Pronunciations

While returning home from a recent road trip Glenn and I made a somewhat startling discovery:

We’re finally beginning to speak English.  

Now, when I say that I don’t mean that we’re picking up on the accent.  What I mean is that we’re finally catching on to the “proper English" pronunciations- which, I might add, is no easy feat.  You essentially have to throw out all your grade school teachings regarding how to sound out words, because, while the Brits enjoy writing in a lot of vowels, they typically don’t pronounce them.  Sometimes they slur through the vowel, and other times they just skip sections all together.

Here are a few examples.

WORD: Warwick 

American pronunciation: war-wick. (2 syllables, emphasis on the a and i)

English pronunciation: warick. (1 syllable, emphasis on the r)

WORD: Leicester

American pronunciation: Lie-chest-er (3 syllables, emphasis on the vowels)

English pronunciation: Lestah (2 syllables, emphasis on the ah)

WORD: Worcestershire

American pronunciation: Wer-chess-ter-shire (4 syllables, emphasis on, well, trying to get the whole thing out without tripping) 

English pronounciation:  Wur-sthr (2 syllables, emphasis on sounding like a mumble)

Yep, you read that right.  All those years that you’ve been buying “the burger booster" and stumbling over the pronunciation, now to find out that we’ve all been saying it wrong.  And the right way is remarkably easy.  Figures.

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Oh- and, I know what you’re thinking.  "D@$n those redcoats.  I’ll call it what I wanna call it!"  **while throwing a tea bag into the sea**  Yes, yes, you proud Americans, it is a free country, way to sock it to ‘em.  

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(side note: Worcestershire sauce is actually named after the town that the sauce was invented in.  It is located in the midlands of England, not too far from where we live.)

And so, after ten months of living in the country, we are finally starting to understand how we’re supposed to sound out our words- and I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be thrilled that we’re finally getting it or a little ashamed that it’s taken us this long!  

I guess I’ll just have to settle for a mix of both.