# Pronunciations that make your skin crawl **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 25, 2007, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430 "2007-03-25T16:16:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2007, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/161 "2007-03-29T20:16:30Z")
[QUOTE=panache45] When I first moved to NYC from Ohio, it took me forever to learn to say merry/marry/Mary so that other people could understand me . . . [/QUOTE] I pronounce all three of those exactly the same. How do you pronounce them? ---
**Author:** ![Jake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jake)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2007, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/162 "2007-03-29T20:27:23Z")
**pinkfreud** : “It’s a fox paw, that’s what it is.” Totally broke me up. Finally someone pronounced it right! 😛 ---
**Author:** ![JR\_Brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d6d6ee/32.png) [@JR\_Brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JR_Brown)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2007, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/163 "2007-03-29T20:46:19Z")
Re merry/marry/Mary [QUOTE=Kalhoun] I pronounce all three of those exactly the same. How do you pronounce them? [/QUOTE] See here: [http://cfprod01.imt.uwm.edu/Dept/FLL/linguistics/dialect/staticmaps/q\_15.html](http://cfprod01.imt.uwm.edu/Dept/FLL/linguistics/dialect/staticmaps/q_15.html) I’m with the 16% who think merry is the odd man out. Many other dialect maps at this site! JRB ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2007, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/164 "2007-03-29T20:51:08Z")
[QUOTE=JR Brown] Re merry/marry/Mary See here: [http://cfprod01.imt.uwm.edu/Dept/FLL/linguistics/dialect/staticmaps/q\_15.html](http://cfprod01.imt.uwm.edu/Dept/FLL/linguistics/dialect/staticmaps/q_15.html) I’m with the 16% who think merry is the odd man out. Many other dialect maps at this site! JRB [/QUOTE] I’m one of the 57% that says them all the same. I wouldn’t begin to hazard a guess as to how one would say it differently. ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2007, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/165 "2007-03-29T21:18:48Z")
My linguistics teacher showed us (an exaggerated version of) the mary/merry/Mary split, and it’s pretty tough to wrap your head around if you say them all the same–because if you say them all the same, you **hear** them all the same, too. Which makes understanding subtle differences in overall similar dialects difficult. ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2007, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/166 "2007-03-29T21:45:43Z")
[QUOTE=fetus] My linguistics teacher showed us (an exaggerated version of) the mary/merry/Mary split, and it’s pretty tough to wrap your head around if you say them all the same–because if you say them all the same, you **hear** them all the same, too. Which makes understanding subtle differences in overall similar dialects difficult. [/QUOTE] As someone who claims to say these three words differently, here are the rhymes that fit my pronunciations: Mary – Cary, vary, scary, dairy merry – ferry, berry, very, sherry, Jerry, bury marry – carry, tarry, Larry, wary I will admit the distinctions are subtle. I have dispensed with the long a sound I used to use in Mary, where it was more like May-reh, May-ree and the like. I have thus moved closer to the marry/merry range, but it’s still more of the a sound in dare and care. It bothers me to hear bury pronounced as if it were burry to rhyme with hurry or furry. In my ear bury rhymes with (or sounds the same as) berry. ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2007, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/167 "2007-03-29T22:02:12Z")
Personally, a list of words that rhyme with each one doesn’t do much for me–I pronounce those words all the same too. Mary/merry/marry is just a convenient example for the phenomenon and it could just as easily be Cary/Kerry/carry. Another example from Linguistics class illustrated the difficulty of all this: the teacher asked a Japanese student to pronounce “Fuji”, and we all agreed that the first consonant sounded exactly like an English “f” to us. But when he asked her to stand in front of the class and exaggerate/draw out the sound, while instructing us to pay attention to the movement of her lips, it became clear that it was actually _an entirely different consonant_. But “f” is the closest phoneme that’s psychologically real for English speakers, so we hear it as “f”. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2007, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/168 "2007-03-29T22:13:21Z")
[QUOTE=Zeldar] Mary – Cary, vary, scary, dairy merry – ferry, berry, very, sherry, Jerry, bury marry – carry, tarry, Larry, wary [/QUOTE] There’s no difference in these words. Not for we 58%-ers, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2007, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/169 "2007-03-29T22:39:54Z")
