The "How do You Pronounce X" Thread

[Sumelic]

Silesia: this one's relatively easy because it's Latinized. I'd say /sɪ'liːʒə/; however, minor variations seem possible like /sɪ'liːʒiə/, /sɪ'liːziə/, /sɪ'liːʃə/.
Polish: definitely /ˈpoʊlɪʃ/ (which I pronounce with a smoothed/broken diphthong as [ˈpo̞ɫɪʃ~ˈpo̞ə̯ɫɪʃ] or thereabouts, due to the velarization of the /l/)
Cracow/Krakow: /ˈkrækaʊ/ is my default guess, but I've never really learned how to say it.
Moscow: /ˈmɑskaʊ/ is my default pronunciation, although I've heard /ˈmɑskoʊ/ and heard of some book with a title like "Why there is no cow in Moscow" that apparently argues against the /aʊ/ pronunciation. From what I remember, the argument isn't especially convincing
Warsaw: [ˈwo̞˞sɑ~ˈwo̞ɚ̯sɑ], like "war" + "saw"
Saint Petersburg: /seɪnt ˈpitɚzbɚg/
Yekaterinburg: I'm not familar with it, so I'm unsure about the stress, but I'm inclined to do /jɛˈkætɚɪnbɚg/
Omsk: /ɑmsk/
Bryansk: I'm not even sure what language this is from. Assuming Russian and it's originally /bʲrʲansk/ or something like that, /briˈænsk/ or maybe /brænsk/in English
Lipetsk: Not sure where this is from either. I want to put the stress on the second syllable, but if it's from Polish I assume first syllable would be more accurate.
Smolensk: /ˈsmɑlɛnsk/, maybe?
Pskov: /pskɑv/. I don't know if this is standard; I find it hard to imagine how this could have a standard pronunciation in English. Maybe /pəsˈkɑv/ would be typical? or just /ˈskɑv/?
Lodz/Łódź: lol, I haven't pronounced this or heard it pronounced but from what I remember it's typically /lɑdz/ or something silly like that. I guess the pronunciation that would be closest phonetically to the usual Polish pronunciation would probably be /wutʃ/, but that doesn't seem best to me for a few reasons. Word-final devoicing is not necessarily something that "should" be taken over into English, where it is not a natural rule (compare "Freud", "vodka" etc.) The pronunciation /wudʒ/ sounds silly, and also my impression is that Poles themselves don't anglicize "ł" as English /w/ as often as one might expect, but often use /l/ instead. The use of /l/ seems excusable also from an etymological standpoint, so I think the pronunciation I would vote for in the end is /ludʒ/. (That doesn't have any unfortunate homophones, does it? It sounds vaguely like it could be a rude word but I don't think it actually is.)
Gdańsk /ˈdɑntsɪg/ maybe? Lol, I'm joking, but it does seem easier to anglicize the German name. My impression is that the Polish pronunciation is something like [gdaj̃sk]. Probably in English I'd just treat the "ń" as if it were "n" and go with /g(ə̆)ˈdɑnsk/ or something like that. I don't know why I feel like using /ɑ/ more here than in Bryansk.
Lviv: Doesn't this also have some other anglicized form? Hmm, as spelled, /l(ə̆)ˈvɪv/ seems like the way to go.
Budapest: /ˈbudɐpɛst/ if I were speaking naturally, /ˈbudɐpɛʃt/ if I wanted to sound pretentious
Ljubljana: /lubliˈɑnɐ/
Košice: /koʊˈʃitsɛ/? Hmm, actually, the "š" seems to indicate it's not from Polish, so maybe the stress should be elsewhere, like /ˈkoʊʃitsɛ/. I'll go with that until I learn more
Skopje: /ˈskoʊpjɛ/
Aarhus: no idea. /ˈorhus/ would be my guess; it looks Scandinavian.

