When a new topic takes over the news cycle, the anchors and reporters will sometimes make a few errors in pronunciation. And you might have, too, when discussing it with your friends. There’s no shame in that, because sometimes, you just really haven’t heard a word spoken aloud before. Plus, the words that are most often mispronounced can provide some insights into what novel ideas we were introduced to over the year.
To learn more about these in-fashion flubs, Babbel talked to the U.S. Captioning Company, the people who write the captions when you’re watching television on mute, and asked what words were mispronounced most in 2017. You can check out the full list here, but first, it might be fun to see how many of these words you know how to say. Be warned: some are a lot trickier than others.
One helpful linguistic tip: ahy sounds like the vowel in “bye.”
Want to know why these words were so popular this year? Check out USA Today‘s coverage about the most mispronounced words of 2017.