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Most annoying mispronunciation

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  • Registered Users Posts: 5,472 ✭✭✭brooke 2


    Do you use this pronunciation?


    On a visit to Amsterdam, I asked the very nice man at the hotel reception
    which of the two, Van Goff or Van Go, was correct. He replied 'Neither! It is
    'Wan Gocccchhhh', or just as our friend in the video clip pronounced it!!


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,472 ✭✭✭brooke 2


    danrua01 wrote: »
    van GO

    just no!

    I get annoyed at football commentators who mispronounce names, surely it's not that hard to do a little bit of work before a game if you're unsure...

    Anyone got any explanation for the eruption of commentators pronouncing
    Gibraltar as 'Gibraltah'? Sounds bizarre to hear them pronounce it as such with
    their flat Irish accents! I notice Martin O'Neill uses the final 'r'. :)


  • Registered Users Posts: 405 ✭✭danrua01


    brooke 2 wrote: »
    Anyone got any explanation for the eruption of commentators pronouncing
    Gibraltar as 'Gibraltah'? Sounds bizarre to hear them pronounce it as such with
    their flat Irish accents! I notice Martin O'Neill uses the final 'r'. :)

    It's easier, maybe? Any time I read it, I read it in Spanish so I can't answer really!


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,824 ✭✭✭Qualitymark


    The ones that madden me is when an incorrect English pronunciation infects Ireland, like people pronouncing "Louth" in Ireland with a soft "th", which is correct for the Louth in England, but not for the one in Ireland, which is correctly pronounced Loudh.

    As for politicians and their bizarre pronunciations, sure don't be tellin' me only akshin' me!


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,472 ✭✭✭brooke 2


    danrua01 wrote: »
    It's easier, maybe? Any time I read it, I read it in Spanish so I can't answer really!

    A few have only started to say it like that recently. I thought it was only IrelandAm's
    Aidan Cooney at first, but I have heard it on Newstalk and also from one or two on
    RTE. It is very disconcerting when, for instance, the person introducing the sports
    item uses Gibraltar and the person presenting the item pronounces it as GibralTAH!
    Beginning to wreck my head!! First world problem, eh?? ;)


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  • Registered Users Posts: 5,472 ✭✭✭brooke 2


    jacksie66 wrote: »
    People in New Zealand say ASHumed instead of assumed. Does my nut in.

    That SH sound seems to be creeping into a lot of words spoken by certain people
    lately, as in Michelle Obama saying 'shtruggle', 'shtrife'; John Travolta 'hairshpray'!
    Latest I heard was conshumerism!! :(


  • Registered Users Posts: 405 ✭✭danrua01


    brooke 2 wrote: »
    That SH sound seems to be creeping into a lot of words spoken by certain people
    lately, as in Michelle Obama saying 'shtruggle', 'shtrife'; John Travolta 'hairshpray'!
    Latest I heard was conshumerism!! :(

    Toilet...tiSSSSS-ewe


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,472 ✭✭✭brooke 2


    mackerski wrote: »
    Picture two occurrences of a high-phlegm version of the ch sound you get in Irish words like "loch".

    'high-phlegm' - perfect description!! None more 'high-phlegm' than that guy on Newstalk's 'Gaeilge Gasta'!!


  • Registered Users Posts: 20,628 ✭✭✭✭yourdeadwright


    One you always here that is wrong is the food Quina (keen wa) being called Kin oooh a by people who think there hip but infact are not at all:D , wrecks my head,


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,824 ✭✭✭Qualitymark


    Then there's a few politicians who've clearly had ellamacution lessons and now talk with what Maureen Potter used to mock as a Fur Hur accent (as in "I'm combing out my byoootifyul fur hur").


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  • Registered Users Posts: 560 ✭✭✭Philo Beddoe


    Then there's a few politicians who've clearly had ellamacution lessons and now talk with what Maureen Potter used to mock as a Fur Hur accent (as in "I'm combing out my byoootifyul fur hur").

