Posts tagged ‘speech’

Jun 12

When you mispronounce a common word

149. When you can’t seem to pronounce something properly

Some may call it “tongue-tied” or “having a stroke” but either way, it is embarrassing. Have you ever been in conversation and then try to say something, but your brain and mouth just aren’t in sync? I’ve heard people say to me:

“Have a nice doy”

“What in the waorld?”

“That’s impassible” (when they meant ‘impossible’)

I’m sure there’s some word for it.

So when your in regular conversation, and you say something that just wasn’t pronounced right, what happens? One of a few things:

You get teased because obviously you can’t speak properly.
It gets ignored but in the “I’m choosing to ignore this” type of way. When you both are aware of what just happened but refuse to give any attention to it because you both know that things will get awkward.
The other person says “Excuse me?” and you’re left there pronouncing it correctly this time.
You get teased some more with the other person repeating what you just said over and over again, and calling her friends to let everyone know. All of a sudden you’re tagged in a Facebook post with no way out, until someone else embarrasses themselves and takes your place.

What makes it more awkward is when you’re with a group of people and you just can’t get yourself to pronounce something properly. Or when your professor in college does it, and acts like he never messed up in his pronunciation.

I guess people aren’t so bad, we sometimes watch out for others to try to avoid awkward moments.

We’re awesome.

May 17

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30. Making people repeat themselves

I’ve found myself in situations where I absolutely cannot hear what a person is saying, whether it is because they have a thick accent, or if they’re speaking too fast, it can sometimes be uncomfortable to ask them to repeat themselves a third time.

Sometimes people ask “what did you say?” even if they have already understood you, just for the heck of it. Actually that’s pretty awkward itself. I’ve stayed quiet before when people ask “What?” and they just end up answering the question that they “didn’t hear”. This post is about that awkward feeling when you can’t understand somebody, and ask them to repeat themselves over and over. Eventually the other person begins to wonder if you have a hearing problem, or if they have a speaking problem and are coming off as a weirdo.

I used to work answering and re-directing phone calls in an office, and sometimes I’d get people with thick accents that I could barely understand. I would ask them to repeat themselves up to three times and then deal with them raising their voices and saying a bunch of things to me (which thankfully, I still didn’t understand). Angry people..

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