# Pronunciacions that make you seethe with anger! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 27, 2008, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978 "2008-03-27T22:06:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2008, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/161 "2008-03-29T15:05:15Z")
[QUOTE=Martini Enfield] Ditto _Aluminium_. There’s a second “i” in it, folks. [/QUOTE] Not here there ain’t. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2008, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/162 "2008-03-29T18:42:56Z")
[QUOTE=Martini Enfield] Near the top of my list of Pronunciation Hates is “Jag-Wahr” for _Jaguar_. It’s “Jag-Yoo-Ar”, dammit! . [/QUOTE] Both are legit. Dudes just have to get used to that fact that a number of words have two legit pronuciations, especially British vs American English. It’s not like you Aussies don’t have a different regional pronuciation for a number of words, too. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2008, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/163 "2008-03-29T19:36:13Z")
[QUOTE=kaylasdad99] Come to think of it, I do object to the anglici **z** ation of words that are “borrowed” into the English language, and I don’t really consider that the passage of three or four centuries legitimizes the action. I’m perfectly content to allow the English language to continue including “junta” in its lexicons; but don’t fuck with the pronunciation of words that are taken from still-living languages (at least). The other languages may want them back someday, and the words should be in a recognizable condition. [/quote] How do you pronounce ‘margarine’? > [@](#): > > And I thought the British were supposed to be all about classy, correct behavior. Absolutely. _Our_ choice of classy, correct behaviour. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2008, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/164 "2008-03-29T19:48:24Z")
[QUOTE=Martini Enfield] Ditto _Aluminium_. There’s a second “i” in it, folks. [/QUOTE] _Ahem_ Sir Humphrey Davy (an Englishman) invented the name “aluminum” (note, “aluminum” not “aluminium”) for the metal. However, in common usage the name evolved into “aluminium” to match the naming convention of other elements. In 1925 the United States decided to switch back to the **original** spelling and pronunciation of the word. Also note that in 1925 we were kings of the aluminum industry. So THERE. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2008, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/165 "2008-03-29T21:01:27Z")
[QUOTE=GorillaMan] How do you pronounce ‘margarine’? [/quote] I’ll cop to the soft “g”. That’s the way I learned it, at my mammy’s knee. > [@GorillaMan](#): > > Absolutely. _Our_ choice of classy, correct behaviour. 😃 This tends to suggest that your choice is one of those “Do as I say, not as I do” things. Well played, sir. Go Brits, and all that. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Ensign\_Edison](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ab992/32.png) [@Ensign\_Edison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ensign_Edison)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2008, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/166 "2008-03-29T22:13:44Z")
First I thought “I have none”. Then I thought “Oh god, ‘Saracuse’.” It’s Syracuse, people. Seeeeracuse. And it’s not in Upstate New York just because it’s upstate from here. It’s in the dag-nabbed center of the state. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2008, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/167 "2008-03-29T22:13:54Z")
[QUOTE=kaylasdad99] This tends to suggest that your choice is one of those “Do as I say, not as I do” things. [/QUOTE] How else do you build an empire? In all seriousness, you need to bear in mind that our encounters with Spanish are not dominated by Latin American pronunciations. We tend to have a greater Castillian influence in ways we might have absorbed any particular word. This is on top of any more general aspects of how much we may or may not alter words which become absorbed into everyday English. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2008, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/168 "2008-03-29T22:16:45Z")
[QUOTE=Jragon] In 1925 the United States decided to switch back to the **original** spelling and pronunciation of the word… [/QUOTE] …because one person used the spelling in advertisments. Still so proud? ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2008, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/169 "2008-03-30T04:16:38Z")
> [@](#): > > **Vox** : I didn’t say people with Southern accents were idiots, I said idiots, who may or may not mainly reside in the South, pronounce “Reese’s” like “REE-cies.” And just to clear it up before it becomes an issue, I have heard both white and black people say this. So this mispronunciation is not limited to the South nor is it restricted to one racial group. Kind of makes me wonder why you brought up the issues of region and race. I’ve lived in the South for almost sixty-five years and I’ve never noticed any mispronunciations of “Reese’s.” But if there were to be a dialectical difference, that would not reflect ignorance. They would just be imitating what they hear and passing that on to those who hear them. Dialects aren’t about ignorance. I’m certain President Kennedy knew that the island country ninety miles off the coast of Florida was not spelled _C-u-b-e-r_. ---
**Author:** ![thirdwarning](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecccb3/32.png) [@thirdwarning](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thirdwarning)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2008, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/170 "2008-03-30T04:39:13Z")
[QUOTE=Stoid] I need a relator to sell my house. [/QUOTE] Well, maybe you’ll be lucky and your relator will be an athelete. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2008, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/171 "2008-03-30T07:18:19Z")
[QUOTE=DrDeth] It’s not like you Aussies don’t have a different regional pronuciation for a number of words, too. [/QUOTE] I can’t think of any off the top of my head, to be honest with you. Most of it follows British English, AFAICT. ---
