My whole life I’ve said continuity as “continue-uh-tee” when it’s “con-tuh-new-uh-tee”?!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I will never, ever forgive my mother for laughing at me (aged maybe 10-12) when I said epitome as epi-tome instead of eh-PIT-toe-mee. She tried to backpedal, saying it was an indication that I was a reader, and that's a good thing... but she laughed at me.

I pronounced Jose as Josie in elementary school. And as a full grown adult in my early/mid 20's I pronounced a name like Vallarta by SAYING the L sound out loud. The very nice Puerto Rican receptionist overheard and explained how double LL's are pronounced.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I will never, ever forgive my mother for laughing at me (aged maybe 10-12) when I said epitome as epi-tome instead of eh-PIT-toe-mee. She tried to backpedal, saying it was an indication that I was a reader, and that's a good thing... but she laughed at me.

Gosh, you're thin-skinned! I can see being a little hurt at the time, but to harp on it to this day?!

I used to work at Panera like 25 years ago, and the word that always tripped people up was "bisque." So many people pronounced it "bis-kay."

[Anonymous]

I struggle with “niche” and “colander”. I can never remember. But yeah OP people were just too polite to correct you. It’s fine. My least favorite is people who say “fustrating” instead of frustrating. Happens more than you’d think.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I will never, ever forgive my mother for laughing at me (aged maybe 10-12) when I said epitome as epi-tome instead of eh-PIT-toe-mee. She tried to backpedal, saying it was an indication that I was a reader, and that's a good thing... but she laughed at me.

This is not normal. I hope it’s a joke.

Why does it matter? You clearly wouldn't recognize a joke if it walked into a bar.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do you say "niche"?
I always avoid saying that word allowed

neesh

*aloud

No way really??? I heard it pronounced “nitch” on TV the other day and assumed I’d been saying it wrong . Because I don’t actually know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I recently said "Chia-puss" instead of pronouncing it right and a partner at my law firm turned and said "I've always pronounced it Chiapas," kind of with a "but what do I know?" attitude. It was SUCH a nice way for him to correct me.

I’m going to remember that one! The way to correct I mean. And the bonus is , if I’m wrong, it honestly just sounds like I don’t know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do you say "niche"?
I always avoid saying that word allowed

neesh

*aloud

No way really??? I heard it pronounced “nitch” on TV the other day and assumed I’d been saying it wrong . Because I don’t actually know.

“Nitch” makes my skin crawl.

[Anonymous]

I still cringe thinking about my 8th grade regional debate performance when I repetitively said “epi-toe-mize” instead of “e-pit-tomize”. Water under the bridge - but thinking of it still makes me blush!

I still have a hard time with subsequent. I know how it’s pronounced but just can’t get it off the tongue - I always want to add an extra syllable. At this point in life though I can just laugh at myself and switch to a synonym.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do you say "niche"?
I always avoid saying that word allowed

neesh

*aloud

No way really??? I heard it pronounced “nitch” on TV the other day and assumed I’d been saying it wrong . Because I don’t actually know.

It's neesh. Nitch isn't wrong exactly, because we all understand it, but it's not the standard, accepted pronunciation. Yet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I struggle with “niche” and “colander”. I can never remember. But yeah OP people were just too polite to correct you. It’s fine. My least favorite is people who say “fustrating” instead of frustrating. Happens more than you’d think.

This.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do you say "niche"?
I always avoid saying that word allowed

neesh

*aloud

No way really??? I heard it pronounced “nitch” on TV the other day and assumed I’d been saying it wrong . Because I don’t actually know.

It's neesh. Nitch isn't wrong exactly, because we all understand it, but it's not the standard, accepted pronunciation. Yet.

My cringe is people who say AnywayS, making them sound like a teen girl. But more and more do it, slowly making it more acceptable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still remember proudly and loudly mispronouncing omnipotent in high school English.

It's hard out here for an autodidact!

Aren't we all autodidacts? I certainly never remember school teaching us how to pronounce hard words (at least not after elementary school). We all have much greater written vocabularies than we do spoken vocabularies.

I listen to a lot of audiobooks and am shocked at how many pronunciation mistakes they make. I look up quite a few to make sure I'm saying things correctly and that they're wrong.

+1 on the audio books. I was listening to one the other day where the narrator pronounced “interminable” as “in-ter-MIN-a-bull”. It took me a while to figure out what he was trying to say.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I still cringe thinking about my 8th grade regional debate performance when I repetitively said “epi-toe-mize” instead of “e-pit-tomize”. Water under the bridge - but thinking of it still makes me blush!

I still have a hard time with subsequent. I know how it’s pronounced but just can’t get it off the tongue - I always want to add an extra syllable. At this point in life though I can just laugh at myself and switch to a synonym.

My word that is hard to get off the tongue is substantive. In HS I remember tripping over prerequisite when thinking about college started ramping up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do you say "niche"?
I always avoid saying that word allowed

neesh

*aloud

No way really??? I heard it pronounced “nitch” on TV the other day and assumed I’d been saying it wrong . Because I don’t actually know.

I just Googled it and "nitch" is the Americanized version that was most common up through the 20th C, and "neesh" is more British/Canadian/Int'l (and now social media, apparently). It vindicates my belief that I've heard it as "nitch" for almost my entire life (born 1978), but my teenaged daughters were trying to convince/gaslight me the other day that "neesh" is and has always ever been the only correct pronunciation and "nitch" is just flat out wrong. Not exactly true.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/niche

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do you say "niche"?
I always avoid saying that word allowed

neesh

*aloud

No way really??? I heard it pronounced “nitch” on TV the other day and assumed I’d been saying it wrong . Because I don’t actually know.

I think niche - neesh vs nitch is the more traditional global pronunciation vs the newer more American pronunciation. I am a neesh person. But I also continue to pronounce data - day-ta vs dat-ta.