Foyer / Foy-yay / Foy-er / Foy-ah / For-aye

[jaxsue]

NYC here and we would say foy-er.

I'm in NJ and always want to know how NYers pronounce "Van Wyck." There doesn't seem to be a consensus.

Having grown up within a few miles of the Van Wyck (a NYC highway) I've had many occasions to not only say it, but I tend to listen for it during traffic reports because it will often affect traffic where-ever I'm driving to.  Most people pronounce it:

van - like a vehicle bigger then a car but smaller then a truck
wick - like you light on a candle

Some people though say

van - like a vehicle bigger then a car but smaller then a truck
wike - rhymes with like

But its significantly less common to pronounce it that way.

I say it as rhyming with "wick," too. I remember reading a NYT article where they interviewed a descendent of the Van Wyck NY family. Since the family was Dutch, it was pronounced in a way that is very difficult for most Americans.

[marcel]

NYC here and we would say foy-er.

I'm in NJ and always want to know how NYers pronounce "Van Wyck." There doesn't seem to be a consensus.

Having grown up within a few miles of the Van Wyck (a NYC highway) I've had many occasions to not only say it, but I tend to listen for it during traffic reports because it will often affect traffic where-ever I'm driving to.  Most people pronounce it:

van - like a vehicle bigger then a car but smaller then a truck
wick - like you light on a candle

Some people though say

van - like a vehicle bigger then a car but smaller then a truck
wike - rhymes with like

But its significantly less common to pronounce it that way.

I say it as rhyming with "wick," too. I remember reading a NYT article where they interviewed a descendent of the Van Wyck NY family. Since the family was Dutch, it was pronounced in a way that is very difficult for most Americans.

It is closest to the second, Wyck rhymes wit like.
For the van pronounciation, see the link to the pronounciation of van Gogh, earlier in this thread

[Thipu1]

There was always a problem with a town in Rockland County NY.  The name of the town is Nanuet.  Locals pronounce it 'NAN-you-ETTE'. 

However, whenever the place is in the news, it's always pronounced 'NAN-oo-it'.

[jaxsue]

There was always a problem with a town in Rockland County NY.  The name of the town is Nanuet.  Locals pronounce it 'NAN-you-ETTE'. 

However, whenever the place is in the news, it's always pronounced 'NAN-oo-it'.

I lived one town over from Nanuet for a few years. Hint: it has a huge Irish population. 

I've heard talking heads on TV mispronounce it. Fingernails on a chalkboard!

[WillyNilly]

There was always a problem with a town in Rockland County NY.  The name of the town is Nanuet.  Locals pronounce it 'NAN-you-ETTE'. 

However, whenever the place is in the news, it's always pronounced 'NAN-oo-it'.

Maybe its because I'm a NYer but it would never occur to me there would even be confusion, of course its Nan-you-ette.  its phonetic.

[jaxsue]

NYC here and we would say foy-er.

I'm in NJ and always want to know how NYers pronounce "Van Wyck." There doesn't seem to be a consensus.

Having grown up within a few miles of the Van Wyck (a NYC highway) I've had many occasions to not only say it, but I tend to listen for it during traffic reports because it will often affect traffic where-ever I'm driving to.  Most people pronounce it:

van - like a vehicle bigger then a car but smaller then a truck
wick - like you light on a candle

Some people though say

van - like a vehicle bigger then a car but smaller then a truck
wike - rhymes with like

But its significantly less common to pronounce it that way.

I say it as rhyming with "wick," too. I remember reading a NYT article where they interviewed a descendent of the Van Wyck NY family. Since the family was Dutch, it was pronounced in a way that is very difficult for most Americans.

It is closest to the second, Wyck rhymes wit like.
For the van pronounciation, see the link to the pronounciation of van Gogh, earlier in this thread

Thanks for the info. NY/NJ have a lot of Dutch names (towns, streets, etc.) due to it being colonized way back (X-DH's family came from Holland to NYC in 1659 when it was still a small settlement), but we've apparently lost the original pronunciations. 

