What words do you hear mispronounced often?

[DawnM]

I want to see if your list is the same as mine.   🤣

[Melissa in Australia]

Since my DH is Canadian and I am Australian I hear words pronounced wrong every single day

 He says the same about me

[Sunshine State Sue]

The word especially pronounced expecially drives me nuts.

[Arcadia]

9 minutes ago, Melissa in Australia said:

Since my DH is Canadian and I am Australian I hear words pronounced wrong every single day

 He says the same about me

My husband and I have the same country of origin. We still pronounce twelve differently. 

[maize]

8 hours ago, Melissa in Australia said:

Since my DH is Canadian and I am Australian I hear words pronounced wrong every single day

 He says the same about me

I love this response.

Pronunciation of common words depends on what is normal for the dialect you speak; for many words this is variable between dialects and no one pronunciation can be designated correct.

Things are trickier when it comes to uncommon words that many people don't hear spoken around them. Sometimes our best guess pronunciation doesn't match a recognized dictionary pronunciation. Since variations are more individual than dialectical it is fair to call them mispronunciations. 

Anytime a variation becomes common it ceases to be a mispronunciation and becomes a legitimate variant pronunciation. And sometimes what started as a less common variant comes to be the predominant pronunciation for a given dialect.

I'd love to have a contemporary recording from, say, the English of five hundred years ago. I'm sure pronunciation and cadence would be significantly different.

Edited April 29, 2021 by maize

[Tanaqui]

When my mother had breast cancer, at one point she had to be debrided. Which means the dead skin had to be removed, not that the doctor who called me about scheduling this bothered to define the word - I had to guess from context and ask him! But I digress.

He said "Debrade". The next doctor said "What? No. Debreeeeeed." The third doctor, who actually did the procedure, said "Debride", as in "here comes de bride".

At this point my mother and I were keeping a tally, and I finally looked it up. The second pronunciation is considered standard, however, the third is more widespread in the speech of the only people who use the word, doctors, who are by definition well-educated and usually speaking somewhat carefully when they use it as well. (No idea where the first came from. That young man gets no cookies. It is exceedingly strange to me that my mother has doctors younger than I am.)

But this is how language changes. Debreed is the pronunciation we got from French, but it's such a niche word it's not surprising that many people use a "spelling pronunciation" instead. Within a generation or perhaps two, I bet the dictionaries will all be updating their entries.

Next, I'll tell you about my favorite rock related word.

[wathe]

Mostly medical stuff by patients, especially drug names, which is usually fine, and not a problem as long as I can figure out what they actually mean.

They say "metro-pole", I say "metoprolol?", they say "yes, that!", and we're good.

More problematic is when patients pick the wrong medical word altogether when giving a history. It happens a lot.  Either substituting the wrong word (ie an aneurysm is quite a different thing than an embolism, even thought they sound a little alike), or using diagnoses they don't actually have to describe symptoms, or using medical words to mean things that those particular words don't actually mean.  It makes it hard to take an accurate history and can be quite dangerous.  Usually I can figure out what people are trying to tell me by using context (prostate vs prostrate as an obvious example) but sometimes I really can't.  I have to walk the fine line of delicately asking people what they mean in plain language when they say x,y,z medical term (because the history as they've related doesn't make medical sense) without making them feel silly or like I don't believe them or like I'm condescending etc - it's sometimes a lot harder than you'd think it should be.

Edited April 29, 2021 by wathe

[wathe]

29 minutes ago, Tanaqui said:

When my mother had breast cancer, at one point she had to be debrided. Which means the dead skin had to be removed, not that the doctor who called me about scheduling this bothered to define the word - I had to guess from context and ask him! But I digress.

He said "Debrade". The next doctor said "What? No. Debreeeeeed." The third doctor, who actually did the procedure, said "Debride", as in "here comes de bride".

At this point my mother and I were keeping a tally, and I finally looked it up. The second pronunciation is considered standard, however, the third is more widespread in the speech of the only people who use the word, doctors, who are by definition well-educated and usually speaking somewhat carefully when they use it as well. (No idea where the first came from. That young man gets no cookies. It is exceedingly strange to me that my mother has doctors younger than I am.)

