You think that’s bad? I’ve had that stupid song stuck in my head since I first posted to this thread… arrgh!
Alias. It’s one of those words that I read a bunch of times when I was a kid and I never heard it pronounced until I had my own in-head pronunciation firmly entrenched. After I found out I was saying it wrong, I avoided saying it at all, because I’d always forget which was right, and it really didn’t come up much.
So then, my husband and I started watching the show Alias, and one night I had to let him know it was starting. So, I yelled at him, “hey, a-LYE-us is on!” and he comes in and says, “what’s on?” and I said, “a-LYE-us! oh fuck…” and alas, I have not yet lived it down.
zyzygy
tzatziki
Which is a shame, 'cause I like it.
I always pronounce “readily” as “reed-ily” and no amount of trying to correct myself has seemed to work.
Prescription comes out as “perscription” every dang time.
Oh, another of my regional issues, towel/tile - and that one has real world consequences when you’re remodeling a bathroom! My boyfriend finds it very funny. He claims he doesn’t say anything funny. And then he said “Arnold Palmer Arnold Palmer Arnold Palmer!” Arrrgh, I hate him sometimes.
“first one out of the shoe.”
I know it’s “chute,” not “shoe,” but the first time I ever heard it, I thought the person was saying “shoe,” and maybe they were (even though it made no sense). But, that’s the word I use in the phrase, even though I know it’w wrong.
I’m another with a problem with “rear wheel drive.” Also “free throw.”
After years of “weer wheel dwive” and “free fros,” I have switched to “back wheel drive” and “foul shots.”
The far more embarrassing one is… I can’t pronounce my own name very well. Julie. Julie. Julie. Carter. Carter. Carter.
I usually sound like I’m saying “Judy Cardle.”
I totally blame my sneakily almost-hidden southern accent for these:
Rural always comes out something like “rurrl”. It drives me nuts, too. I don’t even know if anyone else notices the way I say it, but I do. It’s even worse when I stop and TRY to say it right. Rrroorrrroorralal.
Girlfriend just feels weird. I can’t put my finger on what it is, but something about the “girl” part comes out funny.
Thankfully I haven’t picked up some of my dad’s words. Wolf becomes woof. Wolves are wooves.
Or Montgomery Ward. Too many Rs and Ws too close to one another.
I can’t say rural either, and stumble over brewery. Rool blewry, anyone? I have no idea where the L came from, but if I don’t think hard about leaving it out, it goes in…
My husband thinks this is hilarious. But I can say “documentary.” When HE says it, it’s “dock-you-mint-er-ary.”
(re: chalcedony - I was taught, in a lapidary class, that it is pronounced kal-SID-nee. When I have to spell it out, though, it’s CHAL-sed-oh-nee in my head.)
Abandoning.
Just can’t say it without concentrating and going slow.
Shoulder surgery somehow comes out sounding like SHOLjer SHURjury. It makes my tongue quiver just thinking about it.
When I was a kid, I pronounced shock absorber as shock aGsorber. It wasn’t until I was in my late teens that it even occurred to me that I was pronouncing it wrong.
During a high school speech class, I pronounced the word thermometer as therm-o-meter (long “o”). Apparently it was one of those moments that I’ll carry with me for all time because it was well over 30 years ago and I still remember it. :smack:
I don’t have pronunciation problems, but there’s this memory thing. If I get someone’s name wrong once, the wrong name will remain firmly embedded in my brain and only after many, many attempts to overwrite the program will I be able to get the correct name corrected. So Angie at the front desk remains Anita to me.
Worst mistake was ‘ravishing’ for ‘ravenous’. There’s just no way anybody lets you get off when you proclaim that you’re stunning when all you want’s a sandwich.
I remember being in line during elementary and one of the little snot nosed country bumpkins that I grew up with poked her head up and whined “Do we HAVE to go to libary?” to which I turned round and corrected “You’re sposed to say ‘the libRary’.” In response she tried to correct me. I rarely run into someone who bastardizes library like that, but when I do I can feel the grade three rage bubbling up within me again.
I do all the problys, tempichures, rurrls, and ah-munnas but Albertans are regarded as being very quick speakers, a stereotype which I exacerbate. If I’m in a formal setting or doing some public speaking, the Queen’s English comes out.
Mind you, I’ve got an Australian immigrant father, and a Canadian mother, so maybe I’ve always been more mindful of pronunciation.
Oh wait, I just realized that I bastardize Calgary into Cal-gree. That’s a true test of a native Calgarian though, much the same way a Vancouverite says Vangcouver.
P.S.
I’ve quietly been pronouncing every single word that you failures can’t. sigh I need a hobby.
Like Ruby, I have a problem with shoulders. Soldiers and shoulders get muddled. And I cannot for the life of me say ambulance. It comes out am-blee-ants for some reason. I avoid this in cumbersome ways (emergency vehicle…the EMTs…). I can go years without actually mis-saying the word.
Indefatigable becomes indefaggotable.
Not good.
I’ll not be asking for challah at the bakery, tasty as it is.
I’ll also not be mentioning a few italian dishes or foods, because saying ‘cappa-cola’ to the guy who says ‘gabba-GOOL’ is so painfully wasptastic, but saying it his way is even worse; would make me feel like one of those a-holes who spends a week in England and comes home with an accent.
I think I’ll just write notes.
Accompanyist. And I’ve had a few.
English words with a J. I had to learn to say “prison” instead of “jail” because otherwise there was always some moron who did the same joke about Yale not being a prison. That joke stopped being funny on the year Yale was built.
In Spanish, my Y and LL are identical, but this is a general trend so most people don’t notice.