How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

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How do you say, "Caribbean"?

ca-RIB-be-an
29
54%
ca-rib-BE-an
25
46%
 
Total votes: 54

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M Sea
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#21

Post by M Sea »

The Meat man wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 10:28 am
M Sea wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 10:01 am
Ha, tough one but I have lived in the Florida Keys since the 90’s and get over to the Bahamas often, lived on Man O’ War cay for two years. The most popular pronunciation down here is the first choice in the poll, ca-RIB-be-an. I hear it both ways but the majority of the time its ca-RIB-be-an. 🏝
3716E82C-C5FE-432F-904B-182A7FD8AD1D.jpeg
0938B2AE-3A9F-43A7-9F84-8EDEE2C3CA3E.jpeg
Got to say, I'm a little jealous of all your beautiful beach photos M Sea! My wife and I lived on one of the Bahamian islands (Andros) for a few months back in 2016. Would love to go back someday.
Thank you, never been down to Andros. I spent a few years fishing in the Abaco’s and absolutely loved it there!!! I am very thankful to live down here but three/four months of hurricane season still drives me nutz. Irma got me bad. Total loss, everything but still worth it. 🏝🍻
Last edited by M Sea on Tue Oct 27, 2020 1:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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ChrisinHove
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#22

Post by ChrisinHove »

CaribBEan is obviously the correct way.

Another good one is Himalayan. Pronounced Him-AL-ian properly, I understand (although only from Indian YT reviews of the Royal Enfield motorcycle of the same name).
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#23

Post by Bill1170 »

I say CariBEan more than CaRIBean, but I also say both depending on something I haven’t clearly identified yet. It’s weird!
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#24

Post by Evil D »

I'm another that uses both pronunciations depending on the rest of the sentence.
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Naperville
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#25

Post by Naperville »

The Meat man wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 10:52 am
Tomato vs tomahto may be a valid discussion, but "nu-cue-ler" is flat wrong. :p ;)
I always thought so too, but the dictionary has both pronunciations. I always say NU-Cle-ar.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nuclear
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#26

Post by Naperville »

Evil D wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 2:39 pm
I'm another that uses both pronunciations depending on the rest of the sentence.
I agree, and for the life of me, I cannot figure out why I do it.
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#27

Post by The Meat man »

Sounds like I should have added a "both" option. ;)
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#28

Post by The Meat man »

Naperville wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 5:15 pm
The Meat man wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 10:52 am
Tomato vs tomahto may be a valid discussion, but "nu-cue-ler" is flat wrong. :p ;)
I always thought so too, but the dictionary has both pronunciations. I always say NU-Cle-ar.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nuclear
It's written "NU-cle-ar" and my Reader's Digest Oxford gives only that pronunciation.
Could be that Merriam-Webster thinks the mispronunciation is common enough that it is now valid. They've done that kind of thing before. (Mistakenly, in my opinion.)
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Cambertree
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#29

Post by Cambertree »

The countries of the old British Commonwealth seem to pronounce ‘Caribbean’ with the emphasis on the third syllable. I remember watching Pulp Fiction and the way the Marcellus Wallace character pronounces it with the emphasis on the second syllable seemed unusual enough that usually people here comment on it.

I guess language adapts and metamorphoses over time, so even ‘wrong’ pronunciations like ‘nucealar’ or ‘aks’ instead of ‘ask’ can become the standard way to say a word over time.

‘St Louis’ is a good example. Do you pronounce it ‘Looey’ because that is how the French pronounce it, or ‘Lou-iss’ because that is how the locals pronounce it?

The word ‘bird’ used to be ‘bridd’ in middle English, so it’s another example of the ‘wrong’ pronunciation being standardised over time.

Also the ‘k’ in ‘knife’ used to be fully voiced in English up until the 1600s, and the word for a small pocketknife in French is still ‘canif’.