[cabbageweevil]

Bumping this thread, in respect of a regional-pronunciation matter which I encountered lately -- from a song heard on a You Tube item, performed by a Canadian singer.

The word concerned, is "leisure".  Will set out the word's second consonant, as "zh" -- like the J in the French name Jacques. There seem to be (at least) two possible pronunciations for this word. "Lezher" -- to rhyme (vowels-wise) with "fed her"; and "Leezher" -- to rhyme with "feed her".

In my country, the UK, I have only ever heard "lezher".  I've heard from Canadians (including, but not only, in the the You Tube instance mentioned above), "leezher".  And I had a friend who was from New Zealand, who pronounced it "leezher". The "leezher" pronunciation sounds strange, at least to this Brit; but, of course, a case of "whatever is standard practice / accustomed, for you".

Would be interested to know how this word is pronounced in the USA -- maybe it varies according to what part of the States?  And, should any Aussie participants be around; what's the pronunciation in Australia?

[Hmmmmm]

For me in US south, I say lee's her with a long e.  However I do find myself saying it with the short e when talking with my Brit friends, but I pick up on other phrasing easily without realizing it most times.  And I spend hours a week on calls with my London co- workers.

[WillyNilly]

NYC here. The first part I say leeze rhymes with sneeze or wheeze or breeze, then "ure" pronounced like sure or cure.

When I hear Brits say it, I hear "lehz" almost like the "mez" sound in measure and not so different then the sound of the word ledge, then "ure" the same way I say it.

[scotcat60]

 know Canadians who call Toronto 'Tranna'.

Wait til you get to Norfolk in the UK and pronounce Garboldisham as Gar-bosh-am, and Wymondham as Windham.

And Norfolk is pronounced in such a way as the second half would get me thrown off the board if I were to type it out, and not as Nor-folk which I have heard  said on programmes like "NCIS"

[sparksals]

Foy-yay in my part of Canada.  I hear Foy-yer in the US State I live in now. 

[Outdoor Girl]

I pronounce Toronto as 'The Big Smoke'.     (I probably pronounce it more like Tranno - definitely with an 'o' sound at the end.)

It's lee-zhur and foy-yay for me.

I've seen/heard it somewhere, maybe here, but how is samhain pronounced?

[cabbageweevil]

It's lee-zhur and foy-yay for me.

I've seen/heard it somewhere, maybe here, but how is samhain pronounced?

Hmmmmm, WN, OG: thanks for info on "leisure".  It's rather looking as though it may be: Britain, short "e"; rest of the English-speaking world, long "e".  By proportions and percentages, it seems that us Brits are the weird ones as regards this matter !

"samhain": I've seen an indication that it's pronounced "so-ween" (to rhyme with "go green"). Subject to correction by others on the board who know more about that general area of life, than I do; I have my info from a "speculative fiction" novel in which things so work out that a large segment of the population of the area concerned, adopt the Wiccan faith. (The novel's author is much praised for doing meticulous research, and usually getting things right !)

[Outdoor Girl]

It's kind of funny because we use a lot of British spellings in Canada so I'm surprised we don't pronounce things in the British way.  (Neighbour, colour, sulphur, etc.)

[cabbageweevil]

It's kind of funny because we use a lot of British spellings in Canada so I'm surprised we don't pronounce things in the British way.  (Neighbour, colour, sulphur, etc.)

I suspect that this is chiefly down to Noah Webster (1758 – 1843). In his grammar and spelling manuals, and his dictionary, published in the early years of US independence, he promulgated what became the characteristic American, as distinct from British, spelling conventions.

If I have things correctly, Webster was concerned just with spelling in its own right, not with trying to reflect pronunciation. He wished to simplify and rationalise spelling, and to emphasise his country’s independence of, and different-ness from, Britain. This appealed to “the temper of the times” in the USA, and his spelling reforms caught on there. A business which didn’t apply in Canada; so while pronunciation there, and in the States, has tended to be similar (with numerous local exceptions), Canada has stuck with the British way of spelling.

This is a Brit’s -- possibly inaccurate -- take on the matter; corrections from folk west of the Atlantic, welcomed.