But this is how language changes. Debreed is the pronunciation we got from French, but it's such a niche word it's not surprising that many people use a "spelling pronunciation" instead. Within a generation or perhaps two, I bet the dictionaries will all be updating their entries.

Next, I'll tell you about my favorite rock related word.

Oh, medicine is full of all kinds of fancy special doctor pronunciations.  It's ridiculous, really. 

Debride become deBREED.  Centimetre becomes SAWNtimetre.  CERvical vs cerVIcal, umBILicus becomes umbiLICus.  EczEEma becomes ECSema, which then becomes atopic dermatitis..... 🙂

Edited April 29, 2021 by wathe

[Laura Corin]

Pronunciation

Nuclear

Restaurateur 

 

Edited April 29, 2021 by Laura Corin

[Tanaqui]

Well, to be fair, debreed is the original pronunciation of debride, because that's how they say it in French, I guess.

[Jean in Newcastle]

2 hours ago, Arcadia said:

My husband and I have the same country of origin. We still pronounce twelve differently. 

I am trying very hard to figure out different ways to pronounce the word "twelve" and just can't.  All I can come up with is how I say it. 

[Laura Corin]

2 hours ago, wathe said:

Oh, medicine is full of all kinds of fancy special doctor pronunciations.  It's ridiculous, really. 

Debride become deBREED.  Centimetre becomes SAWNtimetre.  CERvical vs cerVIcal, umBILicus becomes umbiLICus.  EczEEma becomes ECSema, which then becomes atopic dermatitis..... 🙂

Do you think that some of this comes from the international movement and education of doctors? I believe all those pronunciations are common in different countries.  For example, in the UK I grew up saying CERvical and ECS'ma, but I  think cerVIcal is common in the US.

Edited April 29, 2021 by Laura Corin

[SoCal_Bear]

Library is constantly mispronounced as liberry. Like nails on a chalkboard.

[horsellian]

Mischievous.  Probably because no-one knows how to spell it either.

[Laura Corin]

5 hours ago, Melissa in Australia said:

Since my DH is Canadian and I am Australian I hear words pronounced wrong every single day

 He says the same about me

My Texan husband and I have been together for 33 years.  Neither of us remembers which pronunciations we started off with, we have merged so much over the years.

[Pawz4me]

Rottweiler as Rockwilder. Drives me batty.

And my Shih Tzu. Granted it's a bit tricky, but . . oh my goodness. One man asked me years ago if he was one of those Shoes Its. 😂

My MIL insists on pronouncing motorcycle as "motorsickle." It drives me a little bit nuts, but then I remind myself that she says it the same way bicycle is commonly pronounced. So maybe her way makes more sense.

Liberry instead of library

Nucular instead of nuclear

I'll never forget the day I picked DS22 up from first grade and he told me his teacher pronounced Des Moines, Iowa, as Dez Mo Knees.

[Carrie12345]

I still can’t ever remember if it’s comPOsite or COMposite. Dh and I argue about it kind of frequently, and I think we’ve both argued both sides.

[Indigo Blue]

Realitor instead of realtor.

[Indigo Blue]

Salmon instead of sammon. Salmon, of course, is the correct spelling, but the l is silent.

[Indigo Blue]

Alltimers instead of Alzheimer’s 

 

[Elizabeth86]

2 hours ago, calbear said:

Library is constantly mispronounced as liberry. Like nails on a chalkboard.

My dh hates this too and this is how my 3 year old currently says it.  I find it a bit funny.  I just don't get annoyed too much, that's why I find it funny . 

One word said by only one person I know that I find annoying is similar pronounced sim u ler.  

[DawnM]

1 hour ago, Indigo Blue said:

Realitor instead of realtor.

I know several who say real-a-der.   Drives me nuts.

Same with el-a-men-ary instead of elementary.

[MEmama]

FIL pronounces hamburger as hambooger. He manages to get the word into a remarkable amount of conversations.

He has so many weird mispronunciations I would swear he does it on purpose if I didn’t know him better. 

[wathe]

5 hours ago, Laura Corin said:

Do you think that some of this comes from the international movement and education of doctors? I believe all those pronunciations are common in different countries.  For example, in the UK I grew up saying CERvical and ECS'ma, but I  think cerVIcal is common in the US.

