How to Pronounce UK Place Names - Anglophenia Ep 23
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- Опубликовано: 25 авг 2024
- Anglophenia's Siobhan Thompson teaches Science Friction's Rusty Ward-and the rest of America-how to pronounce difficult British place names.
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I was once talking to two girls from Australia in London (I’m a cop), I asked where they were heading next and they said ‘LOOGA BAROOGA’ after some confusion they showed me the address they were going to be staying, and it turned out to be ‘LOUGHBOROUGH’ pronounced ‘Luffboro’ 😂😂😂, I nearly pee’d myself !
Why isn't it pronounced as either Luffboruff or Loboro? Makes no sense.
Loogabarooga is much more consistent
🤣
@@NJ-wb1cz And sounds Australian!
Err…I’m local to the area and we definitely don’t say any of these. To the south, nearer to Leicester, it’s pronounced in the southern British English way (Luff-burra), whereas to the north closer to the Leicestershire-Nottinghamshire-Lincolnshire border area we say “Loof-brah”.
Looga barooga sounds Australian
As a Brit I struggled with some of these
Ditto.
Was that "read" prounced "read" or "read"? Because that's just the sort of pronunciation problem that written text doesn't (by default) solve.
+Simon Clarkstone reed, red.
same
Yep...
As an American who lived in Cheshire, England for over 11 years, I can add a few tricky ones we learned after pronouncing them incorrectly. Keswick (Kez-ick), Warwick (War-ick), Greenwich (Gren-ich), Wybunbury (Win-bree) and Cholmondeley (Chum-lee). There were others, but those stood out! Some place names we never did learn.
That last one is vile
"The whole town is wrong." HAHAHAHAHA
Im from Leeds. It's pronouced Leeds
+AlfieFG lol
***** Yeah pretty much.
***** I don't know how but ok.
+AlfieFG Just remember that the second "e" is silent.
***** no it isn't it's Lee-ds
I spat my water out all over my laptop when he said "DUMB FRIES"
I'm British and I still didn't know how to pronounce half of these
Like what
Alexander Bolton Aberstwyth
Frome
Aberystwyth is easy to pronounce
Alexander Bolton it's only because I've never seen or heard it before
I hope the guest isn't from Massachusetts because we pronounce Worcester the exact same way
Agreed. I'm originally from RI, but everyone knows how to pronounce it correctly.
@Rob Ortiz Thank you! :)
My other half is from Manchester in NH. It makes me cringe how he pronounces Chichester 😬
I am imagining Massholes saying WOOSTAH now
P.S. I mean Massholes in the most loving of ways
Wait so how do you pronounce Worcester sauce
No need for the video: now we all know how to pronounce Leicester here in Italy ;)
Good job guys!
A fair swop, you give us the best manager in europe and your best tenor to sing for us. In exchange you get to pronounce my little city correctly. Having said that, in a Leicester accent this city is called Lestah.
sheikhyaboooty Thank you!
I live in New England where we have a good number of British place names, and our Leicester is also pronounced Lestah, rather than Lester. Similarly, Gloucester is Glostah and Worcester is Woustah
I thank your country for Castro Giovani
Seen - pretty sure only belgrave area peeps will get that reference :'(
Wait. "Ces" in "Bicester", "Gloucester", "Leicester" and "Worcester" is silent but not in "Cirencester"? Wow. I've been learning and speaking English for 19 years already, but British names are just wild. Albuquerque is easier to guess than those...
I always pronounce Alberquerque in Bugs Bunny's voice :3
so true I was about to say the same thing
And the "borough" is pronounced as "bruh"
SUN WARRIOR actually it's pronounced buruh.
SUN WARRIOR as in borough market
You forgot Godmanchester which is pronounced gumster
The Jamie Dodger lol
So would Dodgemanchester be Dumpster 😂
@VanOlsennest 3389 😂😂😂😂
And it's nowhere near Manchester.
Yep, I wouldn't fudged that one up too. I was thinking, [gawd•muhn•cheh•stehr].
When I was in London, I was pronouncing Southwark as South-work (like fork). Then I discovered that it's Suth-uck.
Yeah, happened to me too
I'm from Ely and it's called Ely because it used to be an island in the fens surrounded by eels so was originally called the Isle of Eels which was shortened to Ely
Interesting
I live in Ely too!
How did you think that by typing and explaining it, we would pronounce the word which you typed out and we read would be pronounced the same way
I misread that like "eel of eels" and I can see why it has been shortened.
Ely MEANS island... in Saxon... or Norse... or Celtic maybe... anyway I think the 'eel' thing is coincidental.
Englishman here. I cant get half of them right either!
***** Ecuse me I speak the perfect Enlersh.
J583 excuse me!
