Mispronounced City and State names (living in, restaurant, food)

[MB8abovetherim]

I've heard:

Loss ANN-gliss
Loss AN-juh-leez
Loh-s ANG-uh-leez
Loss AN-Jell-us Probably most common
And of course:

ELL-AY

I tend to say all of those depending on my mood. Some I do just to be funny, or just because.

[cope1989]

Native Atlantans pronounce it without the second "T" at the end. So it's like "Atlanna"

DeKalb county shouldn't be pronounced with the "L." So it should be "dekab"

Ponce De Leon Avenue in Atlanta has been completely translated into southern speak. So it's more like "ponts du leeon"

Older locals pronounce Marietta like "Mayretta"

There are so many Native American place names around here. You're not a true native until you can pronounce "Chattahoochee" by just glancing at it.


South Georgia is more fun to examine.

Vienna, GA is pronounced "Viyenna"
Monticello, GA is "montisellow"
Vidalia, GA is "Vidaya"

[jtur88]

Originally Posted by cope1989

Native Atlantans pronounce it without the second "T" at the end. So it's like "Atlanna"

Vidalia, GA is "Vidaya"

Like Tronno, Ontario. Or even, by some people, Tronna. By the way, Montreal, by local English speakers, is munt-re-awl.

I heard a local radio announcer say vah-day-OAL-ya when I was driving through Vidalia. I admired southern stations that weren't afraid to sound southern.

Another Georgia town is al-BINNY, for Albany.

I've heard people in the area say both core-deal and core-delly. How do you say Cordele? Ive noticed that a lot of southern cities are pronounced differently by whites and blacks.

[glamatomic]

Topsail Island in North Carolina is pronounced Tops'll, with a neutral vowel instead of the ai sound.

The island was named as such because Pirates used to hide in the waterway behind it, and approaching ships were warned to look for the topsails of the pirate ships on the other side of the island.

Also, Beaufort SC and Beaufort NC.

Beaufort NC is closer to the French pronunciation of "Bow-Fort"

Beaufort SC is pronounced "Boo-f't" with a neutral vowel instead of the 'or'

[JustSomeGuy73]

Some more fun stuff on Canada:

Toronto has several pronunciations:

Tow-RON-t'oh (most people who are not from Toronto will say it like this, like people in other parts of Canada or tourists, immigrants, etc)

Native Torontonians and most people who are from southern Ontario will say either:

Tor-onno, Traw'na or Tron-no and usually get mocked for pronouncing it like that by people in other parts of Canada, especially in Western Canada. I intentionally pronounce it "Tow-ron-t'oh" and it really irritates my mother. She tells me to say it as "Toronno!" Tsk, whateva!

Using the same logic, for Ottawa it sounds kind of pretentious to say "Aw-tah-wah" with equal emphasis on each syllable (some older people might say it like that) but most Canadians will say "Odd-ah-wah" with more stress on the first syllable.

And for Vancouver, BC I've noticed people who are born and raised there usually pronounce it as "Van-Q-ver" whereas most people say "Van-koo-ver"

The province of Saskatchewan is often pronounced "Sas-cat-chew-ON" by many Canadians, especially in Ontario. But I believe most Saskatchewan residents will say it as "Sas-cat-chew-win" kind of like the deal with Oregon pronounced with "in" at the end of the name, or even "organ"

I lived in the province of Québec for nearly a decade and have heard Canadians, whether from Quebec or other parts of Canada pronounce it as "Q-beck", "Kwuh-beck" and "Kay-bec"

Incidentally, when speaking English, Montréal is "Mun-tree-all" but if you were speaking French, it's "Moh-rhay-ahl"

Newfoundland is pronounced "New-fund-land" and NOT "New-found-land"

I'm not from there, but I believe most Calgarians will pronounce Calgary as "Kal-guh-ree" NOT "Kal-Gary"

I've actually heard an American say "Montana" for "Manitoba" Yeah, they're kinda sorta geographically close to each other, but...

As for the US city and state names, I did quite well! I actually pronounced many of them they way they are commonly pronounced by locals! (like Des Moines, Illinois, Puget Sound, La Jolla, etc) but there were some that got me. Don't ask me to say Fayetteville - now I'm totally confused!

[jtur88]

A couple of other Canadian ones:
New Glasgow with a Z (zed), as new GLAZZ-go. It's right next to Pictou as in TOE.
Antigonish and Mirimichi accented on first and last syllable.
Dalhousie as in HOW.
Unlike the same name in the US, Ottawa in Canada always a fully pronounced (but not accented) final WAH syllable, and not just sluffed off.

