words that should be easy to pronounce but you can't pronounce

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quiche or kitch

calumerio, Friday, 26 April 2013 17:44 (ten years ago) link

I'm surprised no one has said hamster yet.

c21m50nh3x460n, Friday, 26 April 2013 17:49 (ten years ago) link

I cant say "statistics". It always comes out "sasiststics"

frogbs, Friday, 26 April 2013 18:01 (ten years ago) link

i always mix up "sale" and "sell"

clouds, Friday, 26 April 2013 18:02 (ten years ago) link

but now i'm worrying that i invented this and that no one else says it this way?

I say it this way.

jaymc, Friday, 26 April 2013 18:02 (ten years ago) link

I noticed only recently that I have problems with 'gallery' that don't correspond to how I pronounce anything else, it comes out like 'garrarry' unless I'm very deliberate with my tongue shape. A single word speech impediment.

the kind of man who best draws girls' eyeballs (Merdeyeux), Friday, 26 April 2013 18:03 (ten years ago) link

saying "neesh" seems pretentious.

It's a French word. Either say it like it should be pronounced or say alcove. ;)

He has a lot of baggage (handlers' perks) (Michael White), Friday, 26 April 2013 18:04 (ten years ago) link

i can't pronounce my wife's last name. wtf dude

frogbs, Friday, 26 April 2013 18:05 (ten years ago) link

I never understood why Americans say nitch
I had trouble saying 'parliamentary' all week

kinder, Friday, 26 April 2013 18:07 (ten years ago) link

Had the same thing above about 'segue'. Always pronounced it 'seeg'

Pingu Unchained (dog latin), Friday, 26 April 2013 18:07 (ten years ago) link

wait, it doesn't rhyme with "egg"??

clouds, Friday, 26 April 2013 18:08 (ten years ago) link

I have trouble with my own first name.

WilliamC, Friday, 26 April 2013 18:09 (ten years ago) link

it's pronounced 'neitzsche'

ampersand cooper black (elmo argonaut), Friday, 26 April 2013 18:11 (ten years ago) link

I guess the 'seeg' thing must have come from a mixture of 'vogue' and 'siege' in my mind

Pingu Unchained (dog latin), Friday, 26 April 2013 18:16 (ten years ago) link

Oh, regarding niche -- boy, do I have stories when I moved here. I say <i>neeeeesh</i>. 'Nitch' sounds so strange to my ear.

Talking about phraseology and moving here, it's funny how some people 'corrected' my English because they thought it was incorrect, when really it was either another way of saying something or <i>they</i> were the ones in the wrong. It was frustrating at first, but I got used to it.

c21m50nh3x460n, Friday, 26 April 2013 18:18 (ten years ago) link

neitzsche otm

how's life, Friday, 26 April 2013 18:23 (ten years ago) link

cliché
quiche
crèche
clique
quickie

are a bunch of fuckers.

^ sarcasm (ken c), Saturday, 27 April 2013 08:17 (ten years ago) link

albeit

^ sarcasm (ken c), Saturday, 27 April 2013 08:19 (ten years ago) link

incentivize always gets me. after the first few syllables i give up and slip into the last bit of "synthesize"

chilli, Saturday, 27 April 2013 10:12 (ten years ago) link

by the way what's the deal with putting an "L" sound in "both"? is this a common thing?

chilli, Saturday, 27 April 2013 10:15 (ten years ago) link

Now that I think about it, I have trouble pronouncing my own last name sometimes. It's H0lm, and sometimes I get hung up on the transition from the o to the l.

how's life, Saturday, 27 April 2013 12:54 (ten years ago) link

by the way what's the deal with putting an "L" sound in "both"? is this a common thing?

Say what?

Bees Against Racism (Tom D.), Saturday, 27 April 2013 12:57 (ten years ago) link

so it sounds like "bolth." have you never heard this? it's fairly rare where i'm from but i hear it enough that i figure it must be some sort of variation in dialect.

chilli, Saturday, 27 April 2013 20:49 (ten years ago) link

noticed that I had the same pronunciation issue when I was talking about Mulholland Drive last night.

how's life, Sunday, 28 April 2013 12:06 (ten years ago) link

"curriculum" and "Lily" cause me serious difficulty (which sucks when you, like I do, live with someone called Lily).

the Shearer of simulated snowsex etc. (Dwight Yorke), Sunday, 28 April 2013 12:40 (ten years ago) link

Girl at work says 'ibrufen' instead of ibruprofen

Pingu Unchained (dog latin), Sunday, 28 April 2013 14:04 (ten years ago) link

dog latin says 'ibruprofen' instead of ibuprofen

(sorry)

Pyotr Ilyich Chai Latte (Paul in Santa Cruz), Sunday, 28 April 2013 19:01 (ten years ago) link

lol snap

the late great, Sunday, 28 April 2013 19:04 (ten years ago) link

scooby doo says "ribruprofen!"

the late great, Sunday, 28 April 2013 19:05 (ten years ago) link

My mum calls it ibrufen as well. Google suggests this is definitely a thing. A WRONG thing.

ailsa, Sunday, 28 April 2013 19:06 (ten years ago) link

'Canada Day'--my brain wants to eliminate the middle 'da', so I end up overemphasizing it and going 'Can-NUH-DUH-day'.

lazulum, Sunday, 28 April 2013 19:08 (ten years ago) link

Puyallup, Washington

You pronounce it 'pwee-AWL-up'. But this is non-obvious. Humptulips is much easier.