+J583 The Welsh names are a bit challenging, and she gave us quite a few of them.
+J583 does this women make you cringe as well
Me too
Having grown up in Massachusetts, I'm surprised there are a lot of similar names to towns and cities in my state on this list! I mean, it makes sense, with the colonies and all but it's still cool. Pronounced the British way too!
You mean to say they have English names in New England?
New England???
3:26 Siobhan's face when he said 'go Packers' XD
Its a bit unfair giving him welsh place names as welsh is an entirely different language and hardle any English people can pronce them, but with welsh place names in mind, there former capital is an exellentelly hard one, Machynlleth.
I disagree. It says UK, rather than English. also I'm English and I can pronounce a lot of them (although it helps that my brother went to Aberystwyth university)
I'm English and have no trouble pronounce them (I've been to most of them and spent a lot of time in Wales), but living in London, no one I know would even attempt to say them. But it is fun to watch any way.
I grew up near Wales and we went there a lot as a kid, so I think I can pronounce welsh names not too badly, but I'm quite sure a native Welsh person would probably say otherwise. Though I think it's right to have placenames from all over.
Kinda sad that 'Birmingham' didn't come up. That's often a favourite I hear.
I remember having a discussion with an American friend about British names for places and she complained that we left out letters and pronounced differently from the spellings. So I said to her, you do it too! What about Arkansas? Tucson? Maryland? And she took my point xD.
+Vraie Esprit I'm fairly sure that the Americans have places called Birmingham, and pronounce them the same (it spelled phonetically) except for them often pronouncing the 'h' and there were other words to the same effect for that. Maryland is definitely far less logical than most of ours though.
muh(gurgling sound)oonthlith
I'm Scottish and am still learning how to pronounce some of our place names. And these are just the ones I'm familiar with.
Milngavie = "Mill-guy"
Culzean = "Kull-ane"
Auchtermuchty = "Uhk-ter-muk-tay"
Kirkcudbright = "Kir-coo-bray"
+AllannaXD The last two sound like Klingon battlecries!
Milngavie is easy one you've been on the train
in New Zealand we got all the easy Scottish names like Dunedin, Invercargill, Kinloch... and Leith! 😂
+AllannaXD You didn't even pronounce half them right when you wrote them as sounded out.
AppetiteForInactivity Yes. I did.
What ones do you think are wrong?
It's "Scot-land" not "skat-laynd"
😂
That would be a Southern American accent only! The rest of us pronounce it correctly.
Lol
I'm English & even I had trouble.
As someone who grew up in Mousehole, I can confirm that loads of British people call it mouse-hole too. I have met Americans who have been shocked to find out that Mousehole is a place where people actually live and work, and not just a theme park. My grandmother once had an American tourist wondering around her house thinking it was some kind of exhibit!
I'm from Reading and OMG FINALLY Someone said Redding, not reading like reading a book :)))))
Thomas Bryant I grew up in a town close to Reading, Ohio and it's pronounced the same way. :)
+Thomas Bryant, People from the nearby town of Reading, Pennsylvania also hate when outsiders pronounce it like reading a book
I'm from Reading UK and I think we should change the spelling. Drives you crazy when you try and google anything and all you come up with is book clubs or libraries.
Strangely I've always pronounced the town of Reading as Redding, but while playing Monopoly I call it the Reading Rail Road. (I don't know why)
Thomas Bryant We have a Reading in PA, USA, and we pronounce it exactly the same.
"British English" that'll be English English...
Mate, there are other countries in the UK that are not England.. so, quite literally it's British English and not English English. It's called British Received Pronunciation, which you can speak regardless of where in the UK you're from.
Naah! you are right, ben, its ENGLISH including all derivatives! hee hee.....(a lot English deprication included here, tee hee)
And those other countries (Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland) have their own languages (Scottish Gaelic, Cymraeg, Irish Gaelic and whatever else), and they only later adopted English as the English took them over. There is a case to be argued for it being called English, and not "British English", especially because there's not much influence the regions of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have really had on the development of English.
Southern English?
DontGiveup part of the UK though.
"that whole town is wrong" LOL
UK place names are barely English in nature. Some are Celtic, Norman, Latin and various Germanic.
It's impossible to know how to pronounce a name without knowing where it comes from... and, consequently, what grammar rules to apply.
Since the English language stems from all of those roots, the names are quite quintessentially English.
Tairneanach According to linguistics English is a Germanic language, being related to Celtic and Romance languages only via the general Indo-European Family. But hey...
Aleksandr Panzin According to linguistics? I'll need a source for that that somehow manages to exclude the huge influence Anglo-Norman had - you know, the heavily Romance based language that our dear conquerors of the 11th century used? From Middle English on, English can't be considered an entirely Germanic language anymore.
