Butchered pronunciation of city names

[Oracle of Delphi]

Oooooookay. Here goes.

Bostonian English for those who are not from mASSachusetts.

Boston: Bah-Ston

Worcester: Woo-Ster

Dedham: Ded-hm

Glouster: Gloh-Stah

Chelmsford: Chelms-Ferd

North Reading: Nah-th Red-ing

Marlborough: Marl-Burh

Sounds like y'all talk Yankee talk to me!

[Dsuupr]

Forget cities how about a state.

Oregon; those from teh east like to say Oreee - gone

[K.C.]

Oooooookay. Here goes.

Bostonian English for those who are not from mASSachusetts.

Boston: Bah-Ston

Worcester: Woo-Ster

Dedham: Ded-hm

Glouster: Gloh-Stah

Chelmsford: Chelms-Ferd

North Reading: Nah-th Red-ing

Marlborough: Marl-Burh

Don't forget P-town Sixty8.

[NINETY EIGHT REGENCY]

I went to Washington state in 2003. One of the places I visited was called Wenatchee. A lot of people mispronounce that. It is (when-at-chee)

[mustang84]

But my favorites are not how they're pronounced by just the names like Jersey Shore (in Pennsylvania...not near the shore) and Jim Thorpe (named for the Olympian) and Truth or Consequences (an actual town in New Mexico) and Joe, Montana (an unofficial name change for the town of Ismay in 1993).

Iowa is full of strange town names.

What Cheer, IA is small enough that it probably isn't a very cheerful place to be. Cumming is south of Des Moines. California Junction is located nowhere near California. Same with Pacific Junction. Hard Scratch doesn't even exist as a town anymore, but it still shows up on maps. Lost Nation is lost in a sea of corn. There there are all the odd Indian-named ones: Keokuk, Oskaloosa, Osceola, Ocheyedan, Maquoketa. Don't forget about Diagonal and Gravity.

And then there is Carter Lake, which has a normal name but an abnormal location. It's located across the Missouri River on the Nebraska side in Omaha, even though it is part of Iowa. It's because the Missouri River used to have more bends but was straightened out for ships, and Carter Lake got separated from the rest of the state.

[Farkas]

New Hampshire - Hamp-sure

Berlin - Bur-lin

Concord - Kon-kerd, Conquered

Durham - Der-rum

Plaistow - Plasst-ow

Salisbury - Sawls-burry

Swanzey - Swan-zee

[trinacriabob]

When I am in Lancaster, PA (wife goes to the outlet stores there)

Yeah, right, like that's the REAL reason you go to Lancaster PA. Didn't you say you like "menage a trois" in your profile?

Botched names

The name Oregon is constantly botched as "oreh-gone" when it's pronounce "oreh-gun" as dsuupr pointed out -- Washington states has some weird ones:

Poulsbo - across the sound from Seattle - thought it was "pools-bow", it's "Pauls-bow"

Steilacoom - near Tacoma - thought it was "styl-a-coom", it's "still-a-cum" (no dirty thoughts)

The humdinger:

Puyallup - near Tacoma - thought it was "Pooy-a-loop", it's "Pew-al-lip"

Still, my biggest pet peeve isn't these but rather how so many Americans say "acrost" when it's "across" --- there is no 'effin "T" at the end of that word.

[NOS2006]

Ask BV how to pronounce Dubois, as in Dubois,PA. :AH-HA_wink:

You might be surprised.

That's good...

Ybor City is 'EE-bore', not 'WHY-bore'.

O'lando instead of Orlando.

Wait, it's not O-Town?

[the_yellow_dart]

Cumming is south of Des Moines.

There's also a street in Toronto called Cummer. When they rerouted a part of it, the old road became "Old Cummer". Then they put a Go Train stop there. So you're looking at the schedule with all the normal street names, and then BAM! Old Cummer. It's almost like a maturity test to see if you laugh.

[scharmer05]

There's also a street in Toronto called Cummer. When they rerouted a part of it, the old road became "Old Cummer". Then they put a Go Train stop there. So you're looking at the schedule with all the normal street names, and then BAM! Old Cummer. It's almost like a maturity test to see if you laugh.

This reminds me of a couple of towns in Northwest Minnesota for some reason. Fertile, MN and Climax, MN. One day in the Grand Forks Herald there was a headline that read, "Fertile woman dies in Climax."

[Oracle of Delphi]

I like the names of towns in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Ahhh those Amish, I think all they think about is sex all the time.

Blue Ball, PA

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Blue+Ball,+P...ap&ct=title

Bird in Hand, PA

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Bird+in+Hand...ap&ct=title

Intercourse, PA

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Intercourse,...ap&ct=title

Paradise, PA

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Paradise,+PA...ap&ct=title

So you start in Blue Ball, then go through Bird In Hand and Intercourse, you will shortly arrive in Paradise.

Edited September 20, 2007 by Pontiac Custom-S

[ZL-1]

So you start in Blue Ball, then go through Bird In Hand and Intercourse, you will shortly arrive in Paradise.

[Hudson]

Rodeo Drive is Roh-DAY-oh, but Rodeo Road is ROH-dee-oh

I once met a guy who told me that he "had always heard" that the Isuzu Rodeo was pronounced "roh-DAY-oh." Until I met him, I had NEVER heard it pronounced that way and it had been in production many years at that point.

[the_yellow_dart]

Pontiac-Custom:

How about the corner of Pusey and Allwood streets??

Pusey and Allwood, Brantford, ON

I'm pretty sure that you're supposed to pronounce it "Pewsy" but everyone says Pussy.

[ChevyNovs99]

Newark, NJ = New-irk, not New-ark

New York City = The Sit-ee, thats the NJ pronounciation anyway

[K.C.]

