Poll: Pronunciation of chamomile

In My Humble Opinion
1

How do you pronounce chamomile?

  1. chamo-mile (where mile is pronounced like the measure of distance)
  2. chamo-meal (where meal is pronounced like the portion of food)

It would be also be great if you could add what part of the country/world you were raised in (to see if there are regional variations)

2

I pronounce it chamomile, with a hard C rather than a Ch (as in Chicken) sound. IOW, Camomile, no meal or Chooks allowed.

I’m from Australia.

3

CAM-o-mile: hard c at the start, last syllable the same as the “mile” that is a measure of distance.

Raised in Scotland.

4

chamo as in “camouflage,” maybe with a bit less of a schwa, or “cam” with an o.
mile as in 5,280 feet.

Raised in Northern California.

5

KAM-uh-meal

Sydney.

6

CAM (like ham) - o - (1.609334 km)

ETA: Indian living in London

7

KAM oh meel. So Cal.

8

Meal - West coast US

9

Same. Adelaide, Australia.

10

I’ve used both pronunciations but I’ll go with cam-ah-mile. Australia.

11

Cam-o-mile.

Born and bred Auckland Enzedder.

12

Cam-o-mile. Victoria, Australia.

13

KAM-uh-meel.

Ohio

14

Ditto.

Pennsylvania.

15

I first learned of this tea through Beatrix Potter’s Tale of Peter Rabbit, where Peter is given some medicinally at the end. I pronounced it in my head all sorts of ways. Then I saw an animated production of it, narrated by Meryl Streep (not that I knew who she was at the time, but I can remember the sound of the narrator’s voice from the production and match it up now), who pronounced it “KAM-o-myle”.

I pretty much never hear the word “on the street” so that’s it, that’s how I think the word is pronounced.

16

Ditto. Born/raised kindasorta near Chicago.

17

cam-o-mill (hard c, no “ch”, no units of distance, no meals)

Saskatchewan

18

Me too.

NY

My grandmother says it the other way, and is from Georgia.

19

KAM-uh-meal.

Raised in Florida by Yankie parents.

20

Yeah me too.