    Especially amusing when the new accent is combined with colloquial language e.g. I do be combing out my byoootifyl fur hur.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 21,296 ✭✭✭✭gimmick


    Not a particular word, but I find young women from various parts of the country are mispronouncing words with T in them

    For example

    I was looking on twidder the other day and some guy was talking about what he voded for. I toddally disagreed wid him

    Another and I think its a Cork thing but saying ARFTER for after, AURDREY for Audrey.


  • Registered Users Posts: 405 ✭✭danrua01


    gimmick wrote: »
    Another and I think its a Cork thing but saying ARFTER for after, AURDREY for Audrey.

    I think that's just an accent thing, though. You'd get the "arfter" pronunciation around Yorkshire as well, I think.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,330 ✭✭✭NeVeR


    Hate when people say

    Ear-land for Ireland


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,824 ✭✭✭Qualitymark


    Safetty! Someone just referred to safetty concerns on the radio.

    The pronunciation of "t" as "d" is part of the crawling desire to sound American. Sooo embarrassing! I loll, like!


  • Registered Users Posts: 20,755 ✭✭✭✭dxhound2005


    One you always here that is wrong is the food Quina (keen wa) being called Kin oooh a by people who think there hip but infact are not at all:D , wrecks my head,

    You can achieve unwrecking of your head by spelling the world correctly. Quinoa. And spelling Hear correctly to make sense of what you are writing.

    And then check online dictionaries to reveal that there are two standard pronunciations for quinoa.

    http://www.howjsay.com/index.php?word=quinoa&submit=Submit


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,824 ✭✭✭Qualitymark


    You can achieve unwrecking of your head by spelling the world correctly. Quinoa. And spelling Hear correctly to make sense of what you are writing.

    And then check online dictionaries to reveal that there are two standard pronunciations for quinoa.

    http://www.howjsay.com/index.php?word=quinoa&submit=Submit

    Naah, only one: 2.22 here:



  • Registered Users Posts: 20,755 ✭✭✭✭dxhound2005


    Naah, only one: 2.22 here:


    Popular music is the worst offender against proper English. Cuz I Luv U.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,824 ✭✭✭Qualitymark


    Popular music is the worst offender against proper English. Cuz I Luv U.

    Ah yes, but this is mocking all kinds of things - including the trendy (and correct) pronunciation of quinoa.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,347 ✭✭✭LynnGrace


    gimmick wrote: »
    Not a particular word, but I find young women from various parts of the country are mispronouncing words with T in them

    For example

    I was looking on twidder the other day and some guy was talking about what he voded for. I toddally disagreed wid him

    Another and I think its a Cork thing but saying ARFTER for after, AURDREY for Audrey.

    Oh yes, like the ad for the Gai-edy The-ader...


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  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 5,575 ✭✭✭AlanS181824


    American pronunciation of niche... Kills me every time...


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,278 ✭✭✭mackerski


    American pronunciation of niche... Kills me every time...

    Yeah, I've got a niche I just can't scratch.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 5,575 ✭✭✭AlanS181824


    mackerski wrote: »
    Yeah, I've got a niche I just can't scratch.

    That hurt... That hurt.


  • Registered Users Posts: 28,190 ✭✭✭✭looksee


    Ague caught me out :D



    Gerard Nolst Trenité - The Chaos (1922)

    Dearest creature in creation
    Studying English pronunciation,
    I will teach you in my verse
    Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse.

    I will keep you, Susy, busy,
    Make your head with heat grow dizzy;
    Tear in eye, your dress you'll tear;
    Queer, fair seer, hear my prayer.

    Pray, console your loving poet,
    Make my coat look new, dear, sew it!
    Just compare heart, hear and heard,
    Dies and diet, lord and word.

    Sword and sward, retain and Britain
    (Mind the latter how it's written).
    Made has not the sound of bade,
    Say-said, pay-paid, laid but plaid.