Clicky

Here's an interesting name of a town. I believe there's also one of the same name in Australia.

[thegriffon]

OH yeah - Toronto has an illogical street pronunciation too!

Strachan Ave.

Said "STRAWN". Why? I don't know.

Gaelic, different orthography than English.

[thegriffon]

Cynwyd sounds Welsh... (the vowel-starved country of some of my ancestors).

It's not vowel starved, they just write vowels in a different way than in standard English orthography. Gaelic orthography is different too, although Manx Gaelic is like Scots Gaelic but spelled with English orthography.

garbled pronounciations that have become standard—Seattle, named after Chief Sealte, because the tl/lt is one sound, common to a large group of Amerindian languages [xocoatl (chocolate), Tenochtitlan etc.], which no-one else can pronounce—Bristol for Bristow, because locals put an L on any word ending in a vowel sound (pneumonial).

Sideney for Sydney (Sid-knee)

Mel-borne for Melbourne (MELburn)

Can-BEH-ra for Canberra (Canbra)

Narran-DE-ra for Narrandera (Nuh-RAN-druh)

English cities

Wor-sester for Worcester (Wooster—oo as in book)

Gloucester, which is pronounced "Glosster"

Forster (Foster)

Menzies, NOT pronounced as apparently spelled, because that's not a "Zed" it's a "Yogh", an old letter sort of a cross between a gh and a y at the back of the throat. The correct pronunciation is more like Minghis. Yogh also occurs in other northern english/scots names such as Dalziel (Die-yell)

[thegriffon]

Any Anglicized butchering of cities with non-English names. My skin crawls every time I hear someone refer to Amarillo, Texas. And I have no idea how we got "Florence" from "Firenze."

History. The English name is based on the old name, not the modern spelling and pronunciation.

[thegriffon]

In proper German, Gnadenhutten, means - Huts of Grace. The Pennsylvania Dutch are not Dutch at all, but Germans. Deutsch is the German word for German. Over the years Deutsch was mispronounced as Dutch by the English speaking people of Lancaster County, PA.

When I am in Lancaster, PA (wife goes to the outlet stores there), I always make it a point to listen to the Amish speak. It's an older form of German, but still understandable to me. I like looking at their faces when I speak German to them, I normally get, you understand us? Of course I do! :AH-HA_wink:

Ahh, possibly not. Dutch in English used to refer to Germans, Austrians, Swiss-Germans, as well as natives of Holland and the "low countries". Dutch, Deutsche and the old english Theodisc are all derived from an old germanic word which basically means "national". The first element survived longer in English as thede (nation—the original sense seems to have been "the whole [of us/them], considered together"). Merriam-Webster still lists "German" (in the broad sense) as meanings of both Dutch and dutchman.

Pensylvanisch Deitsch is a "blending of several German dialects, primarily Rhenish Palatinate (Pfalzer) German, with syntactic elements of High German and English". It is classed as "West Middle German", along with the Franconian languages (Pfälzisch, Limburgisch, Kölsch, Luxembourgeois and Mainfränkisch), while standard German is an East Middle German language, along with the nearly extinct Silesian (ethnically cleansed from Silesia after WWII), and Sachsen (Upper Saxon, not to be confused with Sassisch/Sächsisch, Low Saxon, which shares a common ancestry with English).

[ZL-1]

Clicky

Here's an interesting name of a town. I believe there's also one of the same name in Australia.

Those people seem to like f@#king, Austria

[thegriffon]

Derby (Darby)

Berkshire (Barkshear)

Durham (Duhrem)

Any city ending in -ham (-em)

Most cities ending in -wick or -wich (-ick or -itch), except for Brunswick (apparently an Anglicized Braunschweig)

Colchis (kolkis)

Cheltenham (Chelt-nem)

Chersonese (kersoneze)

The grandaddies of butchered names -Istanbul for Constantinopolis. Kandahar or Gandhara for Alexander

[NOS2006]

Clicky

Here's an interesting name of a town. I believe there's also one of the same name in Australia.

"Why 'ello, mate! I hail from f@#king, Australia. I went to f@#king High School, so I guess you could say I'm a f@#king boy. I've been around f@#king girls all my life and they are some of the sweetest girls you'll ever find."

Could make for an interesting conversation.

[ZL-1]

"Why 'ello, mate! I hail from f@#king, Australia. I went to f@#king High School, so I guess you could say I'm a f@#king boy. I've been around f@#king girls all my life and they are some of the sweetest girls you'll ever find."

[Oracle of Delphi]

"Why 'ello, mate! I hail from f@#king, Australia. I went to f@#king High School, so I guess you could say I'm a f@#king boy. I've been around f@#king girls all my life and they are some of the sweetest girls you'll ever find."

Could make for an interesting conversation.

Funny, that's all I ever hear when I am there.

[K.C.]

"Why 'ello, mate! I hail from f@#king, Australia. I went to f@#king High School, so I guess you could say I'm a f@#king boy. I've been around f@#king girls all my life and they are some of the sweetest girls you'll ever find."

Could make for an interesting conversation.

Can you imagine what their high school mascot would be?

[zhawk]

Out here we have

Puyallup

most of our rivers get brutalized

Skookumchuk, Stillaguamish, Ilwaco,

Of course the Hoh River runs very close to Beaver.

[Cory Wolfe]

So you start in Blue Ball, then go through Bird In Hand and Intercourse, you will shortly arrive in Paradise.

[K.C.]

I don't know if this has been mentioned yet, but in Missouri there is a town called Rolla (Rawlla) and some pronounce is "Roll-uh".

Also, Joliet (Joe-lee-et) is the correct pronounciation, not Jolly-et.