There was an interesting quiz a few years back in the NY Times which asks about different words you use, then identifies which area of the US you might come from.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/201 ... z-map.html

The red areas of the map will show areas which are most similar to your ‘dialect’.

I’d be interested to see how accurate it is for all ‘youse’...or is that ‘y’all’? ;) :D

Interestingly it seems to be pretty accurate, even identifying when people have grown up in a place and moved somewhere else later.

I took it three times using all of the variants I’d ever heard in conversation in Australia and every result came up in the middle of New York City - probably because of the strong Irish influence on the historical vocabulary of both places.

A friend in Yorkshire in northern England took it a couple of times and always got a result in the Deep South, which I guess has a fair bit of English influence.
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#30

Post by BLUETYPEII »

You’ll get a kick out of this, it’s about the sixth post from the bottom.

https://forum.spyderco.com/viewtopic.ph ... s&start=20

I about died laughing when I saw it. :D
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#31

Post by The Meat man »

BLUETYPEII wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 7:47 pm
You’ll get a kick out of this, it’s about the sixth post from the bottom.

https://forum.spyderco.com/viewtopic.ph ... s&start=20

I about died laughing when I saw it. :D
Ha ha!!! I remember that one!! :D :D
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#32

Post by The Meat man »

Cambertree wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 6:57 pm
There was an interesting quiz a few years back in the NY Times which asks about different words you use, then identifies which area of the US you might come from.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/201 ... z-map.html

The red areas of the map will show areas which are most similar to your ‘dialect’.

I’d be interested to see how accurate it is for all ‘youse’...or is that ‘y’all’? ;) :D

Interestingly it seems to be pretty accurate, even identifying when people have grown up in a place and moved somewhere else later.

I took it three times using all of the variants I’d ever heard in conversation in Australia and every result came up in the middle of New York City - probably because of the strong Irish influence on the historical vocabulary of both places.
Ha! I just took that quiz and three hotspots came up: Philadelphia, Indianapolis, and St. Louis.
I grew up in New Jersey just outside of Philly and moved to mid-Missouri about 16 years ago. It's surprisingly accurate!
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#33

Post by tbdoc4kids »

Naperville wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 5:15 pm
The Meat man wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 10:52 am
Tomato vs tomahto may be a valid discussion, but "nu-cue-ler" is flat wrong. :p ;)
I always thought so too, but the dictionary has both pronunciations. I always say NU-Cle-ar.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nuclear
Perhaps MW learned their pronunciation from Jimmy Carter, who was a nucular engineer apparently! :)
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#34

Post by Sumdumguy »

Queue the OCC meme!
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The Meat man
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#35

Post by The Meat man »

M Sea wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 12:27 pm
The Meat man wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 10:28 am
M Sea wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 10:01 am
Ha, tough one but I have lived in the Florida Keys since the 90’s and get over to the Bahamas often, lived on Man O’ War cay for two years. The most popular pronunciation down here is the first choice in the poll, ca-RIB-be-an. I hear it both ways but the majority of the time its ca-RIB-be-an. 🏝
3716E82C-C5FE-432F-904B-182A7FD8AD1D.jpeg
0938B2AE-3A9F-43A7-9F84-8EDEE2C3CA3E.jpeg
Got to say, I'm a little jealous of all your beautiful beach photos M Sea! My wife and I lived on one of the Bahamian islands (Andros) for a few months back in 2016. Would love to go back someday.
Thank you, never been down to Andros. I spent a few years fishing in the Abaco’s and absolutely loved it there!!! I am very thankful to live down here but three/four months of hurricane season still drives me nutz. Irma got me bad. Total loss, everything but still worth it. 🏝🍻
That's definitely the downside. We left Andros a couple months before Matthew smashed it.
Actually we happened to be in Florida over that time, but on the Gulf side, so we didn't experience anything more than some blustery cloudy weather. It really tore up Andros and Grand Bahama though.
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Wartstein
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#36

Post by Wartstein »

As a non native speaker in English at first I thought it was CaRIbbean, since the German word for it is pronounced KaRIbik...
Then I heard folks on youtube pronounce it CaribBEan and thought this was the correct form..

