How many syllables in 'diamond'

[Aparecium]

I'm in SE England and always say it in two syllables: DI-mond. But I've just been listening to an audiobook read in a very RP accent, and every character gives it three syllables: DI-a-mond. The a is more of a neutral shwah sound than a flat a.

AFAIK I speak RP with a slight foreign accent at times (1st gen immigrant).

So, which is right?

Snap. And I’ve lived in 5 different counties in Ireland. Also keep singing the song Diamonds are forever in my head now, definitely two syllables😉

Well, Gregggg Wallace was notorious for saying “Choklit” and he’s definitely not a role model..

No - I mean the one that people don't usually pronounce - as in Lie-bree. The Bra bit gets skimmed over.

I think you've explained it brilliantly!

School is 2 syllables in wales. And possible East Mids. Though different schoowul in wales. Scoo-ool in East Mids. Well, some parts.

This thread had me believing I pronounce Wednesday wrong 🤣 Cambridge dictionary has both Weds and Diamond down as 2 syllables although the pronunciation sounds like 3 for diamond.

Di-uh-mund (but first two syllables more like dire)
ath-uh-lete
lie-buh-ree in normal speech (but lie-bruh-ree if I am saying it very slowly eg to a young child)
se-cret-eh-ree
Wenz-day

RP accent, live in Surrey but born and brought up in the West Country.

This is ridiculous, it's not even spelt like that 🤣🤣 I say it with 3 syllables, but the 'a' is very quick.

Definitely say athlete with only 2 syllables haha

This is close to how I say it, but couldn't work out how to write it.

Darr-mund

Yes, this. IA is a single syllable as it's a diphthong.

"A diphthong is a single syllable vowel sound made by combining two vowel sounds. It's characterized by a movement or glide from one vowel sound to another within the same syllable."

So diamond is a two syllable word.

Except that there is no rule in English that says that “ia” must always be a diphthong. For example liar, briar, triad, diamorphine.

So the most that you can say is that diamond can be either a two or a three syllable word according to the speaker’s preference. And indeed that is what many dictionaries say.

2.5 here

All I know is that when it's written in shorthand it's a D with a diphthong IA vowel. Liar is a different type of word.

OK, so shorthand reflects one of the two possible pronunciations.

The shorter one, who’d have thunk it, eh?

The schoo-wull pronunciation in Wales is only done by a certain type/class of person though, it certainly isn't ubiquitous.
Although born elsewhere I've lived in Wales since before I could talk, my siblings and children are Welsh, my DIL and her parents are Welsh as are most of my friends, and not one of us pronounces it that way, we use the normal one syllable pronunciation. But we are all educated professionals who live in the good areas of cities, or in the vale of Glamorgan or west Wales.

@myplace, School is 2 syllables in wales. Not true.

Well it certainly was in Newport in the 70’s, and all through the valleys. Pretty sure along to Neath and Swansea too. Cardiff, I think so, though I didn’t spend a lot of time there. I have tapes of myself as a child, speaking like that. DM sent me to speech and drama lessons and I ended up sounding English rather than ‘posh Welsh’.

Even ‘posh Welsh’ was a diphthong rather than a the short oo spoken elsewhere.

@Buxusmortus I could equally say it’s only not pronounced ‘schoowell’ in the posher areas of Cardiff and west wales. Equally valid point of view.

I grew up paying a lot of attention to accents as I struggled with them. The word coat pronounced ‘court’ really threw me, left me standing like an idiot. ‘Youth Dew’ pronounced ‘do’ without the y after the d- again, left me wondering.

You may have experience of areas where people don’t say ‘scoowell’, that doesn’t mean I’m wrong.

It’s a beautiful accent, and it’s the sound of home, and I want to return to it one day.

@myplace , you made a sweeping statement, and that wasn't true.

In that case You also made a sweeping statement that was not true.

I didn’t say school is always 2 syllables in Wales. That would be a sweeping, and untrue, statement.

Are you sensitive about your accent? I’m unsure why you are finding fault with me.

@myplace, it's not relevant anyway, but I don't like generalisations. Wales is quite a large area, and the accents vary a lot.

Talking of Welsh, chocolate is siocled, two syllables, pronounced shock-led. I assume its etymology is that it came straight out of English, from London or whichever port it first came into, which suggests English pronunciation was two syllables. Although there are so many British English accents, I'm not daft enough to say it always has two syllables.

(Glad someone mentioned diphthongs, because otherwise, I would have.)

@EBearhug , how many syllables in ears and years? I know that in some Welsh accents both get said as yurs.

Diamond is pronounced with a noticeable A by the mining engineers and geologists I know.
Many are not English, some Africans seem to stress the A. Some people speak with more rhythm and variation within a sentence than do the English.
I am a midlander so well used to mumblers and peeps who swallow last sounds of words.
Are syllables defined by sounds or spelling? If I ever thought about this I assumed it was the spelling. Something else I am wrong about?