I've mentioned this before, but is is critical and worth mentioning again:
St. Johns (Newfoundland) is always abbreviated St, and always accented on John's
Saint John (New Brunswick) is never abbreviated St, and always accented on the SAINT.
St. Johns Quebec can be St.-Jean in French where it always has a hyphen. Spell it and say it in French sa(n)-ZHAW(N) to avoid confusion.

[xGrendelx]

Norfolk, Virginia

Pronounced by locals as "nor-***," "nor-fik", or "naw-fik." Not "nor-folk," or even worse "nor-fork."

[JustSomeGuy73]

Haha, yeah I definitely wouldn't say "nor-fork" - I don't know why people add extra letters sometimes.

Kind of like "New Westminster" in BC. You have no idea how many people say "New West-min-is-ter" (note "minister" like a priest), it's "New West-MIN-ster" and NOT "New West-MIN-IS-ter" (take out the extra "i" and the extra "s". It's 4 syllables, not 5. Sometimes I would correct people and say "it's New Westminster" and they would say "yeah, that's what I said, New Westmininster." D'oh! Sometimes I even got mail addressed to me in "New Westminister"

Just thought of another one... in Canada we do not have states, we have provinces. However, it's so close to the word "Providence" (like the city in Rhode Island), and sometimes Americans will talk about a certain "Providence" in Canada. It's a "province" (praw-vince) NOT Praw-vi-dence. 2 syllables, not 3.

[1greatcity]

Originally Posted by jtur88

A couple of other Canadian ones:
New Glasgow with a Z (zed), as new GLAZZ-go. It's right next to Pictou as in TOE.
Antigonish and Mirimichi accented on first and last syllable.
Dalhousie as in HOW.
Unlike the same name in the US, Ottawa in Canada always a fully pronounced (but not accented) final WAH syllable, and not just sluffed off.

I've mentioned this before, but is is critical and worth mentioning again:
St. Johns (Newfoundland) is always abbreviated St, and always accented on John's
Saint John (New Brunswick) is never abbreviated St, and always accented on the SAINT.
St. Johns Quebec can be St.-Jean in French where it always has a hyphen. Spell it and say it in French sa(n)-ZHAW(N) to avoid confusion.

And Regina is sometimes mispronounced re-JEE-na, but it's re-JY-na.

[Mightyqueen801]

Originally Posted by JustSomeGuy73

Some more fun stuff on Canada:

Toronto has several pronunciations:

Tow-RON-t'oh (most people who are not from Toronto will say it like this, like people in other parts of Canada or tourists, immigrants, etc)

Native Torontonians and most people who are from southern Ontario will say either:

Tor-onno, Traw'na or Tron-no and usually get mocked for pronouncing it like that by people in other parts of Canada, especially in Western Canada. I intentionally pronounce it "Tow-ron-t'oh" and it really irritates my mother. She tells me to say it as "Toronno!" Tsk, whateva!

Using the same logic, for Ottawa it sounds kind of pretentious to say "Aw-tah-wah" with equal emphasis on each syllable (some older people might say it like that) but most Canadians will say "Odd-ah-wah" with more stress on the first syllable.

And for Vancouver, BC I've noticed people who are born and raised there usually pronounce it as "Van-Q-ver" whereas most people say "Van-koo-ver"

The province of Saskatchewan is often pronounced "Sas-cat-chew-ON" by many Canadians, especially in Ontario. But I believe most Saskatchewan residents will say it as "Sas-cat-chew-win" kind of like the deal with Oregon pronounced with "in" at the end of the name, or even "organ"

I lived in the province of Québec for nearly a decade and have heard Canadians, whether from Quebec or other parts of Canada pronounce it as "Q-beck", "Kwuh-beck" and "Kay-bec"

Incidentally, when speaking English, Montréal is "Mun-tree-all" but if you were speaking French, it's "Moh-rhay-ahl"

Newfoundland is pronounced "New-fund-land" and NOT "New-found-land"

I'm not from there, but I believe most Calgarians will pronounce Calgary as "Kal-guh-ree" NOT "Kal-Gary"

I've actually heard an American say "Montana" for "Manitoba" Yeah, they're kinda sorta geographically close to each other, but...

As for the US city and state names, I did quite well! I actually pronounced many of them they way they are commonly pronounced by locals! (like Des Moines, Illinois, Puget Sound, La Jolla, etc) but there were some that got me. Don't ask me to say Fayetteville - now I'm totally confused!

In New Jersey, we pronounce Canada's Newfoundland as "New-fund-lund" but our own town of the same name as "New-FOUND-land".

I had no idea until I read your post that anyone ever pronounced Calgary as Kal-Gary. People are all over the place with "Quebec", though.