This is what English would look like if it was a Germanic language:
groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/alt.language.artificial/ZL4e3fD7eW0/_7p8bKwLJWkJ
Tairneanach Existence of loanwords does not make English any more non-Germanic, than the same loanwords make Russian a non-Slavic language.
Even your own link presents a readable text, that has words that are new to many.
As for links.... I'm sorry, but go read Wikipedia or something.
English is a Germanic language. If you can contest that classification, then I suggest you stop posting on RUclips and start writing a paper on the topic.
Aleksandr Panzin Er, no, that's not how this works. You claimed it was a purely Germanic language, you provide the links.
Sure, English is classified as a Germanic language, I'm not disputing that. But its relation to Romance and (to a much, much lesser degree) Celtic languages is not purely that they're all part of the Indo-Germanic family - that's the part you'll have to prove, not only because the burden of proof lies with the one who makes a claim, but also because I haven't found a single link that says otherwise. Instead I find that only about 1/4 of the words in the English language have a Germanic orgin, about 60 % are Latin and French, and the rest have various other sources. You simply can't claim that English has no roots in Romance languages.
Maybe you're the one with revolutionary linguistic findings who should be writing a paper. But try to avoid any Romance words, would you? You wouldn't want those pesky foreign words to ruin your thesis.
Being Welsh, I can say that you both mis-pronounced Powys as the "o" is not pronounced as "a". Pontypridd is also slightly mis-pronouncced as the "i" is pronounced more as the letter "e". You also missed the perfect opportunity to include Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyndrobwyllllantysiliogogogoch :P
Now I feel like an idiot for not watching the whole video, but I can pronounce it and some of the mis-pronunciations that come from it can be hilarious
InstaSim I came straight to the comments to see if anyone else noticed those! She did well bless her, but I'm from Pontypridd and that hurt me a little bit
***** She did well, and I can understand that she, herself, isn't Welsh, but it does annoy me a little how non-Welsh speakers don't learn how to pronounce some of the more simple place names properly
InstaSim being Welsh, this video got me mad seing as she is technically hyprocritical as she said that Yanks can't pronounce British words yet she can't either :D
+Coz that's still funny. Haha true dat xD. Still fair play to her for actually including Welsh place names because I know many wouldn't botner with them. Honestly, I wouldn't mind teaching her how to pronounce the Welsh places properly if she wanted me to :)
Thought your Welsh pronunciation was spot on. I went to Uni in Cardiff, stayed in an area called Penylan (which is almost Cornish - by tre- pol- and pen- will ye know Cornishmen). In 1966 to get home from central Cardiff I had to take a bus to Cyncoed (Kin coid if I remember)! Love to hear what anyone non-Welsh makes of the infamous place name of Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch! 🤣😂
Guys, in England, any town or city name ending with "cester" is an ancient Roman fortified town (castra) and you pronounce it as simple " 'ster" as "Gloucester" is pronounced "Glo'sterr" (two Rs please ;) )
LL in Welsh (or Welch in the old spelling) is pronounced H'L and "DD" is pronounced TH as in "they" or "that"
And, Siobahn, thank you for finally teaching me how to pronounce your name!
Lovely !!!
I live in derby, finally we get some recognition for our strangeish name!
Dan' Whisk Derbyshire great
it's not strangeish, goes by the same logic as the word "clerk" does
Priscilla the Monster Pop yas it’s pronounced Darby not Derby I don’t think anyone from Derby says it like it’s spelt
derby cheese
So inbred
Dumb fries - that's what Americans eat. So true
The name Dumfries is derived from Dun (celtic) and Fries! Germanic immigrants from Friesland! north Netherlands!
🤣😂
Dumb - frees
with ketchup
Yes, and it’s what others eat: everywhere fries are sold. 🤔🧐
The first time I was in London I wanted to visit Berkeley Square. I got a bit lost and started asking for directions. The people I asked all said they never heard of Berkeley Square. The reason, I finally leaned, is that I was saying "Burk-lee" instead is Bark-lee."
I finally asked someone who understood my mispronunciation and gave me the right pronunciation and directions.
When you're Preston and your town will never come up...
City
Virgin Trains are so fast that no sooner have you left Euston than Hey Preston, you're in Lancashire.
You forgot Wymondham, Happisburgh, Bungay, and Attleborough. All of which are in Norfolk, East Anglia and are constantly getting mispronounced by Americans when they come over here, bless them 😊
+Ezri Nicholls I live in Norfolk and can still get confused sometimes. :-)
I know Wymondham is pronounced Windham, but how are Happisburgh, Bungay and Attleborough prounounced? (Not from Norfolk!)
