• teft
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      834 months ago

      I honestly can’t tell if this is true or some British chaps having fun at our expense.

      I’m leaning towards it being true solely because I know how Worcester is pronounced.

      • @Apepollo11@lemmy.world
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        334 months ago

        Ha, honest truth!

        About 30 minutes away is the similarly-named Cholmondeston (Chum-stn).

        These two places are in Cheshire. There’s also the always confusing Wynbunbury (Winbry), and the birthplace of Lewis Carroll, Daresbury (Darsbry).

        • AwkwardLookMonkeyPuppet
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          154 months ago

          You have a city named after a venereal disease and it’s pronounced Cum Stain? Get the fuck outta here!

        • @dumpsterlid@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          It just pisses me off that people forced me to learn english grammar in school like it was a set of rules laid out to logically structure language when grammar classes should just have involved taking the class on a group crime trip through language city roughing up words and sticking em good with silent useless letters, switching out the endings of words with ones that clearly don’t fit, climbing up onto road signs over highways and causing chaos by painting over the old sign directions with new ones written in riddles and installing street parking signs everywhere that all contradict each other like the rules of grammar do.

          The only way for citizens to live a relatively normal life in this city is to frantically try to keep up with memorizing the arbitrarily changing rules of their universe and just give up all hope in unifying things under a rational even vaguely consistent system.

        • @z00s@lemmy.world
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          84 months ago

          That’s not even the worst. The one that pisses my off is how “St Johns” is pronounced “Sinjin”. Wtf it’s not hard to pronounce in the first place, why the fuck is it said like that?!

          • @Apepollo11@lemmy.world
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            44 months ago

            Based on absolutely nothing, my guess would be from the French pronunciation with a bit of a vowel-shift.

        • @AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          I thought Charles Lutwidge Dodgeson, and Alice Liddell lived in Sunderland. There are monuments to Alice all over the town according to an historical book by Neil Gaiman. Did he just move there as an adult?

        • Cethin
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          34 months ago

          Nola is an acronym, not a pronunciation thing. New Orleans, Louisiana, or NO LA for short.

          • @cmbabul@lemmy.world
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            34 months ago

            Oh I know, really just suggesting it as an alternative so our kiwi friends brain would stop breaking

      • @Ilovethebomb@lemm.ee
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        24 months ago

        It makes perfect sense when you realize Americans try to speak by making as few sounds as possible.

        • synae[he/him]
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          34 months ago

          What we lack in quantity (or quality!), we make up for in volume

      • @Apepollo11@lemmy.world
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        64 months ago

        If you’re getting old like me, you might remember Harry Enfield’s Mr Cholmondley-Warner sketches. (And if you’re not, definitely look them up!)

        • @Z3k3@lemmy.world
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          34 months ago

          Yeh I remember those sketches. I think it’s a case of never having seen it written down

    • slazer2au
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      564 months ago

      You say that as if any of us know what a marquis is.

      • @cheeseburger@lemmy.ca
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        384 months ago

        It’s a member of the 24th-century paramilitary organization-terrorist group of the same name of course! Notable members will include Laren, Torres, Chakotay, and even one of the Riker twins.

        • @dumpsterlid@lemmy.world
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          144 months ago

          I stopped actually reading your post when I realized I just wanted to make the Star Trek joke but then I realized I was actually in fact reading the Star Trek joke.

        • @DAMunzy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          54 months ago

          I just watched a YouTube video today about Ben Sisko and his fighting the Marquis and how my current views have made me dislike him and his actions. He had overtaken Picard as my favorite but I think I’m back to Picard being my number one favorite captain.

      • @neo@feddit.de
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        114 months ago

        From Wikipedia:

        A marquess (UK: /ˈmɑː®kwɪs/;[1] French: marquis [maʁki])[2][a] is a nobleman of high hereditary rank in various European peerages and in those of some of their former colonies. The German language equivalent is Markgraf (margrave). A woman with the rank of a marquess or the wife (or widow) of a marquess is a marchioness or marquise. These titles are also used to translate equivalent Asian styles, as in Imperial China and Imperial Japan.

        In Great Britain and historically in Ireland, a marquess ranks below a duke and above an earl. A woman with the rank of a marquess, or the wife of a marquess, is a marchioness /ˌmɑːrʃəˈnɛs/.[3] The dignity, rank, or position of the title is a marquisate or marquessate.

      • @Gabu@lemmy.world
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        34 months ago

        It’s a fairly common title, so you should know what it is if you were born West of Turkey.

        • slazer2au
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          24 months ago

          Ah, you see I was born east of Turkey where titles mean nothing despite being part of the Commonwealth.

        • @Landsharkgun@midwest.social
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          14 months ago

          Bud, the US literally outlawed aristocratic titles. And good riddance to them. The only time a US citizen sees a word like ‘marquis’ is in a world history class in college.

          • @Gabu@lemmy.world
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            -14 months ago

            Which shows how poor your public education is. The monarchy was disbanded in Brazil in the year 1889; We still learn about it in grade school history.

  • @DAMunzy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    4 months ago

    The talk show host pointed out that Cholmondeley is actually pronounced “Chumley” and made the bizarre pronunciation a running joke. “Now there have been rumors an affair between William and the Marching Band of Chicanery since 2019,” he said, mocking her title.

