I used to think the “th” sound is hard because it is uncommon in my language, we do not use our tongues to hit the top teeth like that. But then, it became 2nd nature after living abroad for almost 20 years.
Recently i happen to work with a lot of architects and designers and 1 word comes up which I think is the most difficult to pronouncr: AESTHETIC.
It sounds very simple but if you break down the syllables, your tongue needs to do a bit of work.
For the British English version, the “t” in tic is pronounced quite strong, as in “tick”. Mostly, your tongue only needs to worry about the “THE” sound, i.e. ES-THE-TIC.
In US English, the “t” is most often pronounced as a soft “d”. This means “TIC” will sound like “DIC”. So your tongue needs to flick up for the “THE” sound and then immediately flick down for the “DIC”.
This gets even harder if you consider the adverb: AESTHETICALLY. A lot of tongue gymnasium involve…
Any other words or phrase that you think is dificult?
i used to have difficulty pronouncing the “th” sound as a child too. i would use the same accent my parents did when they used it in words like “three” and i can remember celebrating the moment i realized that i said the number “three” correctly, naturally and without a thought.
ever since then, i’ve struggled with NOT pronouncing the “th” sound when i speak words that require the hard rolling-r sound like in the spanish word “tres”, so go figure. lol
Hierarchy…
I have trouble with “sixths”.
and “twelvths”
Native English speaker here. Aside from catching crap for regional accent differences, I didn’t have any noticeable, repeating problems until COVID. I can’t, for the life of me, properly pronounce
comorbidity. Even when I really concentrate on it, it tends to come out ascomorbibity. It really makes me sound stupid as hell.Comorbibbity babbity boo.
My children’s optometrist is a place called “Tropical Optical”. I can’t do it.
English speaker - corollary.
My sister can’t say sea minerals without it sounding like semen roll.
I am becoming more convinced that I should have been a voice actor…
Non-native but spent a lot of my life living in English-speaking contexts. I know how to pronounce it, but my tongue seems to like tripping up over “hospital”.
“Phthalates”
Czech has this special Ř sound, which is somewhere between a rolling R and the S in vision (/ˈvɪʒən/). I’m learning Czech as a fifth language, so while I can pronounce it standalone or at the start of a word it takes all my focus to manage mid-word.
Legislative.
For me, probably “specific” and “interdisciplinary”
I can not wrap my tounge around ambulance while in a sentence.
So as an Aussie I just call them ambos.Sphere or Sphincter