Aimless, Sunday, 28 April 2013 19:14 (ten years ago) link

pull a yup?

the late great, Sunday, 28 April 2013 19:19 (ten years ago) link

until recently i had no idea people were saying "segue" when i heard "seg-way".

sleepingsignal, Sunday, 28 April 2013 19:28 (ten years ago) link

i always thought it was c'est guaix

Aimless, Sunday, 28 April 2013 19:30 (ten years ago) link

Speaking of the Northwest, I'm glad I don't live in Oregon because I can't say it. Always comes out "organ" or "or-gon."

Josefa, Sunday, 28 April 2013 20:29 (ten years ago) link

i can't say "water" normally i can only say it with a gross long island /new jersey accent, "wuh-dda". (shudders) i've tried to correct it.

Pat Finn, Sunday, 28 April 2013 21:14 (ten years ago) link

maybe it's more like "whugh-der" but still, it's wrong

Pat Finn, Sunday, 28 April 2013 21:14 (ten years ago) link

I panic inwardly a little when I have to say "schedule" because I can never remember if sked- or shed- is the British pronunciation. I pick at random and worry people will jump to conclusions about my class and/or education from my choice. This is bad with other words with an older/French pronunciation vs a less pedantic pronunciation as neither option seems 100% safe, but I guess that's off-topic-ish.

For some reason "duplicate" I end up saying as doo-plicate so as not to say jew-plicate, even though I can successfully say dyu- without angst in other du- words.

When I say "thanks" the th- sound sometimes gets rushed and I feel like I just said "nanks" instead.

I have a very slow mouth, I think. I trip over lots of words, though usually not consistently, and just crash on and hope nobody noticed.

susuwatari teenage riot (a passing spacecadet), Sunday, 28 April 2013 21:29 (ten years ago) link

the hardest word of all is PATHS. there is way too much going on there. any word beginning with a P is difficult, especially a P and then certain vowel sounds-- pussy is really hard to say too!-- and anything ending in THS. how do you know how long to say the th and the s?? i feel like i go on forever. paathhhhssssszzz. having to do readings during mass in grade school and the microphone just blowing up in your face on the plosives-- a reading from the aPOSTle PAUL's letter to the philiPPPPPPians or whatever has probably caused some deep anxiety forever.

ehkarl, Sunday, 28 April 2013 22:00 (ten years ago) link

Oh yeah re "ths", "tenths" is bad. "Tense". "Tennuths". "Tenthuhs-uh". For some reason "months" is easier. We should all go back to saying "tithes" iirc

susuwatari teenage riot (a passing spacecadet), Sunday, 28 April 2013 22:13 (ten years ago) link

four years pass...

something

infinity (∞), Wednesday, 31 January 2018 17:40 (six years ago) link

two years pass...

How to pronounce “midwifery”? Is there a US/UK split?

Time Will Show Leo Weiser (James Redd and the Blecchs), Saturday, 1 August 2020 18:00 (three years ago) link

Mid WHIFF ur ee in U.S.

I can't say "google." Most people say GOO-gle. But I segment the word weirdly, and catch on the second hard g, and so it comes out GOOG-ull. When I try to say 'googling' it comes out GOOG-ling.

america's favorite (remy bean), Saturday, 1 August 2020 18:11 (three years ago) link

I hear differing opinions from yours, remy,

Time Will Show Leo Weiser (James Redd and the Blecchs), Saturday, 1 August 2020 21:28 (three years ago) link

Rural :'(

Scampidocio (Le Bateau Ivre), Sunday, 2 August 2020 08:46 (three years ago) link

When I was a child I always had problems with the 'unvoiced th' /θ/ sound - and that is a problem for an English speaker! And it carried over into adulthood so I sometimes found myself having to think about pronouncing words before I said them - I'm OK now though, sorry, though.

Sonny Shamrock (Tom D.), Sunday, 2 August 2020 09:34 (three years ago) link

I was tongueties as a kid so although it was operated on when I was 6ish I strugged to articulate some words and still have mental blocks on. I tend to refactor sentences around them if I can so "you should" becomes "you ought to", "just because" becomes "mainly because" anything involving the dishwasher avoids the name of the machine itself, I pronounce "schedule" the american way with a hard "k" sound. Lots of other examples I'm no longer even conscious of. ( there's another one... "conscious" becomes "cognisant"!)

thomasintrouble, Sunday, 2 August 2020 09:49 (three years ago) link

My pronunciation of "Minneapolis" often gets an extra syllable like "Indianapolis"

Vinnie, Sunday, 2 August 2020 11:02 (three years ago) link


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