If you are having trouble pronouncing ‘Omicron’ you are not alone – and neither is the name of the latest variant of coronavirus. It ranks, along with “Cheugy”, “Eilish” and “Kelce” among the top mispronounced words of the year.

The US Captioning Company, commissioned by language-learning platform Babbel, prepared the annual list, now in its sixth year: https://www.babbel.com/en/magazine/mispronounced-words-of-2021

(The last year’s list included Anthony Fauci – AN-thon-nee FOW-chee – and Kamala Harris –KAH’-mah-lah”, though she her own advice is in her biography is slightly different: “‘comma-la’, like the punctuation mark.”: https://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/300180441/the-most-mispronounced-words-of-2020-in-the-us )

* While the letter from the Greek alphabet making headlines has flummoxed newscasters and policymakers, it should be pronounced as AH-muh-kraan or OH-mee-kraan – depending on whether you are in the US or the UK.

* ‘Cheugy’, a popular term coined by Gen Z to mock the style and fashion of their previous generation, the millennials, is pronounced ‘CHOO-gee’.

* Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter is Billie ‘EYE-lish’, and Philadelphia Eagles center who has complained that not only media but also his teammates have been mispronouncing his name is called Jason Kelce – ‘KELs’.

* The American fast food chain Chipotle had challenged Baby Boomers to pronounce its name. They should have answered with ‘chih-POHT-lay’.

* The Korean sweet made with melted sugar and baking soda that became popular with its reference in TV series ‘Squid Game’ is ‘Dalgona’: tal-goh-NAH, though ‘g’ and ‘k’ are phonologically close and interchangeable.

* In the world of cryptocurrency, ‘Dogecoin’ is DOHJ-coin and ‘Ethereum’ is ih-THEE-ree-um.

* Neither the current US president nor his previous boss got the name of the Scotland town that hosted the UN Climate Conference right. It’s ‘GLAHZ-go’.

* Shein: SHEE-in): That’s the Chinese fast fashion company which is part of ‘Shein haul’ trend, in which participants record themselves trying on various outfits from the company.

* Stefanos Tsitsipas: STEH-fuh-nohs TSEE-tsee-pas: The world No. 4 tennis player from Greece who lost to Novak Djokovic in the final of the French Open in June.

* Yassify: YEAH-sih-fai: A popular trend in which you apply multiple beauty filters to well-known pictures or portraits for fun effect.

Also see:

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/12/07/us/mispronounced-words-of-2021-cec/index.html

https://apnews.com/article/2021-most-mispronounced-words-69604f93fb8ed6e61f8b6848704eaaf6