New York’s newly elected mayor, Zohran Mamdani, has become a running joke for the repeated mispronunciation of his name, slipping it beneath a wave of political news. According to a list released by language‑learning firm Babbel and the Captioning Group, “Mamdani” is up at the top of the country’s most misspelled words, right alongside a far‑cited gap in the Louvre’s security. The official pronunciation is zoh‑RAHN mam‑DAH‑nee, but many people still blur the m and n sounds in his surname, saying “Marn‑di” or “Muhn‑di” instead.
The mistake even went viral a few weeks ago when Mamdani fought his former rival, former governor Andrew Cuomo, during a mayoral debate. “The name is Mamdani. M-A-M-D-A-N-I,” he said with a burst of frustration, “You should learn how to say it, because we’ve got to get it right.” His on‑stage slip‑up sparked a flurry of memes and social‑media threads debating the proper way to say the last name.
Meanwhile, the Louvre’s audacious heist of $102 million worth of jewels earlier this year left English speakers scrambling with foreign words as well. “LOOV‑ruh,” with a soft emphasis on the “ruh,” is the correct pronunciation of the world’s most‑visited museum. Linguist and cultural adviser Esteban Touma at Babbel explained that many unfamiliar terms demand a voice that English speakers simply haven’t used before, shedding light on why so many words fall into the “hard‑to‑pronounce” category.
Other entries on the list include the medicine acetaminophen—pronounced uh‑SEE‑tuh‑MIH‑nuh‑fen—that President Trump once misarticulated while cautioning pregnant women about its use. South Carolina lawyer Alex Murdaugh’s name is often pronounced wrong; the lawyer himself follows the correct beat, AL‑ick MUR‑dock, rather than the more common MUR‑dugh. The weight‑loss drug Mounjaro, typically pronounced mown‑JAHR‑OH, also made the rankings. These examples remind us that a single slip of the tongue can ripple far beyond the newsroom, touching everything from political campaigns to global headlines.
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