Comment by giancarlostoro

1 day ago

It's the same as GIS, you wouldn't say jizz now would you?

I hadn't thought about how to pronounce GIS, but do you have a problem with the pronunciation of the Japanese Industrial Standards: JIS?

  • I've been pronouncing both of them as /dʒis/ like hiss and not /dʒɪz/. I however am not a native english speaker of English. I wonder if native speakers gravitate towards the z more?

    • I would end both with the S sound, but I'm operating under the assumption that the person I was replying to either pronounces their Ss as Zs or can't tell the difference between the S and Z sounds.

      Because the other assumption I could have gone with is the less charitable take that they know GIS with a soft G doesn't sound like jizz, but they were just looking for a crude way to mock the soft G.

    • I think it depends on region. Related, many speakers pronounce chips and salza, Tezla, Wezley.

How do you pronounce giraffe?

  • Same way I pronounce my first name btw ;) but I think of "gif" as "gift" and this is probably the subconscious association people make without realizing it.

    • Which is why I find it fun to bring up that in Old English "gift" hadn't yet picked up the "t" and was spelled "gif", but in Old English "g" was most commonly "HY". I like the Old English pronunciation of "gif" as "HYEEF", which is a "compromise" position that often makes some of both soft-g and hard-g "gif" pronunciation fans angry.

      2 replies →

    • I do too. The idea that any one pronunciation is more correct based on the letters is quite amusing, given there's examples that work all ways.