+James Christmas Happisburgh= haze-bruh, bungay= like it has a ee at the end and Attleborough with the bruh sound at the end. one that I learnt since living here is Acle= (like stomach ache) ache-ul x
And Edinburgh
What about Wisbech?
Now lets teach them to pronounce other words correctly, for example, aluminium.
It's a whole spelling error thing. That long boat ride they seemed to forget how to spell or pronounce words. The letter U, seems to really confuse them. Don't get me started on football...
considering that aluminum was invented by the British (and is the official pronunciation of the element) and Aluminium by the Americans, them calling it Aluminum is actually more correct than our usage.
Wow, that was a little snobby, don't you think? Not really helping the British stereotype here in the US I'm afraid. As for me, a "dumb American" I really don't care how you guys pronounce it and I don't think it should matter. As long as the message gets across, then let it be. Celebrate the differences, am I right?
Lizzie B judging entire nations from stupid youtube comments will make you hate every nation on earth :D
Lizzie B
As a third party looking on from afar I must say that the message does not always get across. with aliminium, yeh ok that one does but there are many that don't particularly the ones with whole different words. One reason that I don't watch ant yank telly programmes it that I don't understand them.
Here's a couple of towns in West Yorkshire that people commonly mispronounce:
Slaithwaite = Sla-wit
Linthwaite = Lin-fit
As a Welsh person when he said Pontypridd it Killed me!!!! 😂😂😂😂
and powys
It was nice of you to put in one Scottish place name! I guess it's because nobody English can pronounce Scottish place names, so you wanted to embarrass the Americans instead?
Try pronounce these - Falkirk, Kirkcaldy, Loch, Milngavie, Ecclefechan, Auchenshuggle, Auchtermuchty, Culzean, Freuchie, Findochty. Garioch, Kilconquhar, Kirkcudbright, Achahoish, Dubh Artach, Ballachulish, Anstruther and Wemyss Bay.
I will bet no English people(and Americans ahah) get any correct. You are welcome.
PS -Oh and please talk about other nations in the UK too, the UK is not just England.
Half of those really aren't all that hard. And FYI, a number of the names in the list were Welsh as well.
Quietus Q Lets hear you then. English people cannot pronounce Falkirk and Loch correctly, never mind the rest. Some more - Athelstaneford, Dalziel, Eilean Donan, Friockheim, Hawick Lesmahagow, Mallaig, Tarbolton. Americans can't even say Glasgow correctly mind you haha.
Yes and like English people can pronounce Welsh names correctly, she bloody practiced that(or she is Welsh).
"let's hear you then" has to be the most fucking retarded suggestion I've ever read as a youtube comment.
Anyway;Falkirk and Loch are the easiest of the selection you mentioned, I would be more impressed to hear English people pronounce Friockheim and Mallaig. Get down from your high horse mate.
Quietus Q Why is it retarded? This is youtube, you will have a mobile phone. Upload a video..simple.
Yes they are the easiest but English people still get them wrong. I was pointing out they mispronounce the easy ones, never mind something like Milngavie.
Quietus Q He doesn't have a high horse, just a shetland pony!
Not forgetting the classic - Edinburgh
I hate when people say Edinburgh wrong, it's like hello! there's no 'O' in it. although I was once in Waverley train station and passed a Millie's cookies stand where they had a giant cookie with the sentence 'welcome to Edinbrough' written on it. could of pulled my hair out from the frustration.
Eddenburrah.
Robert Gronewold
More like Ayden-bruh, or Auld Reekie to those in the know.
NorthernSeaWitch now see i was under the impression eden-bruh, never caught the ay.
NorthernSeaWitch In my defense, I was told how to pronounce it by a family friend who came from Liverpool. He might not have been the best teacher on a Scottish place name.
How many ways are there to pronounce the letter E? Wow, that's neat. As a Canadian, we tend to be divided on how to say a lot of place names where locals say one thing which is usually incorrect (especially from French or Gaelic origin), where foreigners say it correctly, but no one know where it is.
I was never so stymied as when I saw the following name on a sign on the motorway to London. I knew I was defeated before I started: Meopham. Second place was taken by Gillingham. Fortunately we had a Kentish guide who was conversant with the local spelling configurations.
Great series, by the way.
Gillingham obviously being the worst because both towns pronounce it different ways.
I'm English and I didn't know an awful lot of these...
Shame mate get out your cave
Same here, and I've listened to Americans for so long that some of these made me wonder what happened to me.
It's because a few of them are kind of not very well known places. For instance I wouldn't expect many english or scottish people to know of or even know how to pronounce Llanelli.
Fintan Watson do u know where slough is?
I live in Massachusetts, this is nothing new to me.
We have half of these cities/towns
Yup like Leicester which is awesome :D
That was my thoughts exactly !
Which is in Worcester County no less.
