a while back i made a recording of myself saying mary marry merry all differently. then i proposed we should make a thread where people from all over record themselves saying the same stock paragraph and we can all laugh at each other. that didn't happen.

all three are pretty much the same for me. "merry" is maybe slightly different but "Mary" and "marry" are 100% exactly alike.

this word stuff is crazy, I didn't realize how much some places mess up the language. Can everyone post the country and region they are from so we have a context for their word usage?

Forgot to mention that one of my best friends has a brother named Aaron and a girlfriend of many years named Erin. He went out with another girl named Erin before that. Since we are simple people and pronounce these names exactly the same, it can get to be an Abbott and Costello routine at times. The phrases "boy Aaron" and "girl Erin" get used on occasion. Maybe we should take up the Irish pronunciation, if I can figure out what that is.

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One time, I was talking to somebody and mentioned a person's oeuvre, pronounced "oooh vruh". It is pronounced approximately that way in online dictionaries, both with phonetic symbols and in their audible examples. The guy I was talking too was not understanding what I was saying, or pretending not to understand, then he said "oh, you mean OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOV" in the most overexaggerated, French-y, Alex Trebek-y way possible. This might be how the word is pronounced in French, not sure. But I was right damnit, at least according to merriam-webster.com and yourdictionary.com.

One time we had a dinner event for work that was paid for by a third party. We were told specifically not to order lobster. I think it was a "let's be gracious to this company that is paying for our food" thing. No detailed explanation was given, but I think that is because most people understood our boss' reasoning without getting into it too deeply. This same guy orders...lobster. To state the obvious, he is/was a huge douche.

Car, bar, marr, far, tar.

Carrie the more I say it is slightly different than car because of the two syllable thing changing the 'r' slightly. But almost the same and probably indistinguishable to some people. Its the same as carry. But nothing like Kerry.

I cannot think of how you say Sarah from your description.

Here's another couple I find strange amongst certain English people.

To some aren't and aunt are pronounced the same. I pronounce them like arnt and ant. They pronounce them both like awnt or something.

A specific Liverpool one that I haven't heard anywhere else, hair and her pronounced exactly the same. LOL scousers.

er this is extremely widespread, and i don't really think you are in a position to cricitise anyone's pronunciations! maybe the marry/merry/mary guys.

I pronounce them the same but I think "ant" for "aunt" is commonly used in England as well, maybe a North/South thing?

Do people pronounce "are" and "our" differently? To me they sound the same but some (maybe most?) people say "our" like "hour".

Time to be made fun of-I say are, our and hour all the same.

"Our" and "are" are different where I'm from and both "aunt" and "aren't" are pronounced the same, "arnt".

This accent stuff is interesting.
merry, berry, kerry, terry, very, jerry, gary, larry, carry, tarry, barry, marry all rhyme 100% for me.
I pronounce Mary, Marry and Merry identically.
I live in Vancouver.

Same vowel as married, arrow (not the same as aero = air-oh). And in case we disagree about how to say married, an exaggeration would be the way that Marisa Tomei (cf. My Cousin Vinny).

should we move the accent discussion to a new thread? It's really awesome, but I fear it's going to kill the (also awesome) original thread. Maybe a mod can help move the posts and put a link in here or something.

And sorry for the derail.

He said Europe, not England you salad dodger :P

Which syllable first or second? So Sarah rhymes with what to you? Barra?

it's remarkable how bad people are at explaining their pronunciations. just type them out phonetically in unambiguous terms, don't say 'oh yeah it's the same vowel sound as in [most debated word in the thread]'

(not singling you out here wyman!)

also, yeah this thread is/was good, but i don't want to move 100 posts.

Its hard to be unambiguous. I don't know the phonetic alphabet.

wtf is a barra? And I'd suspect that the first 'a' in 'barra' is pronounced like the first 'o' in borrow.

I've been thinking about how to do this, but I can typically come up with an accent that would screw this up (which is why I've tried to pick words I think most people pronounce the same -- and a variety of them).

The first a in sarah is 'a'

On this chart:

it's the ae as in 'cat'.

Hey guys. Great job on ****ing up a good thread.

where is Dids the Extractor(tm)?

No joke. This pronunciation crap is awful.

EXTRACTORATED.

Most of the NW says pin for both pin and pen which has tilted some people i know.

Ahh and aww sound the same to me. Daryn just has super advanced ears or some ****.

This thread reminds me of the time in AC when daryn was getting into it with the floor at the Borg, who upon hearing daryn's unmistakably thick Boston accent accused him of being a Giants fan from New York.

I say pin and pen differently- but I have a whole list of **** I say weird because some odd Canadian/Minnesota-isms crept into my language from my Mom.

I can pronounce pen correctly if i try or if someone is like "did you mean pin or pen" and i'm like pen.