Historically maybe?  I think these special doctor pronunciations originally came about from historical British influence in medical culture.   But mostly it's just copying one's elders in order to fit in to the medical culture. Canadian-born-and-raised residents and medical students suddenly shift to these pronunciations. (Not everyone does it.  When it happens, though, the transformation is slightly funny to behold, as though putting on a white coat causes it).  Much of medical professional education is informally absorbing the professional culture* - indoctrination, so to speak.

*ETA - while sleep deprived and ever-competing with peers for that residency spot/fellowship spot/staff position.  Medical education systems can cause some weird behaviours.

 

Edited April 29, 2021 by wathe

[Noreen Claire]

"Suhposably" instead of supposedly. Makes me want to punch things. Which is hard, because it's my mother. 😔

[purpleowl]

7 hours ago, wathe said:

Mostly medical stuff by patients, especially drug names, which is usually fine, and not a problem as long as I can figure out what they actually mean.

They say "metro-pole", I say "metoprolol?", they say "yes, that!", and we're good.

Ooooh, can I throw a drug name pronunciation question in here? Montelukast. I have heard different things from different medical people and it drives my brain crazy. 

[pinball]

Toronto

most people drop the final T

[Selkie]

I know someone who says he's going to the choir-practor instead of the chiropractor. I kind of prefer his pronunciation to the actual word.🙂

[historically accurate]

I'm still looking for East Consin, since a lot of people around me drive north to WestConsin. For that matter, I live in Illinois (where the S should be silent). 

My mom says my DH just bought a Tie-yota brand name of car.

All of my South Dakota relatives warsh their stuff to get it clean.  

[regentrude]

"egg cetera"
Instead of etcetera

[regentrude]

2 hours ago, Carrie12345 said:

I still can’t ever remember if it’s comPOsite or COMposite. Dh and I argue about it kind of frequently, and I think we’ve both argued both sides.

This may be one of the words where it depends on whether it is used as a noun or an adjective. Many English words change pronounciation depending on that.

ProDUce vs PROduce. REfuse vs reFUse.

Conduct, conflict, impact, progress.... lots of them.
 

[alisoncooks]

Gah. Just reading this thread makes me twitch. 

My grandfather says chimley for chimney. 

[Vintage81]

21 minutes ago, historically accurate said:

All of my South Dakota relatives warsh their stuff to get it clean.  

My dad, who is a native Texan, says warsh. It drives me crazy. 😆

[Selkie]

21 minutes ago, historically accurate said:

I'm still looking for East Consin, since a lot of people around me drive north to WestConsin. For that matter, I live in Illinois (where the S should be silent). 

My mom says my DH just bought a Tie-yota brand name of car.

All of my South Dakota relatives warsh their stuff to get it clean.  

My in-laws said warsh and they also pronounced sink as "zink" - so it was, "I'm going to warsh this in the zink".🙃

[MEmama]

Specific instead of Pacific. That one is courtesy of MIL. 

[maize]

25 minutes ago, historically accurate said:

 

All of my South Dakota relatives warsh their stuff to get it clean.  

This is an excellent example of--not incorrect pronunciation--but dialectical variation.

Because we have formalized and inflexible orthographic conventions we can sometimes think that a pronunciation we don't see reflected in the spelling of a word is wrong. That way of thinking however gets the way language works completely backwards. The way people speak is the core of what language is; written language is just a system designed to--very imperfectly--represent language in a visual form.

Warsh is a perfectly legitimate word.

So is Warshington 😉

For those who think pronunciation is more correct when it follows written convention, maybe try addressing a military colonel as co-lo-nel?

 

 

 

[maize]

Re: Warshington and dialectical variation:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62786-2004Oct25.html

[JustEm]

dh pointed out that my brother and I both pronounce orange with one syllable. He discovered this while we were playing a game in which you can only give clues that are one syllable and my brother said orange and I didn't call him out on it even though I was the who was supposed to judge his clues

[maize]

8 minutes ago, hjffkj said:

dh pointed out that my brother and I both pronounce orange with one syllable. He discovered this while we were playing a game in which you can only give clues that are one syllable and my brother said orange and I didn't call him out on it even though I was the who was supposed to judge his clues

It's one syllable around here as well. Unless I'm speaking French; then it's two.

I think orange is a one-syllable word in at least half of the US. Ornj.