Yup, I used to have violin lessons in Leminstah and orchestra in Woostah, so those were easy. Some of the other ones threw me for a loop, though.
No Plymouth?😂 even our English teacher messed this one 😂
Well theres a Plymouth in Massachusetts, and its pretty famous in the US as the landing place of the Pilgrims on the Mayflower, so most Americans would probably know how to pronounce it.
How can you mispronounce Plymouth? What did your teacher say - "Plie mouth"?
@@markoldgeezer167 exactly, also she called OHIO- OHI-O(can't really write down her terrible pronunciation),COMFORTABLE-comfortaaaayble, CONNECTICUT-connecute,it.... is's funny now, but this creature with 2 university titles from English and Translating, came to teach us after a wonderful teacher who left our school because of money. She also used to make sentences in which she switched her mother tongue and english 3 times... She had terrible pronunciation, really, and when someone talks to you this way 2 years, you unfortunately start to pick up some of these mispronounced words😏 but let's say I am healthy and far away from her😂
Wow. I'm Australian and thought I had a pretty good idea of British pronunciations but my mind is blown by "Marylebone" being pronounced as "Mah-Le-Bon". I used that tube station all the time when I was in London and I sware to goodness the audio announcement always pronounced it like "The next station is Marroll-binn", this is how I said it aswell. Now I'm not sure!
I'm just up the road from pontypridd, and it's actually pronounced : "Ponty-preeth"
+Jordan Isaac No it's not at all.
That's how I, and everybody else I know,, pronounce it, and that's how I'll always pronounce it
Jordan Isaac translate.google.com/#cy/en/pontypridd
The double d sound isn't pronounced like that, it's a common misconception.
apart from the th you're correct. she pronounced all the Welsh places wrong though.. like Llanelli.. she said it like lanelli saes for you though
+WelshNoble you're right but she pronounced it idd instead of eedd which is wrong
Interesting.
Almost all the names that ends with "cester" it looks that you don't pronounce the "ce"
Bicester - Bister
Leicester - Lester
Worcester - Worster
Manchester = Monster? :)
They're Saxon words
Of course, then you get to Cirencester and it all falls apart.
@@jaycee330 always an exception to the rule 😂
Worcester is not pronounced “Worster,” is it?
The irony is that Siobhan actually speaks American English. She says 'like' rather than using the verb 'say' and inflects her sentences that aren't questions.
"that whole town is wrong" rofl
Even the British lady got the Welsh names wrong
Wales 1-0 Rest of the World
+against the wind Typical Welsh to make the sheep noise ;)
+Matthew Hawkins Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch already beaten us.
+Matthew Hawkins It is Welsh. The whole point of the language is to be unpronounceable.
pitiedvod I'm ok with it
+Matthew Hawkins That's interesting. She's called Siobhan so I'd assume she's Welsh. Maybe not then.
In contrast, lets get some Brits to say some American place names, especially anything that is originally Native American.
You're quite right. Every country has its places which are not pronounced as they are spelt. This is especially true of places named hundreds of years (maybe over 1,000) ago. Spellings and pronunciations change over the centuries. There are some places in the UK which can be spelt different ways - is it the River Lea or Lee (for example). Shrewsbury has different pronunciations.
Sure, like Mississauga, which is pronounced exactly the way it's spelled, but nobody outside Canada gets it right. Of course, in Canada we probably don't pronounce it the way it was pronounced in its original language, even current native people. And by the wya, let's not forget that "correct" pronunciation often changes over time. The Great Vowel Shift and all that. A fun video.
D. Schreiber Missy so-ga? Saw-ga?
englandfootball8 Actually, there are a great many place names that are not English based. Here in Iowa we have Des Moines, Dubuque, Guttenberg, New Vienna and so on. A lot of French and German.
I can pronounce alot...
WHY HAVENT THEY POSTED LATELY?!?!??! This is my favourite channel
So all these years of playing Monopoly and I was saying it wrong... 😂
"I somehow made it more wrong" - for Slough.
Nope, I don't think Slough can get any worse than what it is already.
Bit cruel of you throwing in some Welsh
Part of the UK.
Harry Patrick yeah it's BRITISH place names not WELSH place names!
Just saying that no non Welsh person can pronounce Welsh place names without previous experience. Many Americans have probably never come across Welsh so they would never have any hope of pronouncing them
Wales is part of Great Britain. Also, Thing, that's not technically true. I'm originally from Canada, but I live in Wales right now, and I'm pretty good at pronouncing Welsh. It takes a bit to get used to, but once you get the hang of it, it's not that bad.
Tom Noble it does say UK place names...
Why is the 'E' silent in Bicester, Gloucester, Leicester, and Worcester but not in Cirencester?
