# OK: Where did I pick up this (US regional) pronunciation of "almond"?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [August 20, 2012, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093 "2012-08-20T20:39:21Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/21 "2012-08-21T02:26:22Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#):
>
> Northern California is a big place. Most people in most places in Northern California do not pronounce it that way. As I already noted, this is a Sacramento Valley thing. And even then, it may only be localized to the farming parts.
I lived in the SF Bay Area/Santa Cruz all my life until moving to the Central Valley. Ammand in the CV, almond everywhere else. I still pronounce it almond.
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### Author:  [@Snupzilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snupzilla)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/22 "2012-08-21T02:26:43Z")
awe-mend
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### Author:  [@Twoflower](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Twoflower)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/23 "2012-08-21T02:29:41Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#):
>
> Northern California is a big place. Most people in most places in Northern California do not pronounce it that way. As I already noted, this is a Sacramento Valley thing. And even then, it may only be localized to the farming parts.
The main ammond growing areas are centered around Chico and Modesto. I’d bet that if you’re not within a half hour drive of one of those places, you don’t pronounce it that way.
ETA: And if you drive fast, I think you can make Modesto to Stockton in a half hour …
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### Author:  [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/24 "2012-08-21T03:49:00Z")
I grew up in Amond country - bumfuck northern Sacramento valley Colusa county. It’s pronounced that way because you shake the 'ell out of those nuts to get 'em off the tree. Bwahahahahahaha!!!\*
40 years ago in the Sacramento area there was an irritating commercial that jingled “you say aLLLLmonds and I say AAAAAmonds.” Almond Joy was always with the “L”
But lot’s of people in the Sacramento Valley will use the L. Actually, I just looked up an [almond growing area map](http://www.almondboard.com/Handlers/Documents/Technical%20%20Information%20Kit.pdf)(warning may be pdf). Looks like south of Sacramento toward Fresno has the volume - but those are also bigger counties than the north. So it’s a lot bigger area that a 50 mile line.
It’s a regionalism that I make sure I pronounce without the L just because.
\*I’ve waited years for that.
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### Author:  [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/25 "2012-08-21T03:58:23Z")
> [@Kitty\_A](#):
>
> That’s funny because I do pronounce the L in alms, palm, calm, and psalm, but not in walk or talk. In keeping with that, I also say the L in almond. I grew up in the Midwest, not sure if that has anything to do with it.
Same, but I’ll raise you that I say “sal-mun”, not “sam’n”.
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### Author:  [@Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maggie_the_Ocelot)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/26 "2012-08-21T03:59:18Z")
D: China Guy, I wanted to be the one to make that joke!
My cousins are ammond farmers up in Ceres, and they love that one.
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### Author:  [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/27 "2012-08-21T05:03:51Z")
🙂
Here’s a bunch of photo’s of almond shakers. They literally do shake the hell out of the almond trees so the nuts fall down on a tarp like thing, and there you go. Nuts
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### Author:  [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/28 "2012-08-21T05:20:15Z")
Opps. here’s the link: [almond tree shaker - Bing images](http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=almond+tree+shaker&qpvt=almond+tree+shaker&FORM=IGRE)
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### Author:  [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/29 "2012-08-21T06:09:42Z")
I’m not one to point fingers. For me…
almost = all mund (ɑlmǝnd)
salmon = sall mun (sælmǝn)
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### Author:  [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/30 "2012-08-21T06:11:51Z")
> [@Kimmy\_Gibbler](#):
>
> The “l” in “almond” is not pronounced, just as it is not pronounced in “alms,” “palm,” “calm,” “balm,” “psalm,” “walk,” and “talk.”
I pronounce the l in every single one of those words.
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### Author:  [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/31 "2012-08-21T07:21:57Z")
That’s how I learned to say it when we lived in Davis when I was little. We had an “ammond” tree in our yard. Also, it’s a different vowel than the one used in “almond.” It’s a shorter, less open sound - not just “almond” without the “l.”
Whenever I’ve heard other people say it that way, they’ve always been from around that same area.