    -Stephen Colbert trolls Prince William’s alleged affair with Rose Hanbury


    There’s no Fookin’ way in the King’s English this is the real way to pronounce this!?!

    • @Etterra@lemmy.world
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      134 months ago

      Can you imagine trying to act serious when you’re in any way involved with the Marionette of Chumpmonkey?

    • @AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      There’s no Fookin’ way in the King’s English this is the real way to pronounce this!?!

      Worcestershire. Pronounced wooster-sure. I do believe The King’s English takes the piss whenever possible.

      See also: Through…

      Oooh! And Norfolk. That one is pronounced Nah-fuck, at least in Virginia, US. Not certain how the original town is said, I assume it’s similar, but the accent may have drifted in the last 400 years or so since the new one was founded.

      • @mitchty
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        4 months ago

        One of my favorite things to do in life is to pronounce words wrong to British coworkers like Worcestershire. I’ll enunciate that exactly as written every time even after corrected cause you lot may have invented English but you’ve let the tea go to your heads for too long.

        Every time I see these silly words and learn the alleged proper pronunciation I will endeavor to pronounce them exactly wrong as is tradition. Or I’ll make a deal, I’ll pronounce them right if I can yeet tea into the nearest harbor with the British person watching as is also the tradition of my country.

      • @JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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        4 months ago

        Come to Massachusetts.

        • Worcester
        • Leicester
        • Leominster
        • Gloucester

        The -ham in Framingham is pronounced differently than in Dedham.

        We have an Eastham, an Easthampton, and an Easton.

        We have both -boro’s and -borough’s. In fact, North Attleborough borders Attleboro.

        Next to Attleboro is Norton. Norton is southwest of South Easton.

        • @mPony@lemmy.world
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          24 months ago

          fuck it’s not that hard: Wuster, Lester, Gloster, and fuckin’ Leo-minstrel-wassis-name.

          • @JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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            4 months ago

            Close.

            Woostah, lestah, lemminstah, glostah.

            Framingham is phonetic (framing ham). Dedham is DED-um.

            Ya jabroni.

      • @Zip2@feddit.uk
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        24 months ago

        Norfolk in England is a county, and it’s pronounced the same way.

        It’s home to some crazy spellings too.

        Garboldisham pronounced Garbisham, and Wymondham pronounced Windham. The thing on top of your house is the ruf, and you drive your tractors on the rud.

      • @Makhno@lemmy.world
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        24 months ago

        That one is pronounced Nah-fuck, at least in Virginia, US.

        I’ve lived in Virginia almost my entire life, and most everyone pronounces it “nor-fok”

    • @TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Haha. It is clear you’re not British or at least familiar with British pronunciations of some words and place names. Mispronounce “Leicester” or “Portsmouth” and you will bring down the entire wrath of England. These pronunciations are relic of Old English and pre-Modern Era English, or bastardised when the Norman-French came.

      And who are we to complain when everyday English words are already bizarre? “Salmon” is meant to be pronounced “sa’muhn”. It’s a relic of Norman-French. “gh” in some words are silent like “bought” and “nought”. And sometimes “ou” is pronounced as “aú” like in “bough”. Why are these letters there when they are silent?! The latter words are descendant of Old English.

      These huge variations in pronounciations is what makes many non-native English speakers confused and struggling.

      • I Cast Fist
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        114 months ago

        Mispronounce “Leicester” or “Portsmouth” and you will bring down the entire wrath of England

        Joke’s on them, I have no tea, spices, land, archaeological relics or cheap labor to be plundered!

        These huge variations in pronounciations is what makes many non-native English speakers confused and struggling.

        The way the words are written and their actual phonetic sound being absurdly different (plus vowels completely changing their sound “at random”) doesn’t help either. Same applies to french and their dumb mute final letters and accents in the wrong places. “Tróis” = “trrru aaaahhh”

        • @Gabu@lemmy.world
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          84 months ago

          French is what happens when a drunk Galician and a Roman-Italian try to teach a Viking how to speak Latin.

            • @Gabu@lemmy.world
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              4 months ago

              Nah, Romanian is what happens when two Romans and a few Rus get together for a wild party that lasts a week. By the end, nobody remembers how to speak their native language anymore, so they decide to make do with whatever mess is left. Also, for some reason, a Hungarian guy keeps speaking Hungarian.

        • @TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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          14 months ago

          I’m learning French but I feel that French pronunciations are more intuitive and straightforward.

          Now that you mentioned accent, I think that is why French pronunciations for me is intuitive because there are accents in place guiding speakers on how to pronounce the letter and syllables. English writing, for some reason, do not use accents at all.

      • @Agent641@lemmy.world
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        94 months ago

        Isnt it weird how we pronounce ‘salmon’ as ‘salmon’ but we pronounce ‘salmonella’ as ‘salmonella’?

    • @LazerFX@sh.itjust.works
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      64 months ago

      I live just a few miles north of Cholmondeley, and regularly drive past it. Yes, it’s pronounced to rhyme with the chopped, bloody meat and fish guts you throw into water to attract sharks.

  • @feedum_sneedson@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    It’s weird how posh people all have the same face. And it’s weird how they dress in that way. And it’s weird that they own all the land and money. Weird weird weird.