The American guy: Dumfries “dumb-fries”🤣🤣🤣
Wymondham in Norfolk is pronounced "Windum"
Happisburg in Norfolk is pronounced "Haysbrer"
Will Montgomerie And don't forget Costessey = "Cossy".
Even Norwich causes problems. It rhymes with porridge.
Sprowston is a hard one, Attleborough, Stalham
People always say Bawburgh wrong as well.
+Will Montgomerie These are good ones. I bet lots of the "English people can't pronounce Welsh names haha!" people wouldn't get Wymondham correct. ;)
+CreepySheep Nah it doesn't, because we don't say Ipswidge for Ipswich. It's nor-itch.
Norridge bothers me.
In Massachusetts its Woostahhhhhhhhh
+Corey Rieman Yup. And the state chaahges $1.25 pah.
+Corey Rieman Then ya go pahk ya cah at hahvahd yad befoah goin ta gloastah on tha T foah a few beeahs and a couple lobstahs!
@@robertsacks7995 Correct!
@@robertsacks7995 then ya go pyarrrk your kyarrr at hyaarrvarrrd yad beforrrr going to glossessterrr on tha T forrr a few biiirrrs and copla lyobbsterrs
No places in Northern Ireland?
Like Legoniel? Ballynahinch? Ravenhill?
Haha lol I'm from Ligoniel. We have some very strange place names here too. So many places starting with Bally. I used to think Ballyjamesduff (in ROI) was made up. Best NI place name has to be Muckanaghederdauhaulia (Co. Galway)
@flip inheck I know, sorry, I meant ROI, mistyped bc I'm tired.
Ballynahinch comes from from the Irish “Baile na hinse meaning ‘settlement of the island’ in Gaelic. Like a lot of place name in NI which originate from Irish. There also a Ballynahinch in county Galway in ROI
Just look up "weatherman perfectly pronounces town name." That should help.
Ah, that one. Good!
As an American, I knew Dumfries, Gloucester, Reading, Powys, Slough, and Worcester. I scored a 6/28.
...I am so sorry, Britain.
+Collin Willoughs
...and Milngavie?
*claps* Well done! That's twice as good as he did!
Collin Willoughs that's pretty good tbf, I live in the town next to Reading and some people don't know how to pronounce it
I from Gloucester
I’m from Dumfries 🙌
as a londoner who has lived 21 years right next to ruislip, ruislip manor, west ruislip, south ruislip, and ruislip gardens,
Siobhan YOU are pronouncing ruislip inocorrectly
Rai-Slip like Rice-lip NOT Rise-lip as you said
Ruislip
5 Tube Stations and NOTHING TO DO
I come from Towcester (pronounced "Toaster"!) in Northamptonshire which is not far from Cogenhoe (pr. "Cook-no") and Bozeat ("Bo-zhe-uh"), and then spent years living in St. Neots ("Saint Nee-yuts" rather than "Saint Nee-yots" where I went to Eynesbury ("Aynesbury") school, after which I moved to nearby Eaton Socon ("Soak-on" rather than "Sock-on" as most would say). Many Brits struggle to pronounce most of those places so God help any tourists!
He had me at "Yanelly"! (Llanelli) 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
If you're from Massachusetts you can pronounce at least 3/4 of these, but here is one of ours for you : Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg. It's shortened to Lake Webster, in Webster, MA.
+Dory Codington Thats a hell of a lot of Gs
You mean like the Welsh town of Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoc??
How about "Auchtermuchty"?
This was great :P I have to admit it was entertaining to hear you both mispronounce some of the Welsh ones ;) Unless you can speak Welsh I think it's pretty difficult (from what I've seen with my friends trying) to reproduce the same pronunciations as there are subtle differences a lot of people don't pick up on. I have a Welsh name (Alwen) and it's always interesting to hear how different people will try to say it because a lot of the time they'll think they're saying it exactly like I've said it but they're not and when I pronounce it properly and compare it to the way they're pronouncing it, they genuinely can't hear the difference. There are never any harsh feelings though, I'm just entertained by the many variations of my name e.g. I'm at university living in halls in a flat with 5 Chinese students who call me Alan (I'm a girl) but I can't pronounce their names either so it's become a joke between us. It doesn't help that Alwen, Alwenna, Olwen, Anwen, Alwyn are all Welsh names as well so a lot of the time the mispronunciations are actually different names... I was disappointed you didn't make Rusty try to read out Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch though! I grew up referring to it as 'Llanfairpwll' because the name is so damn long but even with Welsh being my first language, it's a bit of a tongue-twister hahaha
I think Winchester is (was) originally a British place name far before it became a town name in almost every state in the United States. I love in a small town in Indiana with this name. I'd enjoy hearing it pronounced properly! Thanks in advance.