[QUOTE=Kalhoun] There’s no difference in these words. Not for we 58%-ers, anyway. [/QUOTE] Okay. Let me get this straight. As far as you’re concerned, you would have all the -ary words in these sentences sound alike? Carry Cary Kerry over and bury him under Barry’s berry bush. Mary was merry to be able to marry Barry but Jerry was the ferry fairy in the school play. Larry is hairy but doesn’t harry the hari-kari that Kerry carries. Mary is wary to vary the merry way that Perry parries the thrusts from Carey’s epee. ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2007, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/170 "2007-03-30T01:05:21Z")
All the same to me. ---
**Author:** ![Quiddity\_Glomfuster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/c4cdca/32.png) [@Quiddity\_Glomfuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quiddity_Glomfuster)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2007, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/171 "2007-03-30T01:35:14Z")
[QUOTE=fetus] All the same to me. [/QUOTE] To me, Mary and Merry are the same but the a in Marry is the same a as in apple. Say mapple and then say marry using the same a and you’ll have it. ---
**Author:** ![ouryL](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ouryl/32/6067_2.png) [@ouryL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ouryL)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2007, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/172 "2007-03-30T02:13:16Z")
Heard on the news: “A judged signed an order to de-sin-ter the defendant’s first husband.” 😕 de-sin-ter 😕 oh, dis-in-ter :smack: ---
**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 30, 2007, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/173 "2007-03-30T03:02:24Z")
[QUOTE=Kalhoun] I’m one of the 57% that says them all the same. I wouldn’t begin to hazard a guess as to how one would say it differently. [/QUOTE] I tend to say them all the same, but here’s the difference: merry - short e (“mehree”) marry - short a (“maeree”) Mary - the “a” in “air” (kinda between a long and short a) (“mairee”) ---
**Author:** ![Caridwen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c89c15/32.png) [@Caridwen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caridwen)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2007, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/174 "2007-03-30T03:17:37Z")
[QUOTE=pulykamell] I tend to say them all the same, but here’s the difference: merry - short e (“mehree”) marry - short a (“maeree”) Mary - the “a” in “air” (kinda between a long and short a) (“mairee”) [/QUOTE] Exactly. Merry and Mary are the most similiar but all sound different to me. Funny! ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2007, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/175 "2007-03-30T05:48:21Z")
[QUOTE=Colophon] “Can’t” sounds like “car”, with “n’t” tagged on the end. [/QUOTE] What about _can_? (the verb, not the container) ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2007, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/176 "2007-03-30T10:30:45Z")
[QUOTE=Zeldar] Okay. Let me get this straight. As far as you’re concerned, you would have all the -ary words in these sentences sound alike? Carry Cary Kerry over and bury him under Barry’s berry bush. Mary was merry to be able to marry Barry but Jerry was the ferry fairy in the school play. Larry is hairy but doesn’t harry the hari-kari that Kerry carries. Mary is wary to vary the merry way that Perry parries the thrusts from Carey’s epee. [/QUOTE] Prezactly. ---
**Author:** ![seosamh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce7236/32.png) [@seosamh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seosamh)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2007, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/177 "2007-03-30T21:41:43Z")
mass-oose ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2007, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430/178 "2007-03-30T21:53:34Z")
[QUOTE=Zeldar] As someone who claims to say these three words differently, here are the rhymes that fit my pronunciations: Mary – Cary, vary, scary, dairy merry – ferry, berry, very, sherry, Jerry, bury marry – carry, tarry, Larry, wary I will admit the distinctions are subtle. I have dispensed with the long a sound I used to use in Mary, where it was more like May-reh, May-ree and the like. I have thus moved closer to the marry/merry range, but it’s still more of the a sound in dare and care. It bothers me to hear bury pronounced as if it were burry to rhyme with hurry or furry. In my ear bury rhymes with (or sounds the same as) berry. [/QUOTE] “vary” = varie I assume They are not subtle differences to me, it’s hard to imagine that a majority of the country think they sound the same. Don and Dawn on the other hand, are pronounced exactly alike. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pronunciations-that-make-your-skin-crawl/397430.md?page=8)