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Most annoying "spoken phrases" you hear

kasei said:
Actually it means ignorant. Negro means black...
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If you really want to raise some eyebrows, and possibly piss a lot of people off, use the word niggardly often and openly.

Although it bares no connection with the "n" word, and they are two completely different words with different meanings, people (most of which who don't know the meaning of niggardly) often think it means something it does not.

Niggardly simpy means stingy, selfish, etc; and it is not derived from the other word, or the other word from it.
 
bartelby said:
"can you just do this for me" - usually said by my manager to me shortly after she's been asked by our boss to do something.
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Oh yes, MY BOSS always says that to me. Its the first phrase I thought of when I saw this thread. It is said several times a day, everyday! :)
 
'but uhm'

We are waiting for new power Macs. but uhm we don't know what is going to happen.

Like ya know this really makes me spit the dummy.
 
MongoTheGeek said:
Like North Versailles near Pittsburgh?(pronounced ver-SAYLZ)
There is Dubois as well (DEW-boyce)
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You're kidding?

Versailles is pronounced Ver-sai (but with a french accent so more like vehr-sai)

And dubwaah.
 
Nermal said:
I've only person I've ever heard pronounce it as Neeesaaahn was Steve Jobs. But then again, he also pronounces jaguar as jagwire :p
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Most of the americans and canadians pronounce it neeesaaahhn.
 
Chundles said:
It's Hee-yun-day, not Hunday (they actually made an ad here that let everyone know how to pronounce it after we called them Hi-yun-Die's for too long and they got pissed off)
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About 10 years ago, we had an ad for Aiwa.

"This is an Aiwa. It is not an Iowa, and it is not an eye-ee-wa. An Iowa is a state in the US and if you buy the wrong thing, you may end up with a very large chunk of dirt." (or something to that effect :))
 
efoto said:
I see your point, however if a word is created by a certain people, shouldn't it pronounced as the originators deemed it by all the people? I guess it should be however I realize it seldom is. Prime example is the British sayings us US'ers pick up and then slaughter, sorry :eek:
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A lot of strange things can happen when involving multiple languages. Take NZ's native name for example - Aotearoa. It has 6 syllables (a-o-te-a-ro-a) yet most English speakers manage to condense it down to 3 (ah-teh-roa*).

*Think of "roar" without the r on the end - just the "roa" sound.
 
... yeah but I have trouble explaining "Whakatane"

(replace the WH with an F and pronounce the first "a" as a "u")
 
Context comes into play here as well. There was once this hilarious Phil Hartman skit on SNL where he was an anchor with perfect American pronunciation, until he came to a hispanic-origin word. "torrrnahdo" etc. :p

I guess it can, at times, come off as pretentious.
 
kiwi-in-uk said:
... yeah but I have trouble explaining "Whakatane"

(replace the WH with an F and pronounce the first "a" as a "u")
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I don't know where that came from. I've heard it a lot, but it's wrong. You don't pronounce the "a" as a "u". I personally just pronounce the "whak" as "wok" :)

Edit: Now that I think about it, the number 4, wha, is pronounced like "far", so "whak" would be "fark".
 
Language i dislike:
anyone who offers to "learn you" anything, they teach, you learn.

People who pronounce asthma, azma

Our government's habit of frequently describing events as being "historic"; time will tell what we remember and what we won't, so i don't need tony blair trying to add more significance to his warmongering by claiming that it is yet another historic day.
 
tsaxer said:
I can't tell if you two are kidding now. :) I have the distinct feeling that kiwi is, but I wonder about Nermal...
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Seriously, a lot of people really do pronounce it as "****-uh-tah-nee" :eek:
 
tsaxer said:
I can't tell if you two are kidding now. :) I have the distinct feeling that kiwi is, but I wonder about Nermal...
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Would I do that? ;) :D

Nope - serious.
I was there in July, visiting my brother. There is quite a lot of variation in the way the locals pronounce it. Half say "o" (as in wok); half say "u" (as in ****).
 
Well, thanks for answering that...weird.

We've got a few Native American holdover names for our cities,and pronunciation competence tends to be regional. In other words, we'll know if /ye ain't frum uroun' here/ because you can't say it properly.
 
Nermal said:
I've only person I've ever heard pronounce it as Neeesaaahn was Steve Jobs. But then again, he also pronounces jaguar as jagwire :p
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Haha,

I live in the US, and watch LOTS of WRC, ever since 1999 I have been pronouncing Celica similarly to the way I hear the WRC announcers pronounce it (sill-eek-ah) as opposed to the US (sell-ick-ah). Drives my friends nuts!


on an other note, I just heard a college aged kid (ok I am not much older) tell his buddy "Dude that's T*TS!"

I wanted to reply, No It's a D*m* Hummer H2 with ridiculously huge wheels!

But yeah I didn't want to diss da foo, G.

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Nermal said:
I don't know where that came from. I've heard it a lot, but it's wrong. You don't pronounce the "a" as a "u". I personally just pronounce the "whak" as "wok" :)
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I just love telling my US friends who are planning a trip to NZ to take in Whakapapa, you should see their faces when I say it properly.
 
solvs said:
When someone says "no offense, but..." and then says something offensive.
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In a similar vein, it really annoys me when someone says "I don't mean to be racist but..."

I know they are about to be racist, they know they are about to be racist, but they are trying to qualify it by pretending they are not.
 
kasei said:
Actually it means ignorant. Negro means black...
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If you use the simple dictionary Tiger gave you ;);
nig**r: a contemptuous term for a black or dark-skinned person
*****: no entries found
negro: a member of a dark-skinned group of peoples originally native to Africa south of the Sahara
contemptuous: showing contempt; scornful
contempt: the feeling that a person or thing is beneath consideration, worthless, or deserving scron

So basically, nig**r is just a derogatory term pointed towards dark-skinned peoples, and negro is essentially the same by English definition, meaning black by Spanish definition.

Chundles said:
You're kidding?

Versailles is pronounced Ver-sai (but with a french accent so more like vehr-sai)

And dubwaah.
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Seconded. I heard both of those multiple times in the French tongue and they are as Chundles stated them, assuming you want to be proper and pronounce them as the originators did :rolleyes:
 
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