English words that are difficult to enunciate.
The English language is hard to master, even for native speakers. With over an estimated one million words in the language, not only are English words hard to memorize—they can be hard to properly pronounce and enunciate.
On the subreddit r/words, a person posed the question: "What's a word you've noticed many native English speakers have difficulty enunciating even though the word is used fairly often?"
Turns out, there are a menagerie of words people notoriously stumble over. These are 27 English words that people say are the hardest to enunciate.
- YouTube www.youtube.com
"The word I notice people struggle with is 'vulnerable'. Something about that N following an L is tricky." - common_grounder
"Rural." - Silent-Database5613
“'Nucular' for nuclear." - throwawayinthe818
"Remuneration v renumeration (first one is correct)." - RonanH69
"Exacerbated vs exasperated." - SNAFU-lophagus
"I hear grown adults calling wolves woofs and they're not doing it to be funny." - asexualrhino
"'Asterisk'. A lot of people wind up inadvertently name-checking Asterix. I think it's best for those who struggle to use the alternative name for that punctuation mark, the 'Nathan Hale', after the American patriot who famously declared, 'I can only regret that I have but one asterisk for my country!'" - John_EightThirtyTwo
"Jewelry." - weinthenolababy
- YouTube www.youtube.com
"Mirror. Some people pronounce it 'meer'." - weinthenolababy, diversalarums
"I realized recently I have always mispronounced mischievous. It's mis-chiv-us, not mis-chee-vee-us. I don't know if I've ever heard anyone pronounce that correctly." - callmebigley
"ET cetera, not 'ect' cetera. I think people are used to seeing the abbreviation etc and since there is no diphthong tc in English their mind bends it into ect." - AdFrequent4623
"February. It sounds like you're pronouncing it like it's spelled Febuary. But it's spelled February." - SDF5-0, ShadedSpaces
"'Supposebly' [supposedly]. Drives me up the wall." - BlushBrat
"Library. My coworker knows I hate it, so he’ll say Liberry every time." - Jillypenny
"The amount of people who say Pacific when they're trying to stay specific is pretty alarming. I'm not even sure if they know it's a different word sometimes." - Global-Discussion-41
"Then there was my old boss who would confidently and consistently use the word tenant when he meant tenet." - jaelith
- YouTube www.youtube.com
"'Mute' for moot. A good friend of mine, who's extremely intelligent and articulate otherwise, says that. Unfortunately, it's a word she likes to use. I haven't had the heart to tell her she's pronouncing it incorrectly, and it's been three decades." NewsSad5006, common_grounder
"I can’t say the phrase 'rear wheel' without considerable effort." - ohn_the_quain
"Anthropomorphize is a word I have to use semi-frequently with limited success each attempt." - ohn_the_quain
"Turmeric. People drop the first R. It drives me nuts!" - Jillypenny
"Oh, and it’s espresso, no X [ex-presso]." - Jillypenny
sipping modern family GIF Giphy
"Also cardamom with an N." - nemmalur
"Crayon 👑. My ex pronounced it 'cran'. Drove me up a wall." - rickulele, premeditatedlasagna
"Contemplate. It's one of those word I hear people stumble over more than anything, often it comes out as Comtemplate, Contempate or a combination of both." - megthebat49
"Pumpkin (punkin)." - evlmgs
"Eraser (erasure, but they're talking about the pink rubber thing)." - evlmgs