How to pronounce Kyiv (and it's not Keev)

Many people want to pronounce Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital city, correctly out of respect for the people of Ukraine. Sadly though, everyone seems convinced that the correct pronunciation is Keev, which it isn't.
In this video, linguist, polyglot and phonetician Dave Huxtable looks at what Ukrainians actually call their city. On the other hand, some people resent having to call places what the locals call them. Sir Winston Churchill was adamant on this - with hilarious results.
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[@claudeis3456]

You were kind enough to give us the answer straight away so I will watch the entire video.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

I’m glad to appreciated that. I hope you enjoyed the rest.

[@Seishi41]

After February 2022 the Japanese government officially changed the pronunciation of Ukraine's capital to 'Ki-u' キーう。I scoffed at it initially, but they were right. It was one of the few times they got pronunciation correct, unlike what they call the letter 'v' and Vladivostok.

[@user-qf9bf8qm7z]

Very good video! I think you deserve much more popularity As a Ukrainian I can say that you are absolutely right how we pronounce Kyiv

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Дякую Олександре!

[@marcpeterson1092]

I mean, most English speakers don't speak Ukrainian, so saying it it the "hipster" way is at least fairly close.

[@KenFullman]

But he's absolutely aweful at saying "Україна" :)

[@rw4578]

Love the sass in this video, I've laughed so much. 😂Thank you for trying to do the right thing by teaching people about Kyiv, even though I doubt those who actually need to hear it will bother to learn. Your Dutch is great, thanks for the video!

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

You are so welcome!

[@timbuktu8069]

As a non-English speaker (I'm an American) do I understand you to say Key-Yiv is a fairly close approximation?

[@burtleboeuf1429]

Finally, someone raised this. it was driving me mad last year listening to it on the news.

[@slavic_strategist]

How to pronounce Kyiv tutorial: Kiyiv - Ukrainian version, Kiyev - Russian version. As a Ukrainian, I think its gonna be impossible for people from other countries

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

A pretty accurate summary.

[@artembaguinski9946]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages Russian version should end with -f though, as Russian devoices final consonants.

[@HenryLeslieGraham]

kiev is pronounced like Ukrainian without /e/ but with f instead of v/w

[@dancinggiraffe6058]

I read a review of an instructional video in ballet that criticized it because the teacher used a “snooty French pronunciation” of the ballet terms. Well, the language of ballet terminology is French, and the teacher, although she was giving directions in English, since it was directed toward an English-speaking audience, was French. 😄

[@forbesmeek6304]

Glasgow, to the natives, is Glezga not Glesca, and what Glaswegians called Churchill doesn't bear repeating on a family show. 😂

[@PiousMoltar]

Yeah, of course they hate Churchill. Guess they would rather have lost the war. Well they do keep voting for a tyrannical nationalist party so yeah, it all adds up.

[@matthewgabbard6415]

I thought there was a meeting somewhere that I missed. When the crisis started all those news people kept saying it like that

[@hanan7361]

I love this video! Thank you!

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Glad to hear it. Thank YOU!

[@wezzuh2482]

the part about "Turks now running their own country and getting to decide what their cities were called" is absolutely ahistorical. The Turks conquered those cities from Anatolian Greeks, not the other way around. Turkey was never colonized it was the colonizer (the Ottoman Empire).

[@user-bm5zb2zw2f]

The Anatolian peninsula has been populated by a far more wide variety of cultures/people until the Turkish invasion, but yes, non of them were Turk. Also there's not such a thing as "Anatolian Greeks", there were different contiguous Greek regions in Asia Minor, but not an "Anatolian" one as a whole, not even durign the Bizantine Empire at the time of the invasion, as there was different themes in the peninsula. I guess you made it up to highlight the fact that it was primarily Greek culture within eastern Roman empire at the time of the invasion. The mediterranean coast of the peninsula was a core region of Ancient Greece. The Ottoman Empire was established and started to expand three centuries after the Seljuk Turkish invasion and the subsequent Byzantine Turkish wars. Call it with the euphemism of "ahistorical", or by it's name: what this guy was talking was absolutely wrong and false. Thanks for pointing it out.

[@breakthroughmadeinusa9184]

I’ve always heard Kyiv pronounced Ke-ev (Russian) until the war started.