[finlay]

i'm gonna write a few pronunciations out but mine vary depending on how i feel, or the wind or something. so you can mix and match

only /onli/ - between [o:nli] or [oʊnɫi] (ie, I sometimes have a dark L and I sometimes have a diphthong for /o/, sometimes both, sometimes neither, i'm not going to write all the possibilities out, that'd be silly)
fool /ful/ - [fʉ:ɫ] or (usually) [fʉu̯]
again /əˈgɛn/ - [ə̆ˈgɛn]
direct /dəˈrɛkt/ or /daiˈrɛkt/ or /dɪˈrɛkt/ - [dəˈɹʷɛˀkt] etc (i don't really know what exactly /r/ is so i prefer to be less specific)
direction /dəˈrɛkʃən/ etc (same as above i sometimes say /dai/) - [dəˈɹʷɛˀkʃn̩] etc
party /ˈparti/ - [pʰɑːɹtʰi] or [pɑɹʔɪ] etc
four /for/ - [fo.əɹ] (or [ɚ] etc)
Cairo /ˈkairo/ - [ˈkʰae̯ɹʷoʊ] etc
tsunami /tsunami/ - years of living in japan have made me say [ts(ʉ)ˈnami] (before that I wouldn't have pronounced /t/ or skipped the vowel)
lose /luz/ - [lʉ:z] (or [ɫ])
loose /lus/ - [lʉs]
ten /tɛn/ - [tʰɛn]
teen /tin/ - [tʰin] or [tʰi:n]
kin /kɪn/ - [kʰɪn]
good /gʊd/ or /gud/ - [gʊd] / [gʉd] but ʊ is more like a schwa / centralized
bald /bɔld/ - [bɔu̯d] or [bɔ:ɫd] or [bɒːu̯d] etc
bold /bold/ - [boːu̯d] or [boːɫd]
fork /fork/ or /fɔrk/ - [foːɹk] or [fɔːɹˀk] (may be ejective)

Silesia /saiˈliziə/ - [sae̯ˈɫiːzi.ə]
Polish /ˈpolɪʃ/ - [ˈpoːɫɪʃ] etc
Krakow /ˈkrako/ or /ˈkrakau/ - [ˈkʰɹʷakʰao̯] etc
Moscow /ˈmɔsko/ - [ˈmɔsko], [ˈmɒskoʊ̯], etc
Warsaw /ˈwɔrsɔ/ - [ˈwɔːɹsɔː]
Saint Petersburg /sentˈpitə(r)zbərg/ - [semʔˈpʰitʰəzbɚːg]
Yekaterinburg /jɛkatəˈrinbərg/ - [jɘkʰatʰəˈɹʷimbɚːg]
Omsk /ɔmpsk/ - [ɔ/ɒmˀpsk] (I can't get rid of the epenthetic consonant without concentrating)
Bryansk /bri.ˈantsk/ - [bɹʷi.ˈjanˀtsk]
Lipetsk /lɪˈpɛtsk/ - [ɫɪˈpʰɛʔtsk]
Smolensk /sməˈlɛntsk/ - [smʌˈɫɛnˀtsk]
Pskov /pəˈskɔv/ - [pəˈskɔv] or [ps̩ˈkɒv] or something
Lodz/Łódź - I dunno really. If I just pronounce it as I see it, /lɔdʒ/, or maybe /wudʒ/ or /ludʒ/
Gdańsk /gəˈdansk/ [gə̆ˈdanˀ(t)sk]
Lviv /ləˈviv/ - [ɫəˈviːv]
Budapest /ˈbudəpɛst/ - [ˈbʉdəpʰɛst] (yeah i know it should be /ʃt/, sue me)
Ljubljana - don't think I could pronounce it in an English sentence, but I've filed it in my brain as [ʎubʎanə]. Probably if I tried to pronounce it it'd come out as [li.ju...] or maybe japanese style [ɾʲ]
Košice - dunno. [ˈkoʃitse]? (this sounds enough like japanese that i'd do it with japanese phonology, without schwa or vowel lengthening / diphthongization, and with less but not zero aspiration)
Skopje /ˈskɔpjə/ or /ˈskɔpje/
Aarhus /ˈorhus/ - [ˈoːɹɦʉs]

[ˈd̪ʲɛ.gɔ kɾuˑl̪]

Yekaterinburg: I'm not familar with it, so I'm unsure about the stress, but I'm inclined to do /jɛˈkætɚɪnbɚg/

Russians have ultimate stress here.