    Now I surely will not plague you
    With such words as vague and ague,
    But be careful how you speak,
    Say: gush, bush, steak, streak, break, bleak ,

    Previous, precious, fuchsia, via
    Recipe, pipe, studding-sail, choir;
    Woven, oven, how and low,
    Script, receipt, shoe, poem, toe.

    Say, expecting fraud and trickery:
    Daughter, laughter and Terpsichore,
    Branch, ranch, measles, topsails, aisles,
    Missiles, similes, reviles.

    Wholly, holly, signal, signing,
    Same, examining, but mining,
    Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
    Solar, mica, war and far.

    From "desire": desirable-admirable from "admire",
    Lumber, plumber, bier, but brier,
    Topsham, brougham, renown, but known,
    Knowledge, done, lone, gone, none, tone,

    One, anemone, Balmoral,
    Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel.
    Gertrude, German, wind and wind,
    Beau, kind, kindred, queue, mankind,

    Tortoise, turquoise, chamois-leather,
    Reading, Reading, heathen, heather.
    This phonetic labyrinth
    Gives moss, gross, brook, brooch, ninth, plinth.

    Have you ever yet endeavoured
    To pronounce revered and severed,
    Demon, lemon, ghoul, foul, soul,
    Peter, petrol and patrol?

    Billet does not end like ballet;
    Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
    Blood and flood are not like food,
    Nor is mould like should and would.

    Banquet is not nearly parquet,
    Which exactly rhymes with khaki.
    Discount, viscount, load and broad,
    Toward, to forward, to reward,

    Ricocheted and crocheting, croquet?
    Right! Your pronunciation's OK.
    Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
    Friend and fiend, alive and live.

    Is your r correct in higher?
    Keats asserts it rhymes Thalia.
    Hugh, but hug, and hood, but hoot,
    Buoyant, minute, but minute.

    Say abscission with precision,
    Now: position and transition;
    Would it tally with my rhyme
    If I mentioned paradigm?

    Twopence, threepence, tease are easy,
    But cease, crease, grease and greasy?
    Cornice, nice, valise, revise,
    Rabies, but lullabies.

    Of such puzzling words as nauseous,
    Rhyming well with cautious, tortious,
    You'll envelop lists, I hope,
    In a linen envelope.

    Would you like some more? You'll have it!
    Affidavit, David, davit.
    To abjure, to perjure. Sheik
    Does not sound like Czech but ache.

    Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
    Rachel, loch, moustache, eleven.
    We say hallowed, but allowed,
    People, leopard, towed but vowed.

    Mark the difference, moreover,
    Between mover, plover, Dover.
    Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
    Chalice, but police and lice,

    Camel, constable, unstable,
    Principle, disciple, label.
    Petal, penal, and canal,
    Wait, surmise, plait, promise, pal,

    Suit, suite, ruin. Circuit, conduit
    Rhyme with "shirk it" and "beyond it",
    But it is not hard to tell
    Why it's pall, mall, but Pall Mall.

    Muscle, muscular, gaol, iron,
    Timber, climber, bullion, lion,
    Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
    Senator, spectator, mayor,

    Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
    Has the a of drachm and hammer.
    Pussy, hussy and possess,
    Desert, but desert, address.

    Golf, wolf, countenance, lieutenants
    Hoist in lieu of flags left pennants.
    Courier, courtier, tomb, bomb, comb,
    Cow, but Cowper, some and home.

    "Solder, soldier! Blood is thicker",
    Quoth he, "than liqueur or liquor",
    Making, it is sad but true,
    In bravado, much ado.

    Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
    Neither does devour with clangour.
    Pilot, pivot, gaunt, but aunt,
    Font, front, wont, want, grand and grant.

    Arsenic, specific, scenic,
    Relic, rhetoric, hygienic.
    Gooseberry, goose, and close, but close,
    Paradise, rise, rose, and dose.

    Say inveigh, neigh, but inveigle,
    Make the latter rhyme with eagle.
    Mind! Meandering but mean,
    Valentine and magazine.

