Words You Used to Pronounce The Way It's Spelled!

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InnerMe

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 9:37 am

oliveoil wrote:

Yosemite

Had that too! used to say yose- ah- mite, as in dust mites. Until I went to a national geographic exhibit on national parks did I learn that it's yo-sem-ittee as in committee. Which sounds way cooler.

InnerMe

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 9:41 am

youngishbear wrote:

I saw a quote meme once that argued mispronounciation is a sign of intelligence because we get our vocabulary from reading.

Regarding French and other unpronouncables, I take heart from Winston Churchill's alleged claim that "everyone has the right to pronounce foreign names however he chooses." Whether he said it or not is debatable. I will, however, claim that right for myself with obscure foreign words.

To add to zaq's suggestion, all dictionaries contain a pronunciation key, but talking dictionaries do the work for you. You can look up any word online or on dictionary apps and hear it said out loud. The problem is with those words that we don't know we are not pronouncing correctly. It doesn't even occur to us to look those up!

Thanks for announcing this right! I'll take that any time! Now I am officially entitled to mispronounce foreign tongue tripping words.

InnerMe

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 9:43 am

Mommyg8 wrote:

genre. I still don't pronounce it right.

Oh the joys of grade school- arguing over the right pronunciation of genre. is it gen- ree? gen- ra?

Shoshie

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:13 am

Gnocchi. I was nowhere close to nah'key.

And although I could pronounce both words properly, I kept using "sortie" instead of "soiree".

MagentaYenta

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:14 am

zaq wrote:

...
Seriously,ladies, there’s a marvelous analog program (also available online with audio) with which you should make yourselves familiar. It’s called a DICTIONARY and it tells you not only how to pronounce words (including secondary, but still acceptable pronunciations) but also their origins and roots, definitions, synonyms and antonyms, and if you’re really lucky, examples of their use in a sentence.

I highly recommend acquiring one. And then USING it. You can trust a dictionary. Unlike certain ill-advised spiritual leaders and educators, dictionaries do not lie. (If they did, they’d be called fictionaries.) And unlike you or your bff, dictionaries don’t guess. They are exhaustively researched, and nothing goes in that does not have ample documentation in print.

Are students even taught how to use the pronunciation symbols today? I recall my youngest grandson complaining to me about learning the symbols. Ha, no sympathy from me, nor from his mother. I did make sure he got a subscription to the OED online and a Websters unabridged for Chanukkah that year.

zaq

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:19 am

InnerMe wrote:

Oh the joys of grade school- arguing over the right pronunciation of genre. is it gen- ree? gen- ra?

I could tell you. You could PM Ruchel who could tell you with the proper French accSAHnt. But that would teach you nothing. Look it up yourself, and learn not just a word for today but a priceless skill for life. You know, give a man a fish...

Mommyg8

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:22 am

InnerMe wrote:

Oh the joys of grade school- arguing over the right pronunciation of genre. is it gen- ree? gen- ra?

It took me a while to get this pronunciation right - because I just encountered this word in college, as a very much older adult - and the part of my brain that can learn new accents seems to have shut down.

What's hard about the pronunciation is the "g" sound - I can't think of another English word that has that sound. (Probably French?)

penguin

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:22 am

So Yosemite rhymes with epitome?

imasinger

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:23 am

New Orleans. Took me years to figure out that's the city people meant when they said "NAWlins."

zaq

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:27 am

Mommyg8 wrote:

Pleasure. Measure. Leisure.

Kiwi13

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:35 am

Epitome

tigerwife

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:38 am

And the old argument- NICHE- is it nitch or neesh?

zaq

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:43 am

penguin wrote:

So Yosemite rhymes with epitome?

Assonance. Which means almost rhymes but not quite. It rhymes perfecly with “ HaSHEMity” which might be a neologism for “the state of being G-d; G-dhead”.

Not to Be confusedwith Hashemite, the current ruling dynasty of Jordan, which rhymes with “SMASH a mite”, a rather hit-or-miss method of pest control.

Kiwi13

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:43 am

tigerwife wrote:

And the old argument- NICHE- is it nitch or neesh?

Nitch. Always nitch. When people say they’re looking for their neesh I always hear a mispronunciation of niece. And I think to myself, well where did you last see her? Did you try calling/texting? Maybe she doesn’t want to be found.

sweetdimples

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:48 am

Mishap mish-ap

zaq

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:51 am

Why do “ignorant armies clash by night “ when if they bothered to look the blessed words up in the dictionary—online if need be for those who don’t know how to use books—they would KNOW. Sheesh.

zaq

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:52 am

Kiwi13 wrote:

If I were someone’s niche who was being called a neesh, I wouldn’t want to be found, either!

sweetdimples

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 10:54 am

Soot I pronounced to rhyme with boot. It wasn't until 9/11 that I learned to pronounce it the way it should be. After hearing the news go on and on about the "soot and debris all over the city..." come to think about it, debris I used to pronounce dehbris with the 's' sound up until that notorious date in history...

SuperWify

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 11:08 am

Didn’t read the whole thread so I apologize if I am repeating.
Hoax (I said Hocks embarrassed

)
Chaos (cha-ows why couldn’t they just spell it kayos?)

tryinghard

Sun, Nov 12 2017, 11:28 am

I remember my sister talking about Lewis and Clark and their guide "sack-a-JEAH-weea" (jeah rhyming with yeah)

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