OK, honestly now. How do people pronounce the word “our” I know that it should sound like HOUR, but I believe in conversation, many people pronounce it ARE.
How 'bout the rest of the gang. Say the phrase “Let’s go back to our house” out loud, and see what you say.
“R”
“Some people are worried about the difference between right and wrong. I’m worried about the difference between wrong and fun.”
~P.J. O’Rourke~
I pronounce it like “are”.
MaryAnn
No, stupid, it’s a boat!
I say:
“Y’all go to you’un’s house an’ Ah’ll go to mine an’ everbody’ll be the better fer it.”
Try saying out loud, You are our hope. You really don’t want it to sound like Your are are hope, now, do you?
Often, the ‘our’ in sentences is unaccented. And many times, we glide over and mumble unaccented vowels until everything sounds like ‘uh’ (or ‘uh-r’). So, yes, regionally, some people make the ‘our’ sound like ‘are’ in casual conversation.
But when the ‘our’ is accented, it is usually pronounced with the long ‘hour’ sound.
Whose house?
Hour house!
Beatles: %Hour house, is a very, very fine house…%
When you do public presentations, readings, dramas, or songs, always pronounce it clearly as ‘hour.’ In coaching someone doing a public reading, I penciled in an ‘h’ in front of every ‘our’ so the speaker wouldn’t say ‘are.’
Peace.
“Dear God!” Byzantine ejaculates, “Don’t ask me this! It is said like ‘hour’. This is one of my pet peeves! Like when people say ‘axe’ for ‘ask’ or ‘fer’ for ‘for’”.
(Byzantine takes a deep breath and counts to 10. She frets over referring to herself in the third person. She decides, fuck them!)
“Our language is bastardized enough, don’t make it worse!”
Best!
Byz