Bryansk: I'm not even sure what language this is from. Assuming Russian and it's originally /bʲrʲansk/ or something like that, /briˈænsk/ or maybe /brænsk/in English
Lipetsk: Not sure where this is from either. I want to put the stress on the second syllable, but if it's from Polish I assume first syllable would be more accurate.

These are Russian and you luckily guessed the correct place of stress in Lipetsk, but what about the vowels? I'm curious.

Lodz/Łódź: lol, I haven't pronounced this or heard it pronounced but from what I remember it's typically /lɑdz/ or something silly like that. I guess the pronunciation that would be closest phonetically to the usual Polish pronunciation would probably be /wutʃ/, but that doesn't seem best to me for a few reasons. Word-final devoicing is not necessarily something that "should" be taken over into English, where it is not a natural rule (compare "Freud", "vodka" etc.) The pronunciation /wudʒ/ sounds silly, and also my impression is that Poles themselves don't anglicize "ł" as English /w/ as often as one might expect, but often use /l/ instead. The use of /l/ seems excusable also from an etymological standpoint, so I think the pronunciation I would vote for in the end is /ludʒ/. (That doesn't have any unfortunate homophones, does it? It sounds vaguely like it could be a rude word but I don't think it actually is.)

I know a joke: what is the name of a big city in central Poland having only two letters? Uć, [uːtɕʰ], so you might even have just /udʒ/

/ˈdɑntsɪg/ maybe? Lol, I'm joking, but it does seem easier to anglicize the German name. My impression is that the Polish pronunciation is something like [gdaj̃sk]. Probably in English I'd just treat the "ń" as if it were "n" and go with /g(ə̆)ˈdɑnsk/ or something like that. I don't know why I feel like using /ɑ/ more here than in Bryansk.

Maybe because of the lack of palatalised consonants before a?

Lviv: Doesn't this also have some other anglicized form? Hmm, as spelled, /l(ə̆)ˈvɪv/ seems like the way to go.

I did some research and there's no other English name, if you want, you can adopt Lemberg or Léopol.

Košice: /koʊˈʃitsɛ/? Hmm, actually, the "š" seems to indicate it's not from Polish, so maybe the stress should be elsewhere, like /ˈkoʊʃitsɛ/. I'll go with that until I learn more

Yeah, it's Slovakian.

Aarhus: no idea. /ˈorhus/ would be my guess; it looks Scandinavian.

Danish, nice guess.

I've seen many things satysfying my curiosity but I ask you to add other (maybe better?) pronunciations.

[Pole, the]

“jaguar”

[alynnidalar]

dʒægwɐɻ, or something along those lines. (It's not actually [æ], it's probably [ɪə] or something, but I'm not 100% sure what it is. Maybe [ɛə]? I feel like there's an ɛ in there somewhere.)

[Imralu]

I say /ˈd͡ʒægwə/ [ˈd͡ʒægwɐ] (prevocalic: [ˈd͡ʒægwə‿ɹʷ___]), but I think most Australians either say /ˈd͡ʒægwɑː/ [ˈd͡ʒægwäː] or /ˈd͡ʒægjuːə/ [ˈd͡ʒægjʉwɐ] (yuck!) but some might say that with /æː/ in the first syllable (yuck!!) or /juːˌɑː/ at the end, which reminds me of people who say "cinemaaaaah".

For short, but only the car, it's: /d͡ʒæːg/ [d͡ʒæːg]

[Travis B.]

jaguar: [ˈtʃɛːˌgwɑ(ː)ʁ]

[Zaarin]

jaguar [ˈʤægwɑɹ̠ˁ]; as a kid I pronounced it [ˈʤægwaɪ̯ɹ̠ˁ]--no idea where that diphthong came from, though, as it didn't crop up in any other word with /ɑr/.

[linguoboy]

jaguar [ˈʤægwɑɹ̠ˁ]; as a kid I pronounced it [ˈʤægwaɪ̯ɹ̠ˁ]--no idea where that diphthong came from, though, as it didn't crop up in any other word with /ɑr/.

Hypercorrection? Do you have any of the diphthong smoothing before liquids previously discussed?

[Pole, the]

dʒægwɐɻ, or something along those lines. (It's not actually [æ], it's probably [ɪə] or something, but I'm not 100% sure what it is. Maybe [ɛə]? I feel like there's an ɛ in there somewhere.)

