The "How Do You Pronounce X" Thread

[Travis B.]

['ɒ:ɰɐɫ] for both.

Is that the same vowel as in orange, moral, Florida etc.? (All of those usually have LOT in BrE.)

For me aural has NORTH, [ɔː] with relatively weak lip rounding, and oral has FORCE, [oə] with rather stronger lip rounding.

I don't know how dhok speaks them, but I should note that primarily NAE dialects from East Coast have a different vowel in words like orange, moral, and Florida from words with NORTH or FORCE (which are typically merged in most of NAE); the rest of NAE normally merges LOT before /r/, NORTH, and FORCE.

[mèþru]

all of these except aural are the same for me

[Nortaneous]

aural /arəl/
oral /orəl/
moral /morəl/
Florida /florɨdə/
Dewey /duwɨ/
orange /arɨndʒ/~/orɨndʒ/
horrible /harəbəl/

[Estav]

phonetician
Portuguese
overshare
oversharing

[Travis B.]

phonetician: [ˌfõː(ɾ̃)ɘˈtʰɘʃɘ̃(ː)(n)]~[ˌfõː(ɾ̃)ɘˈtʰɘʃn̩(ː)]
Portuguese: [ˈpʰɔʁʷtʃəːˌɡiːs], before a vowel or semivowel [ˈpʰɔʁʷtʃəːˌɡiːz], carefully [ˈpʰɔʁʷtɕʉ̯uːˌɡiːs], before a vowel or semivowel [ˈpʰɔʁʷtɕʉ̯uːˌɡiːz]
overshare: [ˌoːvʁ̩ˈʃɛ(ː)ʁ]
oversharing: [ˌoːvʁ̩ˈʃɛːʁɘ̃(ː)ŋ]

[Pabappa]

aural /arəl/
oral /orəl/
moral /morəl/
Florida /florɨdə/
orange /arɨndʒ/~/orɨndʒ/
horrible /harəbəl/

All of those words are /or/ for me, except after /h/, which i think is due to taboo against pronouncing "whore". there's also a few others that arent, but i had to look them up:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English-l ... 4%CB%90r-/ So apparently Im "General American" rather than East Coast with this particular feature. It makes sense because growing up I felt that "FLAW-rida" etc was stigmatizsed as a marker of low education, perhaps becuase its the more conservative feature, andtherefore used by those with less exposure to the mass media. Therefore, for me, this limerick doesnt quite rhyme:

An elderly man from FL
Collapsed in a hospital C
A young nurse from ME
Sought to banish his PE
And shot him! Now what could be H?

I would never use the word "aural" because there's no way to distinctively pronounce it and not confuse it with "oral".

For Dewey i just say /'du.i/

[Nortaneous]

/fəwnəˈtiʃən/
/ˈpoɹtʃəgijz/
/əwvɚˈʃeɹ/
/əwvɚˈʃeɹɨŋ/

[bbbosborne]

phonetician
Portuguese
overshare
oversharing

[ˌfoʊnəˈtʰɪːʃɪn]
[ˌpʰɔɚ̯tʃəˈgiːz]
[ˌoʊ̯ːvɚˈʃeɪ̯ɚ̯]
[ˌoʊ̯ːvɚˈʃeɪ̯ɚ̯iŋ]

[Nerulent]

Just wanted to pop in to say I have LOT in oral [ˈɔɹ̠əw] (as well as orange, Florida, moral and horrible) but NORTH/FORCE in aural [ˈoːɹ̠əw] (also in aura and Tyrannasaurus) which I believe is normal for UK/Aus/NZ, but the other way round from many people here.

[Pabappa]

Anybody with /ju/ in recuperate? I've only ever heard it with a plain /u/, but it looks like a straightforward Latin loanword, so I'd expect the /ju/ pronunc to be the standard.

[Estav]

Anybody with /ju/ in recuperate? I've only ever heard it with a plain /u/, but it looks like a straightforward Latin loanword, so I'd expect the /ju/ pronunc to be the standard.

I have it as a conscious careful pronunciation for the reason that you give, but my naturally acquired pronunciation has /ku/. It's not the only word with unexpected /u/ in place of /ju/: gubernatorial is generally heard with /gu/, and some people have /gu/ in lugubrious. Lacuna can also have /ku/—but since it is fully Latin in form, that might be something that people do intentionally based on the trend of pronouncing Latin words in English using "restored pronunciation" (at least partially).

[Space60]

I can make a distinction between the two, with aural as [ˈɒːʁʷʊ(ː)] and oral as [ˈɔːʁʷʊʲ], but this is artificial and not natural in the variety here.

People commonly do such to avoid confusion between the two words. The two words can get confused pronounced the same considering they are both adjectives referring to parts of the body.

