# Pronunciation of this year and next year (poll)
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [December 11, 2009, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827 "2009-12-11T04:05:55Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/1 "2009-12-11T04:05:55Z")
How do you pronounce the current year? How will you pronounce next year? I’ve realized I’m going to have to shift gears somewhat, as for the past eight years I’ve been prefacing the current anno with “two thousand”, as in “two thousand nine”. But I suppose next year it will revert to “twenty-” as in “twenty-ten” (just as in the previous century all the years were prefaced with “nineteen-”). How about you?
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### Author:  [@sleeping](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sleeping)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/2 "2009-12-11T04:08:37Z")
Same. I doubt anyone would want to pronounce an extra syllable (or metric foot … ?)
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### Author:  [@Gotterfunken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gotterfunken)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/3 "2009-12-11T05:04:50Z")
Same as the OP. I’ve been looking forward to saying “twenty” as the prefix/preface ever since 1999 ended–it’s felt weird saying “two thousand [and].”
But lately I’ve been wondering if the majority will revert to the “twenty” preface–it’s seems like the official pronunciation for the _2012_ movie is “two thousand and twelve,” and I was starting to think that people were going to maintain the “two thousand [and]” preface for another decade or so.
It’s early days yet in the poll, but I’m encouraged to see that the “twenty” preface is currently in a commanding lead.
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### Author:  [@Maiira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maiira)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/4 "2009-12-11T05:54:17Z")
I put “something else” because I say “two thousand nine” AND “twenty ten.”
EDIT: D’oh, I just saw that on the poll. I r failure. :smack:
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### Author:  [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/5 "2009-12-11T06:58:32Z")
Voted (3). I probably would have pronounced the “two-thousand-and…” in both years, but local advertising for the Football World Cup has burned twenty-ten into my head…
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### Author:  [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/6 "2009-12-11T15:46:17Z")
Two thousand nine, twenty-ten.
I’ve accidentally said “Oh-ten” a few times though, like when I am asked for my credit card expiration date. “Yes, it’s O [looks at card]… ten… um, 2010.”
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### Author:  [@Xotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xotan)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/7 "2009-12-11T15:49:34Z")
Two thousand and nine
Two thousand and ten
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### Author:  [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/8 "2009-12-11T15:53:09Z")
two thousand, nine, two thousand ten - just as if I were pronouncing the numebrs in any other context. People saying the [and] actually makes me twitch. Funny that; I’m not normally a picky person, but that just bugs me.
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### Author:  [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/9 "2009-12-11T16:40:26Z")
We’re going to have a hard time at work. I’m a Periodicals librarian and half of our work related conversations are about magazines and such, as in “We have to start weeding the '08s today”, pronounced “oh eights”. We’re getting the last of the oh nines and we’ve started to get… tens? oh tens? Both awful.
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### Author:  [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/10 "2009-12-11T17:12:07Z")
When I mention past years of this decade I say “o- eight” or whatever. I guess I’d pronounce this year “two-thousand nine” while we’re still in it and “o-nine” once it’s over. Next ten years will be “twenty-10, 11”, etc. and I will refer to them in the same way when speaking in past tense. Once we get to the 20’s, past tense will go back to the last two digits.
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### Author:  [@Max\_the\_Immortal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_the_Immortal)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/11 "2009-12-11T18:18:24Z")
It should have been the fourth option this past decade, but I compromised to the third.
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### Author:  [@GESancMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GESancMan)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/12 "2009-12-11T20:24:56Z")
It’s my opinion that we should retain the “two thousand” prefix for the next three years; in 2013 we can start with the “twenty” prefix. I have no rational reason for this, it just feels right.
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### Author:  [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/13 "2009-12-11T20:38:29Z")
> [@GESancMan](#):
>
> It’s my opinion that we should retain the “two thousand” prefix for the next three years; in 2013 we can start with the “twenty” prefix. I have no rational reason for this, it just feels right.
I feel similar although my abitrary cutoff is 2020. Two thousand eighteen, two thousand nineteen, twenty-twenty.
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### Author:  [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)
#### Post date: [December 11, 2009, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/14 "2009-12-11T21:23:29Z")
Charles Osgood on CBS Sunday Morning always refers to the date as “…Twenty Oh Nine” and it clangs off my ear every week. Dunno why; perhaps it’s because we spent a few years referring to The Year 2000 (either approaching with dread, or as the current year), and it became natural to just append the current year.
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### Author:  [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2009, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/15 "2009-12-12T12:02:21Z")
> [@GESancMan](#):
>
> It’s my opinion that we should retain the “two thousand” prefix for the next three years; in 2013 we can start with the “twenty” prefix. I have no rational reason for this, it just feels right.
I almost feel the same way, but I have a reason. It’s syllabification. Two thousand ten has the same number of syllables as 2009, so why should 'I change? Unfortunately, it breaks down on 2011, but either version sounds wrong to my ears. But every time I’ve read about the Mayan calendar thing, I’ve read it as two thousand twelve.
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### Author:  [@Dusty\_Rose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dusty_Rose)
#### Post date: [December 14, 2009, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/16 "2009-12-14T01:12:04Z")
> [@TruCelt](#):
>
> two thousand, nine, two thousand ten - just as if I were pronouncing the numebrs in any other context. People saying the [and] actually makes me twitch. Funny that; I’m not normally a picky person, but that just bugs me.
Me too.
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### Author:  [@Nametag](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nametag)
#### Post date: [December 14, 2009, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/17 "2009-12-14T01:52:09Z")
I almost said #3, as I say “two thousand nine” and plan to say “twenty ten” most of the time, but I also plan to say “two thousand ten” from time to time, as gravity demands.
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### Author:  [@Projammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Projammer)
#### Post date: [December 14, 2009, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/18 "2009-12-14T02:52:09Z")
Two thousand nine
Twenty ten
Two thousand eleven. Twenty eleven just grates.
Twelve through nineteen can go either way.
But from twenty twenty on out it will be twenty whatever.
eta: Assuming we make it past 2012…
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### Author:  [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)
#### Post date: [December 14, 2009, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/19 "2009-12-14T03:02:42Z")
So now the poll is even between people who say “twenty ten” (52) and “two thousand [and] ten” (45 + 7)
ETA: whoops, add another 4 for the odd people who say “twenty oh nine / twenty ten”. But still pretty close to even!
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### Author:  [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)
#### Post date: [December 14, 2009, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciation-of-this-year-and-next-year-poll/520827/20 "2009-12-14T03:29:13Z")
I say two thousand nine and next year I’ll probably say twenty-ten. But who knows what I’ll do
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