[@maddie_1122]

the ukrainian government requested the international community change its pronunciation and spelling of kyiv in 2019 (iirc) but nobody really reported on anything to do with ukraine in the west until 2022

[@HANSMKAMP]

I make a distinction between the Ukrainian country and the language. And I also use politics in the language I will choose in referring to Ukrainian oblasti (Ukrainian/Russian provinces). I am against Ukraine and I agree with Putin about the military operation/war that is going on in Ukraine. I always used Ukrainian names for parts that I considered Ukrainian and still consider as such. So I will talk about Kharkivska oblast (Харківська Область) which is Ukraine. Oblasti that are annexed by Russia, are Russian to me, and I will use the Russian names, and their cities as well. So I will say Запорожье (Zaporozhye, Russian) not Запоріжжя (Zaporizhzhya, Ukrainian). I will write Донецк (Donetsk), Луганск (Lugansk) instead of Донецьк (Donetsk), Луганськ (Luhansk), Крымский Мост (Krymskij Most) instead of Міст через Керченську протоку (Mist cherez Kerchensku protoku). I consider these areas as Russian, not as Ukrainian anymore.

[@Vangough792]

@@HANSMKAMP🤮

[@peter_oso]

Hmm. So it is telling something that Leningradskaya Oblast still exists and there are 8400 streets in Russia named Sovietskaya; so is it really Russian state or just Soviet state of mind?

[@jivkoyanchev1998]

Well yes, the largest war in Europe, since WW2, for sure did change some stuff on the continent.

[@bogdansakhnyuk586]

Your pronunciation of “И” is more like Ukrainian “і” . But your Kiev pronunciation is on point

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Thanks for the feedback, Bogdan.

[@vlagavulvin3847]

Yupp, ya nailed it.

[@fatcatinsocks]

Superb video Dave - keep up the great work!

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Thanks Graham!

[@jacobparry177]

Do wish more Brits would bemore respectful towards and willing to learn how to say Welsh place names. This distant country that has no relation to the UK is worthy of linguistic respect, but not Wales, its language and culture, despite being an integral part of Britain. This isn't an attack on this channel btw. Loving the content

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Thank you so much. That’s given me an idea - I might do something on how to pronounce Welsh. Not that many people are going to be able to manage Yr Wyddfa any time soon.

[@Rosie6857]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages Let alone Dwygyfylchi

[@tarantularancher5748]

I've only recently found your delightful channel. I am curious about the end of the video. Roughly a minute of audio was cut off. Unsure what was said, but I hope it wasn't more tasteful than the content of the rest of your video!

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Glad you discovered me. Sadly I had to cut the Ukrainian National Anthem because someone claimed the copyright.

[@qwertyTRiG]

Perhaps it's because I'm Irish that I'm very comfortable with the idea that places can have different names in different languages. All towns here have two names, and they're not always even related. So the efforts of countries like the Ivory Coast and Turkey to change their names worldwide seem a bit silly to me.

[@ersia87]

Indeed. Same with Germany, France, Austria and many countries in Europe, including my own, Sweden. They have different names in different languages. We don't call our own country Sweden, we call it Sverige. We don't call Austria Österreich, we call it Österrike (which means eastern-kingdom, just like Öster-reich). To be of the opinion that people globally should spell and pronounce your country, town or whatnot, just the way you do, despite people having different alpabets, writing systems, phonetic sets and not least different histories, is just bizarre. That's my base opinion. However, there might be a red thread running through most of these places wanting to change their globally recognized names. And that is that their globally recognized name is one given to them by some enemy or colonial power. If that is the case, perhaps they have a point. I cannot put myself in their shoes and fully understand their situation, which makes it hard to take a stance in such cases.

[@nathanaelanheim9591]

@@ersia87 I tottaly agree. A similar case would be the Czech Republic, In Poland we call their country Czechy and they call it Česko - for English speakers it can be spelled like this: Chess-koh. Their country was constantly referred to as Chech Republic which is fine but very formal and that is why they opted a few years ago to have their country referred to as or Czechia - which should be pronounced Che-hia, where the che part should be pronounced as in "chair". It makes it sound less like you're referring to them as if it would be in some court case all of the time.

[@dollopsofspraycream]

A further complication is that spoken *Russian* usually weakens unstressed vowels, so the 'e' in Kiev is pronounced in Russian closer to an 'i'. Wiktionary gives: kʲi(j)ɪf. Ironically, the 'keev' pronunciation is actually closer to the native Russian pronunciation - but contrasts with the two-syllable English 'Kee-ev'.

