That’s painful. But then we have a town, Le Seuer, literally “the sewer” that locals pronounce LEE-sewer. It follows a back bend on the Minnesota river, and sometimes in summer, it can smell pretty ripe.
Is there an ointment for that?
I grew up there also and I have always heard it pronounced Dee-TROYT. Accent on the second syllable.
I lived in Missouri for a while and many of the locals call it “Mizz-oor-ah” which just seemed wrong. Others, however, preferred (knowingly) to simply refer to it as “Misery”.
Thank you! I’ve been catching this old UK TV show called Escape to the Country. Most of the presenters pronounce it Shrewsbury, but, one of the them (the one I think looks just like Lord Farquar from Shrek) always says Shroesbury, so, I was really confused.
I suspect you are misremembering that. It probably said it’s pronounced “dih-TROYT,” as that is – I think – how most people outside of Detroit pronounce it (like me, though I tend to schwa the first syllable. If you look on dictionary.com or m-w.com, that will be the only pronunciation offered by the former, and the latter lists that as the first pronunciation.) DIH-troyt is kinda weird.
If I could I’d amend my last post. “Dih-TROYT” is indeed the most common local pronunciation of Detroit.
This is weird. I’ve lived all my life in the greater Metropolitan Detroit area, and now I’ve tried saying ‘Detroit’ several times trying to figure out how exactly do I say it. Definitely an accent on the second syllable, though I have heard ‘DEE-troyt’, as in an announcer saying ‘the DEE-troyt Lions win the game!” (Ok, I don’t hear that particular phrase all that often).
I think for me it’s sort of in the middle between ‘dih-TROYT’ and ‘dee-TROYT’.
I call it the DTW , the 313 or De-Twah.
Yeah all in Dih-Troyt.
Sometimes when I hear it as “dee-troyt” is sounds like the accent is almost equal on the two syllables. Like, using poetic scansion, I would label it as a spondee. The dictionaries I’ve checked all seem to put the accent on the first syllable when the “dee” pronunciation is given. So much so, that Merriam-Webster says, after the “dih-TROYT” pronuncation, this note: "locally also ˈdē-ˌtrȯit " Note the tick before the first syllable indicating stress. I find that odd, as, even though I’m not from the area, “DEE-troyt” sounds like an exaggerated pronunciation to me, and one I use from time-to-time facetiously.
I’ve just discovered the the state of Michigan has on online pronunciation guide with audio!
According to that it’s “Gay-lerd” and “DEE-troyt.”
But (IMO) it’s WRONG! (Well… I’m starting to concede “Gaylerd.”
I used to know a guy named Gaylord. He pronounced it Gay-lord, not Gay-lerd. Considering one of his hobbies was throwing and catching knives with his buddies (their hands always had bandages on them), I would pronounce his name however he preferred it.
I think as a name it is usually gay-lord. Like the former MLB pitcher Gaylord Perry. We had a big street gang here in Chicago in 80s, too, called the Gaylords, also pronounced as gay-lordz, but they seem to have dissipated. Wikipedia says they still exist, but I haven’t heard much about them in the last couple of decades. (They also simply might not be very active in my neighborhood, which is mostly Latin Kings, Satan’s Disciples, and a sprinkling of Two-Six.)
I say Dih-troyt unless I am talking about the airport, when it becomes Dee-troyt Wayne. I can’t explain it.
Or Gaylord Carter, the organist. I saw a silent movie at a revival house in L.A. (or The Valley) in the '80s, and Gaylord Carter played the accompaniment.
My kid had an elementary teacher named Mercedes Hanks.
She was called Ma-shed-ess.
Not like the car Mercedes. No ‘R’
sound in her name.
I thought that was strange .
Southern state perhaps? Lost the R to the regional dialect, like DeKalb County, Georgia lost the L sound (DeKabb).
I live in Camas, WA. People here pronounce it CAM-us (short A sound on first syllable, as in ‘cat’).
Also located here is Lacamas Lake. People here emphasize the first syllable with a short A sound. LA-cuh-mus.
The Atlanta Journal and Constitution has a column called The Vent, and according to it, “real” southerners pronounce the L in DeKalb. Also from that source, McDonough is properly pronounced Mack Donna. Georgians do pronounce the L in walk, talk and salmon.
Peeps around here say ‘acts’ for ‘ask’.
I always thought it was just lazy speaking. For what ever reason.