to call it that. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/30 "2016-01-13T00:11:36Z")
I don’t speak a lick or Korean, but i can figure out IPA and Wikipedia’s example is pretty accurate (they don’t say whether the Korean and english differ). I also looked up the Hangul to verify. The last vowel is e as in “bet.” The same vowel occurs in Romance languages, but english speakers usually make it too long into an “ay” sound. ---
**Author:** ![Gunslinger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4491bb/32.png) [@Gunslinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gunslinger)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/31 "2016-01-13T12:55:00Z")
> [@Greg\_Charles](#): > > [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0UovyM8Ni0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0UovyM8Ni0) > > So, not exactly Hun-day, but that pronunciation is closer than Hi-un-die. Yeah, that’s what I was getting at, just didn’t think to look up a pronunciation guide. ---
**Author:** ![botsgotme](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@botsgotme](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/botsgotme)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/32 "2016-01-13T13:18:35Z")
Hyundai is OK, but how did they come up with “KIA”? I always think of “Killed In Action”!🙂 ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/33 "2016-01-13T13:19:00Z")
> [@Leaffan](#): > > How long must we sing this song? It’s just another manic Hyundai. (Bono v. the Bangles: which earworm will win? ;)) ---
**Author:** ![sbunny8](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@sbunny8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sbunny8)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/34 "2016-01-13T15:22:58Z")
It seems obvious to me that it SHOULD be “Hoon Die” (like Moon Pie) but the commercials say “Hun Day” (like Sunday) and that’s good enough for me. If it’s your name, you get to decide how it’s pronounced. What drives me up a wall is I know someone who keeps saying “Hahn Da” (like Gone Tab), which sounds way too much like Honda for my taste. There are days when I wonder if he even knows that Hyundai and Honda are two different companies. ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/35 "2016-01-13T15:34:09Z")
Hyundai, Hyundai, so good to me. Hyundai mornin’, it was all I hoped it would be. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/36 "2016-01-13T17:52:46Z")
> [@GreasyJack](#): > > It seems like the “hi un die” pronunciation is endemic to the same areas that pronounce Mazda “Mah-z-dah” instead of “Maw-z-duh.” Mawzduh? Who would say that? 😕 BTW in the UK I’m sure the more recent ads say “Hyun-day”. I remember thinking it sounded odd but was probably more accurate, as I remember them being called High-un-dies in the 1980s. How do Americans say Nissan then? Is there even another way? Rhymes with “Kiss and” (tell). > [@subunny8](#): > > What drives me up a wall is I know someone who keeps saying “Hahn Da” (like Gone Tab), Now I’m really confused. “Hahn Da” sounds nothing like “Gone Tab”. Surely you mean Honn, not Hahn? Honn rhymes with Gone. Hahn rhymes with Barn or Calm. ---
**Author:** ![GreasyJack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/df705f/32.png) [@GreasyJack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreasyJack)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/37 "2016-01-13T18:04:48Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > Mawzduh? Who would say that? 😕 Well, I guess maybe more of a “Mahhhzduh.” The important part is the soft A’s, unlike the hard A’s the rest of the English-speaking world uses to pronounce it. Although Mazda is kind of an interesting case in that the pronunciation of it in the home market is completely different because it’s not a Japanese word and (AIUI) Japanese has funky pronunciation rules for foreign words. So there’s not really a “definitive” pronunciation, although I guess you could go back to the original Persian. > [@Colophon](#): > > How do Americans say Nissan then? Is there even another way? Rhymes with “Kiss and” (tell). “Nee-San” ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/38 "2016-01-13T18:24:46Z")
> [@GreasyJack](#): > > Although Mazda is kind of an interesting case in that the pronunciation of it in the home market is completely different because it’s not a Japanese word and (AIUI)… The Japanese name of the company is **Matsuda** , which is very much Japanese - it’s the name of the company’s founder. The English name of the company is derived from this, as well as being a reference to the Zoroastrian god [Ahura Mazda](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahura_Mazda). ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/39 "2016-01-13T18:32:01Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > BTW in the UK I’m sure the more recent ads say “Hyun-day”. This is how the Korean woman in **Greg Charles** ’s link says it. > [@Colophon](#): > > How do Americans say Nissan then? Is there even another way? Rhymes with “Kiss and” (tell). You pronounce it like [one of these](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissen_hut)? We say ‘NEE-sahn’. As for Mazda, the commercials I see from a few miles north of me pronounce it ‘MAZZ-duh’. We pronounce it ‘MAHZ-duh’. In any case, I think my original question has been answered. Here’s another one: What is the proper pronunciation of Hilux? My dad had one, way before they became the Tacoma. We pronounced it ‘high-lux’, as in ‘high luxury’. But I’m pretty sure I’ve heard it pronounced ‘hee-lux’ on _Top Gear_. This is the pronunciation suggested by the spelling; but ‘high-lux’ makes more sense for a car (even if that car is a truck). ---
**Author:** ![GreasyJack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/df705f/32.png) [@GreasyJack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreasyJack)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2016, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702/40 "2016-01-13T18:35:12Z")
> [@scr4](#): > > The Japanese name of the company is **Matsuda** , which is very much Japanese - it’s the name of the company’s founder. The English name is derived from this, as well as being a reference to the Zoroastrian god [Ahura Mazda](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahura_Mazda). IANA Japanese speaker, but my understanding is that the pronunciation of the Persian word “Mazda” in Japanese (given the funky pronounciation rules) is something very close to to Matsuda. The name of the company versus the name of the car brand is something of a pun. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hyundai-bloody-hyundai/742702.md?page=3)