Mispronounced words.

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What are some words that are usually mispronounced or just difficult to say?

How about timbre. People always pronounce it timber instead of tamber.

Victuals. It's pronounced vittles.

Clothes. The human mouth is not designed to say this word.

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Type: Question • Score: 12 • Views: 8,460 • Replies: 84

[+3] - Walter Hinteler - 05/16/2021The meaning of 'moot' certainly is a moot point.
[+3] - coluber2001 - 05/19/2021Timbre or tone color can be described as the difference between the same note played on different instruments, faor instance, a middle C on a piano and a trombone.

@coluber2001,

Timbre is pronounced the French way over here as are most adopted French words, en route, Notre Dame etc.

Pronounced on root and not ruh darm respectively, we don’t tend to anglicise words apart from place names like Blenheim.

We keep French spellings in words like theatre, centre etc.

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@coluber2001,

Victuals = Vittles. I had no idea!

Timbre. I definitely do not say tam ber.

Clothes seems easy to me. Long o

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Reminds me of a conversation I once heard between a northerner and a southerner. The northerner was trying to school the southerner how to pronounce oil. At one point the exasperated northerner said, "Oil," very strongly. "That's what I said," the southerner replied. "All." They never reached a satisfactory conclusion.

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Forte

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@Joeblow,

Joeblow wrote:

Victuals = Vittles. I had no idea!

Timbre. I definitely do not say tam ber.

Clothes seems easy to me. Long o

Thes is a tongue-twistet.

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@edgarblythe,

edgarblythe wrote:

Reminds me of a conversation I once heard between a northerner and a southerner. The northerner was trying to school the southerner how to pronounce oil. At one point the exasperated northerner said, "Oil," very strongly. "That's what I said," the southerner replied. "All." They never reached a satisfactory conclusion.

Southerners, leastways Texans, don't recognize the dipthong oi, pronounced Oy.

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@coluber2001,

Victuals isn’t a word that gets much airplay over here.

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If you want to start a fight, ask how to pronounce "plantain."

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@coluber2001,

I can’t think of any other way to pronounce it.

It’s not used a lot over here.

When I was in Newcastle the pronunciation of the band Motörhead came up.

They pronounced it Mot , (as it cot,) tor,( as in saw,) heed.

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There is at least one online dictionary that will pronounce a word for you.

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@izzythepush,

izzythepush wrote:

I can’t think of any other way to pronounce it.

It’s not used a lot over here.

When I was in Newcastle the pronunciation of the band Motörhead came up.

They pronounced it Mot , (as it cot,) tor,( as in saw,) heed.

So, how do you pronounce "plantain?"

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@coluber2001,

Plan as in 9 from outer space

Tain as in grain.

I think everyone would pronounce it like that over here.

It’s not a word that gets much use, I wouldn’t know what to do with them and I’d have to go to a specialist food shop if I did.

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@izzythepush,

The banana-like thing is shown on cooking shows a lot. They usually pronounce it as you do. There is also a wild plant here called plantain--Plantago--that's unrelated to the banana thing.

However, many pronounce the ending as in mountain. And there's two ways to pronounce mountain: mount'-n and moun'-tin.

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@coluber2001,

We don’t have many mountains in England either. There’s some in Cumbria but other than that they’re in all the other home nations.

I know what plantains are, but to be honest I’ve never really fancied one enough to find out how to cook it.

The ones I have seen in shops have all looked a bit spotty, not like bananas which always a bit green. So no, I’ve never been tempted.

I’m not a huge fan of banana in deserts to be honest, banoffee pie is my least favourite dessert. I still eat it, it is a pudding, but not my first choice by any means.

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@coluber2001,

In Disney’s the Jungle Book, all the fruit mentioned in Bear Necessities like the Paw Paw and Prickly Pear are native to North America, and not found in India at all.

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@izzythepush,

That's Hollywood for you. Occasionally they get things right, but not often.

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@coluber2001,

I only found that out recently, I always assumed they were Indian.

Apparently frogs only go ribit ribit in California, but you would think they all did.

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@izzythepush,

Unfortunately, most Americans think frogs go ribit. We're not the best educated when it comes to natural history.

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@coluber2001,

Round here e say'
BAGEL-a small dog of the hiund family. It is used by hunters to gather rabits

ALL------a combination of natural compumds, including fatty acids, complex esters and lightweight cyclic and chain distillates.

TAR------a round wheel use on autos .Tars are mostly made or ALL erivatives, zinc salts and sulfur compounds. TARS used to have INTER-TUBES from which us kids would have built vessels.

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Mispronounced words.

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