I think [eə] and [ɛə] are pretty common in American English for /æ/.

[Travis B.]

dʒægwɐɻ, or something along those lines. (It's not actually [æ], it's probably [ɪə] or something, but I'm not 100% sure what it is. Maybe [ɛə]? I feel like there's an ɛ in there somewhere.)

I think [eə] and [ɛə] are pretty common in American English for /æ/.

Before nasals these are ubiquitous in NAE, but generalized they are more specific to Inland North dialects. (My idiolect is weird because I raise but normally do not diphthongize /æ/, even before nasals, only sporadically diphthongizing it when stressed as [eɛ] (even though at one point I picked up [iɛ] from my ex).)

[linguoboy]

dʒægwɐɻ, or something along those lines. (It's not actually [æ], it's probably [ɪə] or something, but I'm not 100% sure what it is. Maybe [ɛə]? I feel like there's an ɛ in there somewhere.)

I think [eə] and [ɛə] are pretty common in American English for /æ/.

Before nasals these are ubiquitous in NAE, but generalized they are more specific to Inland North dialects.

Eh, it's a bit more complicated than that since some dialects even have phonemic contrasts in this positions between broken and unbroken /æ/. My native dialect (by which I mean St Louis, not Baltimore) features tensing but not breaking.

[alynnidalar]

dʒægwɐɻ, or something along those lines. (It's not actually [æ], it's probably [ɪə] or something, but I'm not 100% sure what it is. Maybe [ɛə]? I feel like there's an ɛ in there somewhere.)

I think [eə] and [ɛə] are pretty common in American English for /æ/.

Before nasals these are ubiquitous in NAE, but generalized they are more specific to Inland North dialects. (My idiolect is weird because I raise but normally do not diphthongize /æ/, even before nasals, only sporadically diphthongizing it when stressed as [eɛ] (even though at one point I picked up [iɛ] from my ex).)

Yeah, I diphthongize /æ/ everywhere. (and I have most or all of the Northern Cities Vowel Shift) I'm just not sure what I diphthongize it to! Wikipedia tells me it's ɪə~eə, but a lot of times that doesn't seem correct for me. It's likely I have different realizations in different contexts, but I don't know what contexts those are.

[Travis B.]

dʒægwɐɻ, or something along those lines. (It's not actually [æ], it's probably [ɪə] or something, but I'm not 100% sure what it is. Maybe [ɛə]? I feel like there's an ɛ in there somewhere.)

I think [eə] and [ɛə] are pretty common in American English for /æ/.

Before nasals these are ubiquitous in NAE, but generalized they are more specific to Inland North dialects.

Eh, it's a bit more complicated than that since some dialects even have phonemic contrasts in this positions between broken and unbroken /æ/. My native dialect (by which I mean St Louis, not Baltimore) features tensing but not breaking.

It is true that some dialects contrast broken and unbroken /æ/, but I was not going to get into that as I am not personally familiar with these varieties. As for St. Louis, is it not on the periphery of the Inland North dialect region, having some of its features?

[Travis B.]

Yeah, I diphthongize /æ/ everywhere. (and I have most or all of the Northern Cities Vowel Shift) I'm just not sure what I diphthongize it to! Wikipedia tells me it's ɪə~eə, but a lot of times that doesn't seem correct for me. It's likely I have different realizations in different contexts, but I don't know what contexts those are.

Yeah, what I read claims these are centering diphthongs, but what I hear often here and from my relatives in the Chicago area is non-centering opening diphthongs; e.g. I frequently hear [iɛ] from my relatives in the Chicago area.

[linguoboy]

It is true that some dialects contrast broken and unbroken /æ/, but I was not going to get into that as I am not personally familiar with these varieties. As for St. Louis, is it not on the periphery of the Inland North dialect region, having some of its features?

This is true, but (a) this is a recent development; my dialect dates from before it was so pronounced and (b) even today, the chief NCVS feature I hear from my relatives there is fronting of /ah/. I can't think of anyone I know in St Louis who has breaking of /a/ similar to what I commonly hear in Chicago.