**Author:** ![GameHat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ed655f/32.png) [@GameHat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GameHat)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2008, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/172 "2008-03-30T07:21:56Z")
[QUOTE=DrDeth] How do you think it should be pronounced and how do you think it is being mis-pronounced? 😕 [/QUOTE] [Espresso](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espresso) is a delicious coffee concentrate. Wonderful on its own or as added to a blended drink. Expresso is an abomination unto the Lord. ---
**Author:** ![GameHat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ed655f/32.png) [@GameHat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GameHat)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2008, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/173 "2008-03-30T07:26:05Z")
Another one: I had a good friend in college named “Juno” Pronounced “Hoo-no” No matter how many times I corrected him, my father would still address her as “Joo-no” I’ve never forgiven him for this. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2008, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/174 "2008-03-30T20:59:49Z")
[QUOTE=GorillaMan] How else do you build an empire? In all seriousness, you need to bear in mind that our encounters with Spanish are not dominated by Latin American pronunciations. We tend to have a greater Castillian influence in ways we might have absorbed any particular word. This is on top of any more general aspects of how much we may or may not alter words which become absorbed into everyday English. [/QUOTE] Hah! The way the British pronounce “Cádiz” and “jaguar” has nothing whatsoever to do with Castillian Spanish, and everything to do with ignoring entirely the Spanish pronunciation. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2008, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/175 "2008-03-30T21:05:21Z")
[QUOTE=lorene] My mother pronounces “mature” as “Ma-TOUR”. According to [dictionary.com](http://dictionary.com), that is indeed correct, but it still makes me want to scream. She is also one who says “ad-VER-tis-ment” and “HAR-iss-ment.” Scream, scream, scream. [/QUOTE] Sounds like my mother. Does she pronounce “poor” as “poo-er” and “humble” like " umble" (for some reason omitting the H and emphasizing the omission by forcing a glottal stop to make sure you know she’s omitting the H) ? Oh, I could go on about my folks and their pronounciations. Shrafnel. Helment. It’s like they read books in order to come up with new words to mispronounce. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2008, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/176 "2008-03-30T23:33:16Z")
[QUOTE=wring] Heard it again today: “I pacifically asked her” . Oh really? as opposed to atlantically asked her? [/QUOTE] Are you sure he didn’t mean he asked her without the urge to punch her in the face? As I only learned a couple of years ago, [pacific](http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/pacific) means “peaceful.” I suppose I should have gathered that sooner as it shares a root with pacifist, but I’d never heard it without being connected to the ocean until then. It bugs me when news folks decide to change the pronunciations of place names. Yesterday one on NEC was going on about “I-rock.” For a second or two I wondered if Apple had released a product to compete with Rockstar and it was causing violence. ---
**Author:** ![Rick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9f8e36/32.png) [@Rick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2008, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/177 "2008-03-31T00:18:05Z")
[QUOTE=Martini Enfield] Near the top of my list of Pronunciation Hates is “Jag-Wahr” for _Jaguar_. It’s “Jag-Yoo-Ar”, dammit! [/quote] If you have to repair one, teh correct pronunciation is often Quagmire. > [@](#): > > I get driven mad by The History Channel (amongst others) pronouncing _Carbine_ as “Carbeen”. The correct way to pronounce the word is “Carbuyne”, regardless of what you lot in the US might think. Ditto _Aluminium_. There’s a second “i” in it, folks. Only when you are talking about the metal in a Quagmire. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2008, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/178 "2008-03-31T00:47:42Z")
> [@lizardling](#): > > Vajayjay… To my horror, I saw this _on the cover of a women’s magazine_ while I was buying food a couple of weeks ago. I was previously ignorant of it. I worked out what it was, of course, but I was dismayed. **Celyn** ’s description of it as ‘very icky and twee’ is perfect. [QUOTE=spoke-] Oh yeah, and when you’re talking about men on horses, it’s **cavalry**. When you’re talking about men on crosses, it’s **Calvary**. Know the difference, please. [/QUOTE] What about men on cross horses? 🙂 For many years, I had no idea that ‘vittles’ and ‘victuals’ were the same word. I read ‘vittles’ (spelt that way) in books about pioneer times in the West; ‘victuals’ was a lot less common and tended to be in nineteenth-century fiction like that written by Jules Verne. My dialect of English has tended to lose the Y-sound in words like ‘tune’ and ‘due’; I pronounce those identically to ‘toon’ and ‘doo’. Oddly, some words had already smushed the y into the preceding consonant before we lost the Y-sound, and we’ve kept those: mature’ is ‘ma-CHURR’ for me. So we have fossils of Y-sounds that live no more. > [@Martini Enfield](#): > > Near the top of my list of Pronunciation Hates is “Jag-Wahr” for Jaguar. It’s “Jag-Yoo-Ar”, dammit! Not where I live. We actually pronounce it closer to ‘JEIG-wahr’. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2008, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/179 "2008-03-31T00:54:59Z")
And for everyone’s amusement, here’s the infamous [vocal samples thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=445112), in which we get to actually hear each other! Most of the samples are stored on my web server, so they’re still there. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2008, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978/180 "2008-03-31T00:56:34Z")
[QUOTE=Themenin] I must be having a high density day, but surely **nachos** _is_ the plural of **nacho**? [/QUOTE] No, the singular is **nachos** , pronounced na-choss (not na-choes). I guess the plural would be nachoses. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciacions-that-make-you-seethe-with-anger/442978.md?page=10)