Even though English is spoken in many places around the world, the way we pronounce words can differ from country to country.
In particular, Australian English is vastly different from American English, which is what u/scarletmanuka found out when they learned of the difference in pronunciation for "sentient." So, in light of that discovery, they asked the Reddit community for other words that are pronounced differently in Australia and the USA.
1. "The name Megan. It's pronounced Meh-gan everywhere else, except in Australia, it's pronounced as Mee-gan."
2. "Melbourne. Americans pronounce it as it's spelt, we [Australians] pronounce it as 'Mel-burn.'"
—u/CoDroStyle
4. "They [Americans] say Graham like 'Gram.'"
"It's [in Australia] like 'gray-em,' but you've got to really half-arse the pronunciation of the 'e.' Almost like 'gray'm.'"
5. "Craig like 'Kreg.'"
6. "Aaron like 'Erin.'"
7. "The way yanks pronounce 'water' as 'wah-trr' makes my fucking blood boil."
8. "Toob instead of tube. My kids all pronounce it as 'YouToob' instead of 'YouTube.' Fuck, it gives me the shits, but then I’m a cranky old cunt."
—u/jakirk33
"It's called yod-dropping. American English removes the initial y- sound (the 'yod') from 'u' for many words with a leading 't' or 'd' and sometimes 'j.' Tube, tune, dune, Tuesday, tumour."
9. "'BrisbAne' instead of 'Brizbn.'"
10. "The most challenging Australian word I’ve ever seen for Americans to pronounce is 'Cairns.' It's like it uses a vowel they just don’t have. They really want to pronounce the 'r' in it, whereas Aussies rarely pronounce 'r' unless it's at the start of the syllable."
"Sydney-based yank ex-pat here. I've learned to just memorise and repeat the Aussie pronunciation of Cairns (to the best of my ability) without reference to its spelling. To be fair, I do that now with many place names in Australia, but Cairns is the example that got me on it."
—u/art13ss
11. "Aussy instead of auzzy, even after an Australian has just said the damn word."
13. "Can-bear-ra instead of Can'bra."
14. "Eeemoo. It's a goddamn EEEM-YOU!!! Drives me batshit insane every time."
—u/dutchroll0
15. "Buoy. Americans say it 'booey,' but it's from the word 'buoyant,' so our way is better."
—u/kratos649
16. "Yuman for human, flar for flower and J. S. Back for J. S. Bach."
17. "Data vs. data — as in day-tah vs. dar-tar."
—u/Schedulator
18. "Pergola."
—u/MMLCG
"As a huge fan of renovation shows, this one makes me laugh so much every time I hear it. Per-ga-lah, hahaha."
19. "Carmel. There's another 'a' in there for a reason."
—u/serenitative
"That one always bothered me growing up. I say 'caramel,' but most people I knew did say 'carmel.'"
—u/J-Sully_Cali
20. "They [Americans] pronounce 'mirror' like 'meerrrrr' and 'horror' like 'whore.'"
—u/pologolfpolo
21. "Niche. They [Americans] say 'nitch.'"
—u/timblom
22. "Duty. We have a tendency to pronounce it 'jew-ty.'"
—u/atdarkness
23. "Pecan, almond and fillet."
—u/mai51
24. "Riz-OE-toe (risotto), nuculer (nuclear) and iron (eye-ron)."
25. "Antarctica (they [Americans] don't pronounce the first 't')."
—u/Enceladus89
"Or they leave out the first 'c,' like 'anne artica.'"
26. "How no one is mentioning cement in here is amazing. Americans pronounce it 'seament' as in 'semen,' instead of 'ceh-ment.'"
27. "Australians say 'route' that rhymes with 'out.' This drives my Indian-raised parents crazy (they say 'root' and claim that's closer to the British pronunciation)."
"In Australia, if you say 'root' with the boot sound, it usually means to shag someone or have sex. It can also refer to root vegetables, but is probably said less often."
28. "They [Americans] pronounce solder as 'soder.' Soldering to sodering."
—u/HurtsToBe