Things Americans tend to say that sound weird to you

"Of-course, I could certainly see how the Americans would find some of our pronunciations funny as well. Such as "clerk" being said as "clarke" or "mall" as "male". "

We in the American South used to pronounce Pall Mall cigarettes "pehll mehll"; you can imagine my consternation when I heard it pronounced Pahll Mahll out here in the American West...

You mean you said "pale mail"?

↑ Yessiree.

I have gleaned the idea that the American South--more conservative and resistant to change--retains more of its British English linguistic heritage, although admittedly such a notion initially evokes sniggers...

Sorry Damian I meant Glasgow. Please accept my 'umblest apologies. I haven't been to Glasgow either. There's another place I mispronunce. So I better not ask directions to "Socky-Hall Street or Saucy-Hall or Saw-Chee-Hall in Glarrz-go"?.

I remember when I shared with a loverly girl from Perrrrth. She went to get a yogurt and then shouted something like "Auch its gone a wee bit foosty!" (with her head inside the fridge). Foosty is not a word I'd ever heard before so I said "What??". She said "The yogurt". I said "No, repeat what you just said". She said "The yogurt". "No. What's gone frosty?", I asked. "I dinnieno", she replied with a shrug. "Do what??"...It went on like that for ages. Eventually, for the sake of peace, we gave up trying to understand each other whereupon I (helpfully) pointed out her yogurt was past its best before date and nearly got head bitten off.

Wrotham, Meopham, Trottiscliffe and Teston are all Kent classics


Yes, I'm lucky enough to live in a converted Oast House. It has a single conical cowl. It cost a bomb.

I had to remove the huge brick Kell (kiln), repair the cowl and replace some of the Kent Peg Tiles and Weatherboarding. My lounge is in the round bit so I had to have some furniture made to fit.

Yes Jasper - you are absolutely right. The 'correct' (or should that be 'original' pronunciation) for Pall Mall cigarettes is "PELL MELL". Wow - so in parts of the South they are still pronounced this way?? Surprising (saying that though - I watched a nice American film recently called "Harvey" with the legendary James Stewart. One of the American characters, who was from the South, actually pronounced long A's in words such as Bath so Bath sounded like how I would say it (Barth). I have never heard an American pronounce that word like that).

Apart from maybe older generations and a few sad gits like me I would say that "Mall" is pretty much said the same way the Americans would say it.

Apart from, that is, the mall infront of Buckingham Palace which is always pronounced "male" or to that effect.

Mall isn't used much that much here mind, as we call them "shopping centres" but slowly I am noticing shopping centres being called malls, a shopping centre near me for instance is was "The Liberty Shopping Centre" is now "The Romford Mall". So it is on the rise.

Although the original use of mall was coined in England and did indeed refer to a covered shopping area, I think the Americans have certainly made it their own now. So the increasing use of mall on these shores can be attributed to American influence.

Which surprises me when Damian says that American English is having very little effect here - this is very wrong. Perhaps he is correct with the written word (but Microsoft and the Internet are changing that) but he is very very wrong on the spoken word. At least here in England anyway.

Now why am I talking about malls for? Sort it out boy!

Sorry for the typos - bloody chubby digits!

You must have had to type a lot before your fingers started bleeding.

MALL has two pronunciations in the US & Canada, unrounded /mAl/ and rounded /mQl/, in cot/caught merged areas, MALL [mAl, mQl] ryhmes with DOLL [dAl, dQl], in NYC MALL is [mOl] but DOLL is [däl]. I'm not sure about the UK pronunciation of these two words.

During my grandparents generation it was much more common, both in the south and New England, to pronounce bath with a long A (and just so you know it's really hard as Americans to remember that you mean a long 'a' by "ar" since most Americans speak a rhotic dialect and even ones who don't would never represent a long 'a' that way). I'm told that Boston English at one time had more long 'a's like that than RP, but I have no real evidence of that. But it is pretty easy to observe that my step grandfather and everyone his age I've met in NE always says bahth and dahnce, while his children still say ahsk and aunt. People of my generation sometimes say ahsk, but the more British pronunciation of aunt is still near universal in eastern New England.