Watch the film "Shaun of the Dead" - the Winchester is the local pub.
My parents lived in Worcester, MA during their time as US2 missionaries and it's definitely pronounced how Siobhan said it.
Let's be honest, though. English pronounciation is the one part of the language which doesn't make any sense.
K always makes a kuh sound, and S always makes a suh sound. But why do we need that schizophrenic letter C, that cannot decide if it is supposed to make a kuh sound or a suh sound? That's K's and S's job, you copycat.
it only makes an S sound when it's followed by an I or an E
NeurodogNVR Celtic and Caeser are two counterexamples.
***** Is it true that there are more counterexamples to "i before e, except after C, or when sounded as A", than actual examples?
carultch Celtic can be said seltic and Caesar is meant to be said like Kaiser in Latin
We have a city named Gloucester, Worcester and Reading in Massachusetts and they're pronounced exactly the same. They also have a Leominster and pronounce it somewhat similarly to the English town (Lemon-ster). He must not get around much. As a matter of fact we have lots of towns and cities in the US with these names and most are not pronounced that far off from the British (given the differences in our rhotic and their non-rhotic accents).
And then there’s Peabody….pronounced Pea-b’dee. Was the “o” just to eliminate the confusion between the “b” and the “d”?
I used to live near a hard to pronounce town called Linthwaite, and Slaithwaite I still don’t know how to pronounce those, I just lived next door in a town called Golcar (pronounced Go-ker) which is much easier to pronounce. Also I have a Worcester near where my cousins live in Tewkesbury, in Massachusetts and nobody knows how to pronounce Tewkesbury
Slaithwaite's not that hard if you have proper training like me, which means reading a shit ton of comments and figuring out the correct pronunciation. Linthwaite same thing, did it with the help of comments lol
Siobhan actually did pretty well with Welsh places. I was pretty impressed. Possibly some work on ll and dd pronunciation along with the Is being more pronounced
Unless I missed it, I'm surprised you didn't do a place name ending in "shire". Most outside the UK seem to pronounce it "Shy-er" rather than just "Shur" :3
+RTAVY73 Yeah, "Cher" or "Shur" depending on your accent, I was meaning more only as one syllable, not two.
I reckon it's because of Tolkien and his hobbits.
+Rabid Raccoon or "sheer" where I was born & raised.
+Rabid Raccoon Who says 'shur?' ....its pronounced to sound like 'ear'...
+jorgepeterbarton who says 'ear'? I've never heard anyone call Yorkshire 'yorkshear'
I live in Massachusetts, we have a lot of towns spelt and prounounced the same way. The names usually confuse Americans from other parts of the country. Gloucester, Leicester, Worcester, Leominster, and Marlborough are cities in Massachusetts pronounced the same way as in the UK. Worcester is the second biggest city in my state after Boston and it's funny to hear people try to pronounce it who aren't from New England, it comes up a lot due to the city's size and influence.
Fun fact: your Leominster is pronounced differently from our Leominster. The English one is "Lem-ster", two syllables only. (I live about 25 miles from the place.)
@@Loganberrybunny Now that just crosses the line into absurdity. JK. Good to know.
When did the “o” become silent in “Pea-b’dee?”
@@davidthaler7018 Right? Haha
0:48 I FANGIRLED SO HARDD ARGH I'M A BEATLE MANIAC
I'm from Leominster and this is literally the ONLY time the internet talks about our tiny town
Why is Bicester pronounced differently than Cirencester? One gets the cester & the other doesn't?? I'd love to know the reasoning of this, the etymology or is it just two very far away places with different regional pronunciations?
Also, Worcester in Massachusetts is pronounced Worster...being from the West I do not understand this either. We're hard on our R's here.
Yep, about 1/2hour from me. Except we pronounce it the same way she does, that is, there's no 'r' sound in the middle, and definitely not the way he said it.
It's pronounced Woosta
pmmclaughlin1
I've heard people argue about the R. I have no idea, I live where everyone uses all the R's.
tkmaz You used them all so there were none left for us.
I've heard Loughborough as Loogabrooga!!!
That sounds like an Aussie outback town!
It always cracks me up when he says MARY la bone
I love happisburgh!! I went to primary school there. Everyone pronounces it wrong unless you’ve lived in Norfolk for five hundred years and everyone assumes that everyone in the world should be able to pronounce a weirdly spelt, tiny, sleepy little seaside town that is slowly falling into the sea because of coastal erosion.
I'm from the UK and I have no idea where Bicester is.
Oxfordshire I think
It's on Google Maps
Oxford
Oxfordshire, not too far from London.
+LemonZeppelin I live in Bicester. Its in Oxfordshire about 1 hour away from London.
Also Yorkshire - Yorksha, not the northern hobbit town.