    And I bet you, dear, a penny,
    You say mani-(fold) like many,
    Which is wrong. Say rapier, pier,
    Tier (one who ties), but tier.

    Arch, archangel; pray, does erring
    Rhyme with herring or with stirring?
    Prison, bison, treasure trove,
    Treason, hover, cover, cove,

    Perseverance, severance. Ribald
    Rhymes (but piebald doesn't) with nibbled.
    Phaeton, paean, gnat, ghat, gnaw,
    Lien, psychic, shone, bone, pshaw.

    Don't be down, my own, but rough it,
    And distinguish buffet, buffet;
    Brood, stood, roof, rook, school, wool, boon,
    Worcester, Boleyn, to impugn.

    Say in sounds correct and sterling
    Hearse, hear, hearken, year and yearling.
    Evil, devil, mezzotint,
    Mind the z! (A gentle hint.)

    Now you need not pay attention
    To such sounds as I don't mention,
    Sounds like pores, pause, pours and paws,
    Rhyming with the pronoun yours;

    Nor are proper names included,
    Though I often heard, as you did,
    Funny rhymes to unicorn,
    Yes, you know them, Vaughan and Strachan.

    No, my maiden, coy and comely,
    I don't want to speak of Cholmondeley.
    No. Yet Froude compared with proud
    Is no better than McLeod.

    But mind trivial and vial,
    Tripod, menial, denial,
    Troll and trolley, realm and ream,
    Schedule, mischief, schism, and scheme.

    Argil, gill, Argyll, gill. Surely
    May be made to rhyme with Raleigh,
    But you're not supposed to say
    Piquet rhymes with sobriquet.

    Had this invalid invalid
    Worthless documents? How pallid,
    How uncouth he, couchant, looked,
    When for Portsmouth I had booked!

    Zeus, Thebes, Thales, Aphrodite,
    Paramour, enamoured, flighty,
    Episodes, antipodes,
    Acquiesce, and obsequies.

    Please don't monkey with the geyser,
    Don't peel 'taters with my razor,
    Rather say in accents pure:
    Nature, stature and mature.

    Pious, impious, limb, climb, glumly,
    Worsted, worsted, crumbly, dumbly,
    Conquer, conquest, vase, phase, fan,
    Wan, sedan and artisan.

    The th will surely trouble you
    More than r, ch or w.
    Say then these phonetic gems:
    Thomas, thyme, Theresa, Thames.

    Thompson, Chatham, Waltham, Streatham,
    There are more but I forget 'em-
    Wait! I've got it: Anthony,
    Lighten your anxiety.

    The archaic word albeit
    Does not rhyme with eight-you see it;
    With and forthwith, one has voice,
    One has not, you make your choice.

    Shoes, goes, does *. Now first say: finger;
    Then say: singer, ginger, linger.
    Real, zeal, mauve, gauze and gauge,
    Marriage, foliage, mirage, age,

    Hero, heron, query, very,
    Parry, tarry fury, bury,
    Dost, lost, post, and doth, cloth, loth,
    Job, Job, blossom, bosom, oath.

    Faugh, oppugnant, keen oppugners,
    Bowing, bowing, banjo-tuners
    Holm you know, but noes, canoes,
    Puisne, truism, use, to use?

    Though the difference seems little,
    We say actual, but victual,
    Seat, sweat, chaste, caste, Leigh, eight, height,
    Put, nut, granite, and unite.

    Reefer does not rhyme with deafer,
    Feoffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
    Dull, bull, Geoffrey, George, ate, late,
    Hint, pint, senate, but sedate.

    Gaelic, Arabic, pacific,
    Science, conscience, scientific;
    Tour, but our, dour, succour, four,
    Gas, alas, and Arkansas.

    Say manoeuvre, yacht and vomit,
    Next omit, which differs from it
    Bona fide, alibi
    Gyrate, dowry and awry.

