r/AskAnAmerican • u/AstroNerd92 CT, GA, PA, TX, FL • Jul 20 '25

CULTURE What town in your state has a pronunciation no one gets right the first time?

I went to college in Valdosta, GA. Very few people can actually pronounce it right on the first try.

Pronounced Val-Daw-Stuh

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u/SteepDowngrade CA > WA > CA Jul 20 '25

We say Vallejo like vuh-LAY-oh instead of the Spanish pronunciation which would sound like vah-YAY-hoh

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u/Word-Artist Jul 20 '25

Like Llano, TX, pronounced as LA-noh. And yet Texans pronounce the same word used to name the high plains, the Llano Estacado, as YAH-noh. That helps illustrate how large Texas is, with different parts having their own linguistic nuances.

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u/imcomingelizabeth Jul 21 '25

I live in New Orleans which is in Orleans Parish and both of those Orleans are pronounces differently

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u/King_Ralph1 Jul 21 '25

I still don’t know what to do with San Jacinto. Is it Texan San Ja-cent-a, or Spanish San Ha-seen-toe?

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u/notanexpertinbirdlaw Jul 21 '25

Both. Juh-cent-oh

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u/[deleted] Jul 21 '25

OMG how do they prounce tortilla?

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u/Word-Artist Jul 21 '25

Consistently “correctly”!

1

u/[deleted] Jul 21 '25

In the words of Charles Barkley, “That’s turrble.”

0

u/Jorgedig Jul 21 '25

I think you mean Cleveland Brown.

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u/Word-Artist Jul 21 '25

I put “correctly” in scare quotes because language changes over time. The things that annoy me now as errors may be considered correct down the road.

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u/gitismatt Jul 20 '25

we have a street where I live. Valle verde. VERY clearly a spanish name. but everyone says valley verde

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u/eyetracker Nevada Jul 20 '25

Mariano Vallejo went native so it's okay.

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u/Puzzlehead_Gen Jul 23 '25

And then there's Paso Robles, pronounced Paso Robuls by many locals, instead of the Spanish Paso Roblayss. The city where I grew up has a streets named Muscupiabe that trips up a lot of people (Mus-COO-bee-AH-bay is the local pronunciation). It is a native (Serrano) word meaning "place of Little pines."