Edited April 29, 2021 by maize

[SKL]

Nuclear.

New Klee Ur.

[JustEm]

13 minutes ago, maize said:

It's one syllable around here as well. Unless I'm speaking French; then it's two.

I think orange is a one-syllable word in at least half of the US. Ornj.

well I mean people say it with one syllable but it isn't a 1 syllable word.  We are just saying it wrong, not that I am going to start saying it correctly though

[historically accurate]

30 minutes ago, maize said:

This is an excellent example of--not incorrect pronunciation--but dialectical variation.

Because we have formalized and inflexible orthographic conventions we can sometimes think that a pronunciation we don't see reflected in the spelling of a word is wrong. That way of thinking however gets the way language works completely backwards. The way people speak is the core of what language is; written language is just a system designed to--very imperfectly--represent language in a visual form.

Warsh is a perfectly legitimate word.

So is Warshington 😉

For those who think pronunciation is more correct when it follows written convention, maybe try addressing a military colonel as co-lo-nel?

 

 

 

Doesn't mean it doesn't bother me when I hear it. 

[maize]

13 minutes ago, hjffkj said:

well I mean people say it with one syllable but it isn't a 1 syllable word.  We are just saying it wrong, not that I am going to start saying it correctly though

The way people say a word IS the word.

Not the way a word is spelled.

Colonel is a two syllable word.

[MEmama]

1 hour ago, pinball said:

Toronto

most people drop the final T

Dan Levy is the only Canadian I’ve literally ever heard pronounce the second T. It sounded so wrong to my ears, I kinda felt like he did it on purpose. Lol

[maize]

8 minutes ago, historically accurate said:

Doesn't mean it doesn't bother me when I hear it. 

Fair enough!

I admit to being irrationally irritated by the word "aunt" when it is pronounced differently from "ant." In my dialect it is "ant" and even though I know the other pronunciation is perfectly legitimate, it sounds off to my ears.

[Junie]

I once had someone (a child) tell me that I pronounced a word incorrectly.  She told me that my "pronounciation" was bad.  I rolled my eyes and carried on.  :)

[Arcadia]

7 hours ago, Jean in Newcastle said:

I am trying very hard to figure out different ways to pronounce the word "twelve" and just can't.  All I can come up with is how I say it. 

He pronounced 12 more like 3-elves. While I tend to pronounce 12 as twelf.

[Kanin]

Some of my elementary students get surprised at the spellings of words they've only ever heard pronounced. One second grader was miffed yesterday that "drink" isn't spelled "jrink." I explained that it kind of sound like a /j/ at the beginning, but it's a d. 

Lots of them are surprised at the word "have." It's not actually "haff!" Like, "I haff to go to the bathroom." When I say "it's HAVE," they look at me like I'm nuts 🙂 

[MEmama]

16 minutes ago, Kanin said:

Some of my elementary students get surprised at the spellings of words they've only ever heard pronounced. One second grader was miffed yesterday that "drink" isn't spelled "jrink." I explained that it kind of sound like a /j/ at the beginning, but it's a d. 

Lots of them are surprised at the word "have." It's not actually "haff!" Like, "I haff to go to the bathroom." When I say "it's HAVE," they look at me like I'm nuts 🙂 

I’ve always wondered how phonics is taught to those who don’t pronounce words as they are spelled. Like here where Rs are added and dropped seemingly randomly in speech, the spoken word often doesn’t match the spelling at all.

I'm not surprised your students are confused! 

[Laura Corin]

2 hours ago, MEmama said:

I’ve always wondered how phonics is taught to those who don’t pronounce words as they are spelled. Like here where Rs are added and dropped seemingly randomly in speech, the spoken word often doesn’t match the spelling at all.

I'm not surprised your students are confused! 

Like this: 'That word 'half', it has an extra 'l' you can't hear, and that word 'farm', that has an extra 'r' you can't hear.  Why?  Well, pronunciation changes over time and English is more like a bunch of languages smushed together than a single language.'

Basically, phonics only goes so far with English, and we all spell words differently than they are spoken.

Or alternately, 'the sound 'ah' can be spelled 'a, ah, al, ar'.'  I found the earlier version less confusing to teach.

Edited April 29, 2021 by Laura Corin