According to this, those Inland North features are actually in decline amongst the youngest speakers. I'll pay particular attention to my nephew's speech when he's up visiting this week.

[alynnidalar]

This all reminds me that on the radio this morning, the hosts were having an argument over the pronunciation of Sasquatch that I'm pretty sure was really about how advanced their NCVS was; the one guy seemed to have a farther back vowel in the first syllable than the others.

Sometime I should take a class or something on phonology--I'm surrounded by interesting stuff that I don't really know how to transcribe or interpret! I just know it's there.

[Travis B.]

This all reminds me that on the radio this morning, the hosts were having an argument over the pronunciation of Sasquatch that I'm pretty sure was really about how advanced their NCVS was; the one guy seemed to have a farther back vowel in the first syllable than the others.

Sometime I should take a class or something on phonology--I'm surrounded by interesting stuff that I don't really know how to transcribe or interpret! I just know it's there.

It took me a long time to understand how the dialect here even works phonologically - and I don't mean just my weirdass idiolect but in general. While some things were pretty obvious, such as the NCVS, other things were not, for instance, for the longest time I was not aware of that the dialect here has systematic l-vocalization, in all positions other than at the start of stressed syllables (and even there in many cases), in all registers, as I was so used to hearing this that this was just what I thought [ɫ] sounded like (it is obvious now, though, when I come into contact with people from outside the area and they do indeed have [ɫ]). And of course I had to learn that some things were just my speech being weird (e.g. a lot of people here have rather weakly released retroflex affricates in /tr/ and /dr/ where I have strongly sibilant palatoalveolar ones, and most people don't elide /t d n nt nd/ nearly as much as I do, even though they do so enough - in that there are certain words that people tend to frequently elide in, and I just elide in a wider range of words than they do - that they understand such elision perfectly well). But then I learned other things were not me being weird, and people do indeed elide /b/ in probably and able to and /ð/ in other and rather.

[linguoboy]

This all reminds me that on the radio this morning, the hosts were having an argument over the pronunciation of Sasquatch that I'm pretty sure was really about how advanced their NCVS was; the one guy seemed to have a farther back vowel in the first syllable than the others.

No, I think this is a slightly different phenom. Wiktionary gives the pronunciation as /ˈsæskwætʃ/ (representing Halkomelem sásq’ets) and I have heard some speakers use this. But I have /ah/ (i.e. LOT) here, possibly under the influence of watch.

I can think of several Western place names which have /a/ locally but which I initially acquired with /ah/, e.g. Nevada, Colorado, Los Gatos (my late husband's hometown in the South Bay).

[Travis B.]

This all reminds me that on the radio this morning, the hosts were having an argument over the pronunciation of Sasquatch that I'm pretty sure was really about how advanced their NCVS was; the one guy seemed to have a farther back vowel in the first syllable than the others.

No, I think this is a slightly different phenom. Wiktionary gives the pronunciation as /ˈsæskwætʃ/ (representing Halkomelem sásq’ets) and I have heard some speakers use this. But I have /ah/ (i.e. LOT) here, possibly under the influence of watch.

I am used to /ˈsæˌskwɑːtʃ/ [ˈsɛˌskwɑʔtʃ] for Sasquatch myself. Note that /w/ negates the fronting of LOT IMD.

[Zaarin]

jaguar [ˈʤægwɑɹ̠ˁ]; as a kid I pronounced it [ˈʤægwaɪ̯ɹ̠ˁ]--no idea where that diphthong came from, though, as it didn't crop up in any other word with /ɑr/.

Hypercorrection? Do you have any of the diphthong smoothing before liquids previously discussed?

In quick speech, yes, especially before /l/ but rarely before /r/ (i.e., I don't think it ever happens in ire, fire, tire, acquire, wire, but it might in I'll when speaking quickly).

[KathTheDragon]

/ˈdʒægjʉ.ə/ for me

[Jonlang]

/ˈdʒægjʉ.ə/ for me

More or less the same for me, except it's probably more like /ˈdʒægɪu̯.ə/ in my Welshy accent.

[Imralu]

koala

[Travis B.]

[kʰəːˈwɑːɤ̯ə(ː)]~[ˈkʰwɑːɤ̯ə(ː)]