[@DerekCroxtonWestphalia]

The one that drives me crazy is Cote d'Ivoire. I get why they might insist on being called that in diplomatic circles but it makes no sense to expect the rest of us to use a couple of French words. (I'm actually pretty good in French, but most people aren't and there's no particular reason they should be.) No one in the English-speaking world tries to pronounce München or Köln the way Germans do (at least not in English-language discourse) and it seems rather silly to expect more about Ivory Coast. Imagine how badly we are all butchering the names of Chinese cities, and probably a lot of other countries' where the language is extremely unfamiliar. For that matter, we don't even make the effort to call China Zhongguo, or even to call Japan Nippon (which we might be able to say with some approximation since it isn't tonal).

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Yes, I’d prefer to use a name from one of the 78 languages of the country instead of colonial French. Yes, the mangling is a problem when people insist on everyone using an endonym. I can’t really imagine many people getting it right now we are to call Snowdonia Eryri, Snowdon Yr Wyddfa, and the Brecon Beacons Bannau Brycheiniog.

[@gerardvanwilgen9917]

" For that matter, we don't even make the effort to call China Zhongguo, or even to call Japan Nippon" Rightly so, considering how speakers of Chinese and Japanese themselves usually mangle foreign names to the point of total unrecognizability (i.e. Chinese "Mòěrběn" for "Melbourne").

[@PiousMoltar]

I try to pronounce Köln properly because "Cologne" just seems stupid. And French. It seems French.

[@GAREXO1]

2:53 No, "и" in Ukrainian = "Ы" in russian. Y+y+i=И. Or in Wikipedia. Sorry for bad english

[@GAREXO1]

@@sieuwkedevries5211 I agree with you, but your words do not apply to my proposal (by Google translate)

[@sergiykernytsky719]

Great video!

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Thanks Sergiy!

[@lardyify]

I’m with Winnie. Call Beijing, Peking. We don’t fall over backwards to call Berlin, Bear-leen or even Perth (Scotland), Pairth.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

I don’t think anyone’s expecting you to say it like a native Beijinger.

[@auntiecarol]

@lardyify No Chicken Chennai and Mumbai Mix for you, then, I take it? 🤣

[@lardyify]

@@auntiecarol quite right, nor Chicken Kyiv!

[@flowerpt]

Alma Ata could have had A² if they only knew!

[@NantokaNejako]

But only until they renamed themselves Almaty 😊

[@hirsch4155]

God I love English humour😊 . Nobody roasts like you guys . And the best part is it’s done without an ounce of malice, even though North Americans forget this and get butthurt.

[@jiasdfadfdeygshjklsIlgs]

Too bad the sound goes off at the end where Dave said in Ukrainian "дякую за перегляд і слава Україні" ('thanks for watching and glory to Ukraine'). I am lucky to have found this channel, it's exactly the stuff I like (I'm a Ukrainian and have been studying English my whole life). Thank you Dave, keep up the good work.

[@volodymyrdrobchak4592]

Thanks!!!

[@lacithedog5506]

This is great fun. Thanks.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@PersonallyOptimistic]

Good video, people are very funny about pronunciation. Though you said Warszczawa not Warszawa.😅 I am not immune!

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

We’ll spotted. I realised when editing that I’d mispronounced Warszawa, but by then it was too late to change it.

[@001variation]

All I hear is "it's pronounced keev, not keev!" so if it's that small of a difference that I really don't think it matters

[@NantokaNejako]

Well then, should we also pronounce Rome as the Romans do? Should we pronounce Tokyo and Berlin the proper way (finally, because it's so easy!) Should we? Or should we go on not caring at all about other countries and their languages, until one day a war breaks out there? Interesting topic.

[@nicholasdalby5178]

very informative content

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Glad you think so!

[@nicholasdalby5178]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages Definitely! Came across randomly. I have long pronounced it somewhere between the Ukrainian way you illustrate so clearly and the way most said Kiev prior to the current conflict. My error was the way the word floats out at the end into a sound seldom heard in conversation, if ever, by an American

[@douglasbrandt4068]

No discussion on Barthelona?

[@josemoran508]

Well, I do like saying Ouestmoutiers and Cantorbéry. I wonder if that makes Winston C twist in his grave

[@carlinberg]

Obviously Ulaanbaatar is already the hipster form of itself!

[@dianefields6056]

Thank you.

[@jeffreymills7627]

Once again a pleasure to hear your carefully curated languages! If i may pick at one straw: even in those areas of Italy where "ciao" is most often used, an italian approached by a stranger wouldnt likely greet you initially with that word . Even if they were coming to you with a request, they wouldnt likely, unless there were extenuating circumstances that could evoke familiarity where there isnt any.

