co-worker pronounces “fiance” as fee-ans (last syllable as in “finance”)
Wrong, but possibly understandable. For instance, maybe the person has heard the words fiance and fiancee spoken, and seen them written down and not really made the connection. I could understand someone thinking fiance was pronounced that way and fiancee was pronounced the other way. But if it is an honest mistake, it’s something that should be correctable pretty easily.
**co-worker pronounces “concerto” as con-sir-to
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Again, understandable it someone doesn’t realize it comes from Italian. It should be fixed easily when explained. If someone just doesn’t want to sound pretentious, I don’t see how it’s pretentious to use the proper word for it and instead sound like an idiot. I’m all for not using large words when smaller words are as good or better, but in a case like this, it’s the only appropriate word.
co-worker pronounces “LAN” as land
To be fair, I work in computers, and the first time I heard LAN, I thought it was land too, but that was also many years ago and I was a kid at the time. Frankly, I think the term is widespread enough these days, particularly in a business setting where it might be used more than once in a blue moon, that it’s hard to justify someone saying it consistently enough to be noticed as being wrong and not getting corrected.
friend pronounces “router” as roo-ter (the network thingy)
While I can understand the idea of “rooter”, I think their logic is flawed. Around here, I often hear both “rowt” and “root” for “route”, but they’re used in different contexts. When I hear “rowt”, it can be used as both a verb and a noun, but “root” is ALWAYS a noun. Around here, you might actually hear a statement like “I’d suggest that you “rowt” around “root” 7 to avoid all the construction.” In that sense, a router is performing an action, like so many other nouns that -er, so it should be pronounced like the verb. You don’t say “advicer”, you say “advisor” because an advisor advises with advice. A “rowter” “rowts” internet packets of “roots”/“rowts”. Now, maybe that’s just a regionalism, but I’ve still never heard “root” used as a verb.
I apparently “misprounce” things myself. I’ve been told a few times that it’s weird that I say the L in “folk”, particularly in reference to folk music. I also say Wednesday more like “wednsday” than “wenzday”, which is how I often hear it, but I don’t think I’ve heard any complaints.
I used to be engaged to someone who spoke English as a second language, and she had some words that struck me as odd, like “iron” was said “i-run”. I don’t really blame anyone like that, though, especially since it’s not deliberate.
As for ones that really get me:
Harbinger - Said as “hairbringer”. I’m really baffled here, as I can sort of see saying “har-bing-er” rather than “har-bin-jer” but where do two extra Rs come from? Worse, I’ve heard this from at least two or three people, and they insist on continuing to say it even after being corrected.
Pronunciation - Said as “pronounciation”. I think it’s just the unintended irony in not being about to properly pronounce pronunciation that drives me nuts. In that sense, it makes words like pronunciation and enunciation heterological and mispronunciation autological.