    Sea, idea, guinea, area,
    Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
    Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean,
    Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

    Compare alien with Italian,
    Dandelion with battalion,
    Rally with ally; yea, ye,
    Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, key, quay!

    Say aver, but ever, fever,
    Neither, leisure, skein, receiver.
    Never guess-it is not safe,
    We say calves, valves, half, but Ralf.

    Starry, granary, canary,
    Crevice, but device, and eyrie,
    Face, but preface, then grimace,
    Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.

    Bass, large, target, gin, give, verging,
    Ought, oust, joust, and scour, but scourging;
    Ear, but earn; and ere and tear
    Do not rhyme with here but heir.

    Mind the o of off and often
    Which may be pronounced as orphan,
    With the sound of saw and sauce;
    Also soft, lost, cloth and cross.

    Pudding, puddle, putting. Putting?
    Yes: at golf it rhymes with shutting.
    Respite, spite, consent, resent.
    Liable, but Parliament.

    Seven is right, but so is even,
    Hyphen, roughen, nephew, Stephen,
    Monkey, donkey, clerk and jerk,
    Asp, grasp, wasp, demesne, cork, work.

    A of valour, vapid vapour,
    S of news (compare newspaper),
    G of gibbet, gibbon, gist,
    I of antichrist and grist,

    Differ like diverse and divers,
    Rivers, strivers, shivers, fivers.
    Once, but nonce, toll, doll, but roll,
    Polish, Polish, poll and poll.

    Pronunciation-think of Psyche!-
    Is a paling, stout and spiky.
    Won't it make you lose your wits
    Writing groats and saying "grits"?

    It's a dark abyss or tunnel
    Strewn with stones like rowlock, gunwale,
    Islington, and Isle of Wight,
    Housewife, verdict and indict.

    Don't you think so, reader, rather,
    Saying lather, bather, father?
    Finally, which rhymes with enough,
    Though, through, bough, cough, hough, sough, tough??

    Hiccough has the sound of sup...
    My advice is: GIVE IT UP!


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,824 ✭✭✭Qualitymark


    There's a nice website called howjsay.com…


  • Registered Users Posts: 16,500 ✭✭✭✭DEFTLEFTHAND


    BRILLANT


  • Registered Users Posts: 10,693 ✭✭✭✭blueser


    Not going to trawl back through nearly ninety pages, but I would guess my nomination has already been, er, nominated. Several times, probably. Anyway, here goes;

    The American pronunciation of ''aluminium''. To our stateside readership, it's got a second 'i' in it and is pronounced al-you-mini-um, not a-loo-mi-num. Thank you for your time.


  • Registered Users Posts: 6,793 ✭✭✭FunLover18


    blueser wrote: »
    Not going to trawl back through nearly ninety pages, but I would guess my nomination has already been, er, nominated. Several times, probably. Anyway, here goes;

    The American pronunciation of ''aluminium''. To our stateside readership, it's got a second 'i' in it and is pronounced al-you-mini-um, not a-loo-mi-num. Thank you for your time.

    I read about this in Bill Bryson's "A Short History Of Nearly Everything", if I remember correctly it was actually named twice by the guy who discovered it. I think he first called it 'aluminum' before changing it to 'aluminium' so it would fit in with the other elements. It could be the other way around, but I suppose technically, both are correct in a way

    EDIT: I found the excerpt. I got it slightly wrong. According to Bryson 'aluminium' was invented by the Brits so it would fit in so therefore it would seem that, in this instance, the Yanks are right … or at least, not exactly wrong
    The confusion over the aluminum/aluminium spelling arose because of some uncharacteristic indecisiveness on [Humphry] Davy's part. When he first isolated the element in 1808, he called it alumium. For some reason he thought better of that and changed it to aluminum four years later. Americans dutifully adopted the new term, but many British users disliked aluminum, pointing out that it disrupted the -ium pattern established by sodium, calcium, and strontium, so they added a vowel and syllable.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,824 ✭✭✭Qualitymark




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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,824 ✭✭✭Qualitymark




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