[@martinomasolo8833]

Probably a mariner would. Italian here

[@vladimir520]

Loved the video! Did KZbin mute the outro? I can't hear anything.

[@gramail2009]

First part really helpful, thanks. Sounds like we should be writing 'Kiyv' as a closer approximation to Ukrainian pronunciation rather than Kyiv?

[@urseliusurgel4365]

Mick Jagger, "' Ere, Keef, Keef! D'yer know what? The Ukrainians have renamed their capital city after you."

[@nicholasdalby5178]

My own grandfather referred to Istanbul as Constantinople. For him, habit. Was not defiance or prejudice. Simply how he was taught. It became a joke for him 6:08

[@nickwarawa5764]

I second that. It irritates the hell out of me when all news hosts pronounce it KEEV.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Indeed.

[@paulcfox]

BTW, when I was in Ukraine in 1989 (then the Ukraine SSR), I encountered one native, out in the country, that pronounced it "Kee-YOFF", or something similar. Any Ukrainians know what dialect that might have been?

[@poltronafrau]

Scouse, obviously

[@paulcfox]

😂@@poltronafrau

[@apertamono]

I don't know, but that substitution is so common in Russian that the 'yo' sound is written as Ë. The Ukrainian alphabet doesn't have that letter.

[@user-fu2ui8ms7q]

Thanks a lot for your the Ukrainian way of pronunciation

[@TomHoffman-uw7pf]

NOXFULL-a city of eastern Tennessee

[@drumlinbeatpaul]

Great video and thanks for making clear what I've suspected since this "Keev" thing started. I agree---if you're intending to pronounce a place name the way the natives do as a mark of respect to them then you should do it properly, otherwise it's an empty gesture.

[@artiomsinelnikov9664]

Dave, you can also make some videos on how to pronounce correctly the new names of the freshly named, or, actually, renamed streets in Kiev like Bandera, Shukhevitch and a bunch of other Hitler collaborants that are now glorified as national heroes in Ukraine. This will really help supporting these folks.

[@PiggyXMalone]

Thanks for a great video. Nice touch with the outro. In response to the point about hipster names: the Australian city of Brisbane endured a short lived and never very popular appellation of "Brisvegas" when the civic authorities thought it a good idea to promote it as a "wild weekend" destination. Fortunately the attempt, while initially gaining ground, foundered, much to the satisfaction of most Brisbane residents, I'm sure.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

You are most welcome. They did the same with my home town of Basildon, which even has a sign saying Basvegas. Not something I would aspire to if on the council.

[@7DYNAMIN]

The amazing polyglot millionär is back at it again, pronouncing facts.

[@brandonwalker5011]

I must not be a hipster because I lived in Berkeley for many years and have never heard of Beserkeley.

[@faalkar05]

8:02 KAZAKHSTAN UPDATE: I regret to inform you that Nursultan has AGAIN changed its name, as of september 2022, back to Astana and now holds the Guiness World Record for most name changes of a capital. (it has also been called Akmolinsk and Tselinograd...) you are btw a very funny man mr. Huxtable!

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Brilliant. Thanks for letting me know and for your kind comment.

[@faalkar05]

​@@DaveHuxtableLanguages oh yeah, your channel looks just about absolutely glorious and (as a major geography nerd and hence also expert linguistics rabbit-hole-explorer) I'll be sure to very soon binge through it all 😁😆

[@jivkoyanchev1998]

Very good explanation! Just one small note. The Turks did not gain their independence, they just changed their form of government, and places like Ankara, Izmir and Istanbul were known with these names amongst the Turks even before the fall of the Ottoman Empire. I think the West slowly transition to pronouncing some places with their native names, when these countries became more relevant. Like Greece and Turkey post WW2.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Thank you.

[@andrewhammel8218]

Yeah. Turkey was never ruled by some European power. They were oppressed by the Ottoman Empire..which they themselves ruled. So they were oppressed by...themselves (under ancient style oriental despotism). After the first world war the dozens of OTHER nationalities of the Ottoman Empire (Greeks, Egyptians, Syrians, Bulgarians, etc) were freed when the Turks were stripped of their vast empire. So Turkey was reduced to owning only what is now Turkey itself. And then Turkey decided to become a modern style republic under the leadership of Kemal Ataturk who made many reforms. Including language related reforms.