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### Author:  [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/32 "2012-08-21T07:29:43Z")
> [@Bozuit](#):
>
> I’ve only noticed people beginning to pronounce the L in the last 10 years or less. I assumed it was some kind of hypercorrection.
I’m native to Northern Ohio and I’ve been pronouncing it that way for about 50 years now. I was astonished, as an adult, when I began to come across the odd person who would insist that the /l/ sound is incorrect. I just can’t hear it that way! The /l/ in almond has always been sounded in my world. It is no hypercorrection. That simply is its real pronunciation for what is certainly the majority of native English speakers.
The gruff old guy who ran the corner store where all us kids in the neighborhood went to buy candy also surprised me when he said [ælmənd] with the vowel sound of Al as in “You Can Call Me Al” instead of the normal pronunciation [ɑlmənd]. That was around 1969 and really jarring to my ears. No idea where he picked up that pronunciation. But in any case the /l/ is sounded.
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### Author:  [@Darryl\_Lict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darryl_Lict)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/33 "2012-08-21T07:33:41Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#):
>
> Yep. I have friends who grew up as Ammond farmers near Modesto, and that’s where I’ve heard it.
Yeah, the only people I know who pronounce it that way are actually Ammond farmers.
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### Author:  [@Becky2844](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Becky2844)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/34 "2012-08-21T07:45:39Z")
I say salmon like “jammin’” and almond like “awl-mund.” I’m positively sure I’m absolutely right. And pe-KAHNS are what you put in a pie, with a little Karo syrup. (East TN born.)
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### Author:  [@Tibby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tibby)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 10:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/35 "2012-08-21T10:22:36Z")
Pronounce _[“Al”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yow5HfIZNfA&feature=related)_ like Peggy Bundy and rhyme _“mond”_ with \*international children’s emergency fund. \*That’s how we hip people say it.
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### Author:  [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 10:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/36 "2012-08-21T10:27:48Z")
> [@aldiboronti](#):
>
> I live in the UK and always say ah-mund. It tends to be so pronounced by older people (I’m 60) as it used to be standard years ago, as balm (bahm), alms (ahms), falcon (faw-con) and others.
I say “ah-mund” and I’m in my mid-30s (SE England). “Al-mund” strikes me as one of those “spelling pronunciations”, like pronouncing the “t” in “often”.
Collins dictionary only gives one pronunciation, which agrees with that: /ˈɑːmənd/
Interestingly, it comes from the Old French _almande_, but modern French spells it _amande_. Was the old “l” silent too?
I think silent letters might be gradually dying out. I wonder if this phenomenon has been studied?
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### Author:  [@nofloyd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nofloyd)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/37 "2012-08-21T13:40:07Z")
> [@BrotherCadfael](#):
>
> Born in New Jersey, have pronounced the “l” all my life.
Another Jersey-ite, but never with ‘l’, ah-mund
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### Author:  [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/38 "2012-08-21T14:05:33Z")
‘All-mund’. SoCal native.
I was listening to NPR while driving through the Central Valley about a decade ago, and there was an interview with the head of the Almond Council (or something). It took me a while to realise that these ‘ammins’ he was talking about were almonds.
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### Author:  [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/39 "2012-08-21T17:28:00Z")
> [@Colophon](#):
>
> I think silent letters might be gradually dying out. I wonder if this phenomenon has been studied?
Interesting! I have the opposite impression, that people are ceasing to pronounce letter that folks used to pronounce. The first example that comes to mind is the “wh” sound, whereby I’ve run into many people (especially younger than me) who pronounce witch and which exactly the same, or wine and whine. Although I suppose now that I think about it, that’s less a “silent letter” issue than a “disappeared sound” issue.
Hmm… seems like I had other examples on the tip of my brain but now I can’t think of them.
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### Author:  [@Philliam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Philliam)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2012, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ok-where-did-i-pick-up-this-us-regional-pronunciation-of-almond/632093/40 "2012-08-21T17:48:25Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#):
>
> Yep. I have friends who grew up as Ammond farmers near Modesto, and that’s where I’ve heard it.
Yep - that’s how it’s pronounced down in ‘Mo-dusty’…and Ceres, too.
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