But now I am confused.... :p :p
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#37

Post by Doc Dan »

Usually Cari Bee an
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Cambertree
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#38

Post by Cambertree »

The Meat man wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 8:19 pm
Cambertree wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 6:57 pm
There was an interesting quiz a few years back in the NY Times which asks about different words you use, then identifies which area of the US you might come from.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/201 ... z-map.html

The red areas of the map will show areas which are most similar to your ‘dialect’.

I’d be interested to see how accurate it is for all ‘youse’...or is that ‘y’all’? ;) :D

Interestingly it seems to be pretty accurate, even identifying when people have grown up in a place and moved somewhere else later.

I took it three times using all of the variants I’d ever heard in conversation in Australia and every result came up in the middle of New York City - probably because of the strong Irish influence on the historical vocabulary of both places.
Ha! I just took that quiz and three hotspots came up: Philadelphia, Indianapolis, and St. Louis.
I grew up in New Jersey just outside of Philly and moved to mid-Missouri about 16 years ago. It's surprisingly accurate!
Cool! Yeah most folks in the US I know, who tried it were amazed at its accuracy!

I’d be interested to see some more results, and also what kind of answers people outside the US get.
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#39

Post by James Y »

Cambertree wrote:
Tue Oct 27, 2020 6:57 pm
There was an interesting quiz a few years back in the NY Times which asks about different words you use, then identifies which area of the US you might come from.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/201 ... z-map.html

The red areas of the map will show areas which are most similar to your ‘dialect’.

I’d be interested to see how accurate it is for all ‘youse’...or is that ‘y’all’? ;) :D

Interestingly it seems to be pretty accurate, even identifying when people have grown up in a place and moved somewhere else later.

I took it three times using all of the variants I’d ever heard in conversation in Australia and every result came up in the middle of New York City - probably because of the strong Irish influence on the historical vocabulary of both places.

A friend in Yorkshire in northern England took it a couple of times and always got a result in the Deep South, which I guess has a fair bit of English influence.

Interesting. I took the test, and it indicated my accent most matches the Stockton/Modesto, CA, and Reno, NV areas. I’m from (and live in) San Diego, but my mom was born up in Hollister, CA (which is VERY close to Modesto and Stockton); and my dad was born in Ventura, CA. BTW, I’m not Euro-American; my ancestry is Japanese, not that that really matters. My dad had a distinctive ‘Nisei’ (2nd-generation Japanese-American) accent, which sounded superficially similar to the way some older Native Americans speak; but my mom clearly had a bigger influence on my speech patterns.

I recall hearing somewhere that the “standard” American accent (meaning no regional accent), like most mainstream news reporters use on-air, was most similar to how a German speaker might speak English after a long period of time. I don’t know if that’s true or not.

I had an acting coach who always spoke and taught with zero regional accent. One day he revealed that he was actually from Texas, and showed us how he REALLY talked when he was away from the class, or wasn’t acting. I’d had no idea he spoke that way. He said he had to adopt the ‘standard American’ accent in order to land acting gigs and not be typecast by casting directors “as a hick” (HIS words, not mine). The only time he used his real accent while auditioning was if he were trying out for a role that called for a Texas or southern accent.

I know that I subconsciously adopt different mannerisms and speech patterns (not accent-related), depending on which environment I’m in and/or who I’m speaking to. I speak far more formally as a professional than I do with family, which is also different from how I speak with friends. I’m sure everyone everywhere does similar.

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ChrisinHove
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Re: How do you pronounce "Caribbean"?

#40

Post by ChrisinHove »

Wow! Honolulu, followed by New Orlean and San Francisco. Strange for a Bristolian (almost pirate! - we used to drink at the Llandoger Trow, the pub featured in Treasure Island).
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