Well im from yorkshire and I say yorksha :D
I'm from Yorkshire and the people who have a strong Yorkshire accent pronounce it york sha everyone else pronounces it york cher
well I say York shire.
+RTAVY73 Just asking, Enfrog Newydd? Where did that come from? The Brythonic tribes in Yorkshire spoke an ancient form of Welsh as did the English and Scots, but never herd of that pronunciation. Flattered you have a Welsh name for us.
+Brythonic Man Efrog Newydd is actually New York. Efrog is York, and Swydd Efrog is Yorkshire
There is a city called Gloucester in the US, it's in Massachusetts, North - East of Boston...
The end really cracked me up. Where the guy keeps on pronouncing it wrong and the girl in perfect English correcting it. Love this video. Many of the names I didn't know by the way.
Sadly I can guarantee if I ever get the chance to go across the pond to visit the UK, I'll likely do the same thing. But I'd rather be wrong and be corrected than be wrong and think I'm right. I'll leave that to US conservatives. *takes a bow* Thank you, I'll be here all week.
The Marylebone debate always irritates me because here in London we pronounce it 'marry-le-bone' since that's how the station is pronounced.
It's Marry-l'-b'n. Whoever started the Mar-lee-bone , or anything with lee-bone on the end should be shown the door!
Yeah totally agree! I've never heard anyone say 'lee-bone'
I pronounce it like mar-libony
Geo I say "mar-lee-bone"
I learned to pronounce this one from the automated announcements on the tube...
One inland mass settlement close to Surrey and home to over 10 million people reads 'London' but is actually pronounced ˈʃɪthəʊl .
In English place names "ces" is pronounced "s". This is the best way to explain it. Cirencester is the exception and is pronounced Siren-sester or Siren-sesta.
She should have done Towcester (pronounced Toaster)
I'm British, and very knowledgeable on my UK geography(I know all of these places), but I only got about half right. I guarantee you the average chav would have got 90% of these wrong. And come on, welsh ones aren't fair, no one who isn't Welsh or hasn't researched it can pronounce them.
I am from a town in West Virginia, Hurricane. We pronounce it the way the British pronounce it, almost. The town was settled by the British and the pronunciation stayed.
I got some of them correct because I live in New England. Some of the names mentioned are names of towns in Massachusetts.
Here is Shevonne helping us pronounce some British place names. I used to live in Ruislip and oftentimes went through Slough and Reading. My "friends" once had me pronounce all the names on the Central Line. Shat themselves laughing when I got to _Theydon Bois_
I think its usually spelled siobahn not shevonne as it's an irish name
@@MArmes-fn8lq that was the joke
15 seconds in and I can already tell you, that is the most american sounding person ive ever heard in my entire life....I honestly didnt think it was possible to around so Yankee.
I'M AMERICAN AND HAVE NEVER EVEN HEARD OF MARYLEBONE AND I GOT IT RIGHT JUST BY LOOKING AT THE THUMBNAIL! I AM WAY TOO HAPPY ABOUT THIS!
I'm Canadian. When I lived in Norfolk it took me a while to get used to saying Fakeham (Fay-kin-am). I pronounced it 'Fackingham', lol! You could practically hear the necks snap back on the locals when I said it.
I remember pronouncing Worcester the same way he did as well, until one day I asked a sales assistant where I could find "Wor-sass-ter" sauce in a supermart. She asked "you mean 'Woo-ster' sauce?" "No, I'm looking for 'Wor-sass-ter' sauce" I insisted, and this went on for a while until she laughed and said "yeah I know what you're talking about" and brought me to the row. I suppose we learn something new every day!
FrizFroz It's Wooster shire sauce
Anything with Shire on the end they get wrong a lot. Like Yorkshire, Americans frequently say the shire on the end the way shire is pronounced on lord of the rings where hobbits live.
wapentake, far better ;o)
Vito Corleone David hasslehoff is one American I heard call it york shire. The actual British pronunciation is York sheer
Worse if you live in Leicester and an American tourist says LIE-SES-TER-SHY-R
Im from a state called new hampshire and whenever I hear british people pronounce a name with shire in it they mostly pronounce the same way i and everyone I know do
You all gotta realize that many towns in the northeast of the US were named for the town where the English settlers first originated from in the colonial days. We have our own ‘Worcester’, ‘Leicester’, etc.
Siobhan pronounced 'Cirencester' wrong. It's pronounced in a similar way to Worcester (something about the 'cester' part of towns; we tend to just ignore it altogether). Hence: "Ci-renst-er".
I'm starting to love this channel, I don't know whether it's because my Mom's British, and I have a natural curiosity about the United Kingdom, or if it's because I think Siobhan is beautiful.
Thank God someone has finally written her name!