To be appalled that DP pronounces the L in almond

[BumpPower]

I say armond.. Am I wrong? Almond sounds wrong..

People aren't suggesting almond and salmon should rhyme...

They're just giving two examples of words with silent Ls.

Ah-mond here - grew up in S.Yorskhire and have lived in N.Lancashire for 20 years now.

Most people here would say Ah-mond I think? I have heard people (mostly people originating from more southern counties I think?) pronounce it Ahl-mond or Ol-mond but not though much of it as it's a very subtle difference in pronunciation really.

walk and calm - all have the 'l' in there !

How the heck do you pronounce walk with an L in it??

Is it wal-k? Or warl-k? Or worl-k?

Two people have linked to on-line dictionaries that give the "correct" pronunciation. One of them pronounces the "l" , the other doesn't. I think that's good enough evidence that there's no right way. (Though I have to listen to the one with the "l" several times to be convinced it's there. Maybe others will hear it differently.)

Ahmond. Only ever heard one person say all-mond and it sounded really odd.

You are so right OP

LTB

Pronouncing the L in almond is a bit........... Brian Sewell. Some of his pronunciations used to really grate with me. Especially when he said 'seck-s'yoooooo-ullllll (sexual). And he said it a lot!

Aarghh at seck-shoo-al < boak face

Also isss-yoos for issues.

My mother says "tooona" instead of tuna

How does he pronounce the name of the singer out of Soft Cell?

Brian Sewell (Syooooowell) would never pronounce the 'l' in almond!

He wouldn't even pronounce the 'l' in golf. Or Ralph.

Of course you can pronounce spell fish "ghoti"

FWIW I'd say "all-mond"

I say ah-mond. So pleased that I haven't been saying it wrong all these years so thank you 2nds for posting that link.

The L is silent. Al-mond is wrong.

DH is a Northerner and says al-mond. amongst other odd things

Theoretician Wed 20-Jul-16 11:25:22
Two people have linked to on-line dictionaries that give the "correct" pronunciation. One of them pronounces the l

I looked up the Oxford English Dictionary, The definitive record of the English Language

It gave five pronunciations including two American ones.

The first would represent Received Pronunciation. and the other four regional variants.

1. RP, is 'a: (l)mend'

(the e is backwards) You can listen and the L is not pronounced.

1. 'almend'

(the e is like a backwards e), pronounced 'almend' the al part rhymes with the al in alimony

1. 'olmend' (the o is a backwards a), pronounced allmend the all rhymes with fall.

1. US 'a(l)mend' the L is not pronounced

1. US 'ae(l)mend' the L not pronounced the ae rhymes with the a in a friend

How the heck do you pronounce walk with an L in it??

Been said a few times; it's a very soft back of the throat L. Pretty much swallowed and therefore not obvious: it's there though.

I think this link tell us the story. In summary:

• the original word didn't have an 'l' in it,
• for some reason an 'l' got into the spelling because English is weird
• the 'l' was never pronounced but nowadays - when everyone can read - a lot of people say the 'l' because it's there in the spelling.

But it's still wrong to pronounce the l. In my opinion.

www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2010/02/almond-joy.html

What an interesting link Boudica

Ahmond here too.

Ah-mond here. DP says Al-mond and I was always a bit worried I've been saying wrong.

Using other words (palm, calm, etc.) to justify not pronouncing the L in almond makes no sense whatsoever. In the first place, many native speakers of English do in fact pronounce the L in palm, etc. But more significantly, English has such idiosyncratic spelling that the way we say one word often has very little to do with the way we say another word (e.g., the O is pronounced differently in the words woman and women).

I could just as easily ask the non-L people whether they pronounce the L in the words almanac or almost (or any number of other words). It would prove nothing, of course. The fact remains that there are a number of different pronunciations of almond, and they are all perfectly fine, with the L or without.

Talking about 'right' and 'wrong' pronunciations for word where there are clear accepted variants (rather than 'that sounds weird to my ears) comes across as pretty snobbish.

I can't speak for everyone on the thread Dot but I was talking about other examples of silent Ls to make your exact point (that the spelling is irrelevant) - when other posters were saying "but there's an L in it so it must be al-mond".

I also say scone as in gone not cone.
Never heard ah-mond
But then I say bath not barth etc
I must be a pleb or pheb?

North West coast, we all say aLmond here.... I've never in my life heard it pronounced another way, I'd probably correct someone if I did Well not now, but I would have

Since we're talking about nuts, I can think of 4 ways to pronounce pecan. All correct depending on what region of the US you're in.

How many ways can you think of?

Brian Sewell (Syooooowell) would never pronounce the 'l' in almond!

Ah mond. I've never heard it pronounced with the l.