Suck my nads Z.

WRP - cheers for that mate! That was intriguing stuff and as I said before these variations in American pronunciation surprises me but it probably shouldn't.

I worked with a bloke from Lowell in Massachusetts (I think his parents were Irish?) and I swear he would pronounce a word such as fast with that arr sound (long A!) which I remember sounded a bit odd to me but I never really though about back then and so I never asked (would of probably thought I was weird if I did).

You answered another question that I have wondered, and that was the difference in pronunciation of aunt by Americans. I always assumed that they pronounced it so it sounded like ant but obviously not everyone stateside does.

Now what is the 'normal' or should I say standard pronunciation of the word "data"?? I assume the Americans pronounce it like "DAT-ah" but apparently I am wrong on that one as well. For the record I pronounce it "DAY-ta"

Personally I usually say day-ta, but I don't really know what or if there's a pattern to people's preference. It seems like free variation between the two stateside.

Ahnt is also a feature of AAVE, so New Englanders aren't the only Americans who say it. Generally I find it to be a pretty handy indicator of where people are from (at least if they're aren't black, then it obviously doesn't help), since it's one of those things that people don't usually stop saying even if they move away.

I have no doubt that someone from Lowell (which is about 20 miles from where I grew up) would have a Boston accent (or would have Irish parents as that's how we roll in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts) and would thus say that. I just doubt that if you asked him to transcribe his speech it would ever occur to him to use an "ar" and not a "ah" to describe the sound. It isn't so much an issue of the sound itself as interaction with the dominant dialect, which in the case of the US is decidedly rhotic. For (slightly satiric) examples, see here.

http://www.universalhub.com/glossary/pronunciation.html

I might put Worcestershire sauce on red meat before cooking. It's a pretty common thing to find in an American fridge or occasionally on the table at a steak restaurant. I wouldn't personally eat it raw, though. Tastes better cooked in.

I can't stand it when people have a soft G in fungi. "Funjee" is just so wrong to me. It's fungus and fun-guy -- hard G, long I. That other pronunciation just comes from people trying to erroneously apply English spelling/pronunciation rules to a Latin word.

Alright then, let's spell it "fungui" to guarantee the hard G sound.

Or instead, let's start pronouncing giraffe "guiraffe" and gift "jift".

Problem solved!

I remember when I was a kid watching programmes on the TV with David "Bwellerme" Bellamy. He always used to say "Funjee".

***Which surprises me when Damian says that American English is having very little effect here - this is very wrong. Perhaps he is correct with the written word (but Microsoft and the Internet are changing that) but he is very very wrong on the spoken word. At least here in England anyway**

Americanisms have become absorbed into British English to a certain degree over the years but they have now become unnoticeable to the extent that it's difficult to pinpoint them as being of American origin really. This has been inevitable considering how globalised the world is now and the invasion of British homes by American films and TV programs, so unless you are a purist it's pointless to resist, but what I mean is this - there is still a bit of a difference between the way the average Brit and the averge American speaks, disregarding accents and dialects - they use expression we never do and vice versa.

Some aspects of the British media have tended to make nouns out of verbs now and again, which is an American trait, but a good many people here have railed against this and resisted its use for the mst part. Many see it as an unacceptable Americanism.

Pub Lunch: can you give a list of examples of American English which have become widely used in British English, not including the more obvious ones? Probably there is a difference between England and Scotland, as we use terms and expressions which are unknown down there.

The word "mall" - in the UK it resembles the word "maul" and the American shopping mall is usually called a Shopping Centre here, as in the Gyle Shopping Centre here in Edinburgh, not too far from where I live - with the word "mall" being used to refer to certain segments of the whole shopping centre itself, and often given individual names.

The broad treelined avenue in London running from Trafalgar Square and Admiralty Arch all the way along to Buckingham Palace is called The Mall - rhyming with "pal" and not "maul", and just to the north of it, beyond Custom House Terrace, and parallel to The Mall, is another long broad street called Pall Mall (both rhyming with "pal")....lined mostly with exclusive clubs for "gentlemen and officers of Her Majesty's Armed Forces" or various business organisations and the like.