[anteallach]

Just wanted to pop in to say I have LOT in oral [ˈɔɹ̠əw] (as well as orange, Florida, moral and horrible) but NORTH/FORCE in aural [ˈoːɹ̠əw] (also in aura and Tyrannasaurus) which I believe is normal for UK/Aus/NZ, but the other way round from many people here.

I think oral (but not the others in your list, which have LOT essentially universally in the UK as far as I'm aware) usually has FORCE in the UK, leading to the two usually being homophones for the NORTH/FORCE merged majority. The pronunciation with LOT is out there, but I get the impression that it's commoner in Aus/NZ than in the UK.

Anybody with /ju/ in recuperate? I've only ever heard it with a plain /u/, but it looks like a straightforward Latin loanword, so I'd expect the /ju/ pronunc to be the standard.

Yes, I have /ju/ there.

[Salmoneus]

Anybody with /ju/ in recuperate? I've only ever heard it with a plain /u/, but it looks like a straightforward Latin loanword, so I'd expect the /ju/ pronunc to be the standard.

I have it as a conscious careful pronunciation for the reason that you give, but my naturally acquired pronunciation has /ku/. It's not the only word with unexpected /u/ in place of /ju/: gubernatorial is generally heard with /gu/, and some people have /gu/ in lugubrious.

There are people who don't??

Lacuna can also have /ku/—but since it is fully Latin in form, that might be something that people do intentionally based on the trend of pronouncing Latin words in English using "restored pronunciation" (at least partially).

/ku/ for me, although /kju/ wouldn't sound weird.


Nerulent: as anteallach says, 'oral' has NORTH/FORCE in the UK - I definitely think of LOT in that verb as something foreign. Orange, florida, moral and horrible, however, all have LOT, again as anteallach says. Oral/aural are generally merged - when younger I tried sometimes to make a distinction of some kind, but couldn't really - in hindsight, I may have been trying to imitate a north/force split, but of course I didn't know that at the time (and still can't really comprehend the idea of it in practice).

Some people have /aw/ in 'aural', presumably a combination of spelling pronunciation and an attempt to disambiguate.

Oh, and some people have GOAT in one of them, again probably just to disambiguate, but I don't know which, or why, or even whether everyone has the distinction the same way around.

[Travis B.]

I can make a distinction between the two, with aural as [ˈɒːʁʷʊ(ː)] and oral as [ˈɔːʁʷʊʲ], but this is artificial and not natural in the variety here.

People commonly do such to avoid confusion between the two words. The two words can get confused pronounced the same considering they are both adjectives referring to parts of the body.

I just checked with my parents, and they cannot tell apart [ˈɒːʁʷʊ(ː)] for aural and [ˈɔːʁʷʊ(ː)] for oral.

[Imralu]

For transdialectic comparison, [ɔ] = /ɒ/ (eg "cot") and [oː] = /ɔː/ (eg. caught/court).


aural [ˈoːɹəɫ] (CAUGHT vowel ... normal pronunciation of "au", "aw")
oral [ˈɔɹəɫ] (COT vowel, short o sound)
moral [mɔɹəɫ] (COT vowel)
Florida [ˈfɫɔɹəɾɐ] (COT vowel)
Dewey [ˈd͡ʒʉːwɪ̆i̯] ... or [dəˈwæɪ̯] lol
orange [ˈɔɹɪnd͡ʒ] (COT vowel
horrible [ˈhɔɹəbəɫ] (COT vowel)
phonetician [ˌfɐʉ̯nəˈtʰɪʃən]
Portuguese [ˌpʰoːt͡ʃəˈgɪi̯z]
overshare [ˌɐʉ̯vəˈʃɛː] (verb); [ˈɐʉ̯vəˌʃɛː] (noun)
oversharing [ˌɐʉ̯vəˈʃɛːɹɪŋ]
recuperate [ɹəˈkʰʉːpəɹæɪʔ͜t̚]

[Zju]

Does anyone pronounce undulate with an initial /jʊ/?

[TurkeySloth]

Some people have /aw/ in 'aural', presumably a combination of spelling pronunciation and an attempt to disambiguate.

Alternatively, there's the OW vowel, which is only known if one has exposure to Latin pronunciation.

[Zaarin]

Does anyone pronounce undulate with an initial /jʊ/?

If you're referring to the second vowel, something like that. [ɐnˌdjʊ̘ˈlɛɪ̯ʔ] perhaps?

Some people have /aw/ in 'aural', presumably a combination of spelling pronunciation and an attempt to disambiguate.

Alternatively, there's the OW vowel, which is only known if one has exposure to Latin pronunciation.

Or the majority of dialects of English except Scottish?

[Zju]

I'm referring specifically to the first vowel.