The word matrix has become mainstream in 1999 thanks to the movie The Matrix. Long before that, the word had been in use in science and technology. In mathematics and physics (the fields I am most often confronted with in talks and discussions), a matrix is a regular array of objects such as numbers or
Today, I want to cover a topic that has been suggested by Gerrit, a follower of my blog on FB. He pointed out that German native speakers (and quite likely also people with other native languages) sometimes have difficulties getting the pronunciation of the syllable ‘ey’ right. For example, in the words Disney, Kinsey, hockey,
The word height can be quite difficult for non-native speakers because they are tempted to pronounce it in the same way as the word hate. However, there is a clear difference: hate is pronounced as [heɪt], listen here, height is pronounce as [haɪt], listen here. For me, a simple way to remember the correct pronunciation
The pronunciation of the titles lieutenant and colonel, given to selected army and police officers, respectively, is both challenging and interesting. First, the British and American pronunciations are very different in the case of lieutenant. In British English, the pronunciation is [lefˈtenənt], see and listen here, whereas in American English it is [luːˈtenənt]. Second, colonel
The definite article the is the most often used English word, see here. However, even though it only has three letters, its pronunciation can be tricky. There are three different pronunciations, the so-called weak forms [ðə] and [ði], and the strong form [ði:]. You can listen to all three forms here. The is most often
Most scientists are very familiar with the name and work of Richard Feynman. Among his many achievements and contributions, let me mention Feynman diagrams, the Feynman path integral (an alternative formulation of quantum mechanics), and his work on quantum electrodynamics for which he shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1965. Feynman is not only
Here is another example (for the first, see here) of what can go wrong when non-native speakers put too much effort into their American accent (in this case a successful German scientist who has been living and working in the US for many years). The name Kelvin, used for the unit of temperature and referring
The pronunciation of Chicago, home of Al Bundy and Al Capone, seems to be tricky for many non-native speakers. The problem is that the ‘ch’ is not pronounced as in words such as change, chance or chocolate. Instead, it is pronounced like the ‘ch’ in champagne or chandelier. The phonetic spelling is [ʃˈɪkɑːɡəʊ] or, also,
You all know that the plural of man is men. In line with the different spelling, the words man and men also have different pronunciations, namely [mæn] for man and [men] for men, respectively. Listen to both pronunciations here, and make sure you can tell the difference. The motivation for this post comes from a whole
The names of books and their authors are frequently used in any language. However, correctly pronouncing a book title or its author’s name (or the names of some of the characters) seems to be quite hard. Here are some interesting examples. In some cases, the problem is a general one, namely a lack of interest