That’s some high tier psychological damage right there.
TBH, I’m a native Kansan and have only ever heard it called “Ark City.”
That makes sense. It’s like back in Morocco, how Morocco Mole is just called Mole.
And in Brazil, Brazil Nuts are just called nuts.
(X) Doubt
They’re actually called Castanha do Pará (Pará Nuts), but whatever.
What do they call the in Pará then?
Ohio is great for shit pronunciations of town names.
Bellfountaine - bell FOUN’n (the t drops there in most dialects, some would say ‘fountain’ with the the first syllable stressed).
Versailles - verSAILS
Medina - muhDYEnuh
I submit: Gallipolis, Ohio.
or rio grande (rye-oh grand).
I’m not sure how Gallipolis should actually be pronounced. The ~polis suffix seems sensible enough, but not sure on the first part.
I’ve heard people pronounce it as “galli-PO-lease”
I would say the Ohio version gal-uh-puh-LISS and I think that’s how people I knew from there said it, but it’s been a couple decades, heh.
There’s a Miami, Oklahoma. Pronounced, “My-am-uh”
My extended family is from a tiny Ohio hill town named Antioch, pronounced “annie-OCK”.
We have “verSAILS” in Indiana too. Also:
Peru - Pee-roo
Russiaville - Roosha-vil
Lebanon - Leb’nun
My favorite though is that there are two spellings for the Wabash river: Wabash and Ouabache. And despite being in a town that is on the Wabash River, the local Oabache Elementary School is pronounced: Wah-bat-shee.
I think y’all also have KAY-row (Cairo) if I remember right. (or maybe that’s Illinois?)
The pronunciation of Lebanon you called out may sound like it came from a hayseed, but it’s closer to the way people in the country of Lebanon pronounce it than the mainstream American pronunciation.
Right down the road from Versailles is the town I grew up in and the movie Hoosiers is based off of. Milan (pronounced my - lan)
I learned that from the Big Bang Theory!
There was a disagreement on how to pronounce Arkansas; the first two US senators from Arkansas disagreed on how to say it.
Congress ended up having to request the Arkansas legislature in defining how to pronounce the state name.
Why not just ask the fucking Quapaw tribe they stole the name from?
If you want people to call you Arkansaw, don’t spell it Arkansas. Thankyou for coming to my TED Talk.
Y’all come to New Orleans and try to pronounce a single street name “right.”
Bourbon Street
Are you saying “boo” or “boo-urbon”?
It’s pronounced “urinal.”
Arkansas is pronounced Arr-Kansas already though. ;)