[@witthyhumpleton3514]

No no they most definitely did. The Treaty of Sèvres was supposed to leave the Turks with nothing more than a Rumpstate in the north of Anatolia, with the victorious allied powers gaining control of large parts of Anatolia, the Bosporous was supposed to become a demilitarised, international zone under de facto control of the British. Atatürk then actually fought them in Anatolia until they were given the right to retain control over what we now know, although there were conflicts out in the east against Armenians and Kurds as well. But they definitely fought for their independence at the time.

[@PiousMoltar]

@@andrewhammel8218 "Turkey was never ruled by some European power" Excuse me? Never heard of the Romans? Turkey was under "European power" for like 1500 years or so

[@andrewhammel8218]

@@PiousMoltar Hey Sherlock. We were obvioulsy talking about modern European colonialism. The Utuber assumed that Turkey had been colonized by England or France or Italy in the 19th and 20 the centurey just like every other African and middle eastern third world country, and at some point in the 20th century it had "gained its independence" from said modern European nation. It was not. They were oppressed and colonized by their own oppressive Ottoman empire until Ataturk made it a modern republic. The fact the landmass of Anatolia (which wasnt yet called "Turkey" because the Turkish ethnic group had not even migrated to Anatolia yet out of cenral Asia )had been ruled by Alexander the Great and later by Rome and still later by Byzantine Greeks is obviously totally irrelevant.

[@hueyiroquois3839]

My personal pet pyivs are Maryland and New Orleans.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

😀

[@Frohicky1]

I hope I'm not being rude but, was this really filmed on location?

[@NantokaNejako]

Yes of course 😂😂😂 Just watch the video. He explains it at the very beginning 😅

[@Banglish123]

Just so long as I can say New-carsul and not New-cassul I'm fine

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

You can, but Geordie will laugh at you.

[@Banglish123]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages but they don't pronounce Norwich correctly

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

@@Banglish123 They get closer than Americans would.

[@dsl8873]

The French call Paris Pareeeee. We English don't use their tongue to name their city. And that's not disrespect. That's why it's ok to say Keev

[@y2ksurvivor]

If only life, and language, were so simple.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

The French have always called Paris Paris and pronounced the final -s until the 17th century. The name was not imposed on them by a colonial power, unlike Kyiv which was known internationally by its Russian name until Ukrainian independence in 1991. The problem with Keev is that people think it's the Ukrainian pronunciation when it isn't. It would be like someone insisting on calling Paris 'Pay-reez'.

[@paulcfox]

Pronouncing city names "the way native speakers do" seems to be a fetish peculiar to (some) English-speakers. The Germans still call the capital of China "Peking." The Chinese don't bother to even approximate the "correct" pronunciation of foreign capitals. London, Paris, Washington, and Tokyo are Lúndūn, Bālí, Huáshèngdùn, and Dōngjīng respectively. I'm happy enough to write "Kyiv" instead of "Kiev," but I'm not going to obsess about pronouncing it exactly as a Ukrainian would.

[@TheFinalMeowntdown]

German isn’t THE international language of trade and diplomacy though. It doesn’t have the same demands placed on it. It isn’t even a UN language. The Chinese aren’t using different names for London and Paris chosen by perpetrators of centuries-long cultural genocide though, are they? The reason “we” think it’s called Kiev (and the reason why the first language of many Ukrainians is still Russian) is because the Ukrainian language was *outlawed*, even after the fall of the USSR and has only recently become the official language of state. The eradication of the Ukrainian (and Belarusian) identity is a stated aim of Putin; he and his Z cult say that there shall be only one Russian people. Is there anything wrong with respecting the wishes of a people fighting for their right to exist, as they have done for centuries and not using the name chosen by the oppressor - even if they do say Vashinhton? There’s nothing nerdy, pretentious or “fetishistic” about it. It’s no different than calling the West Bank - which is occupied - the Occupied West Bank.

[@VandalAudi]

It's fair to use the exonym Kiev,... I mean, do you call the country Egypt as Msir, the India as Bharat, or China as Zhongguo?

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

But we don’t use Soviet names for St Petersburg, Ekaterinburg, Volgograd, Almaty etc. either. In any case this video is about how to pronounce Kyiv, not whether we should use the pre-1991 name for the city.

[@VandalAudi]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages ah that's agreeable. This is more about which pronounciation is more popular, to me, the Russian Киев' is more familiar than the Ukranian Київ'. It's not that I don't support Ukraine or anything, but because, my country is still using the Russian pronounciation and spelling when reffering to that city, eventhough we are remotely involved in that conflict.

[@stevencole9387]

What I want to know is do people living in Worcester get covid borcester jabs?

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

That almost works, but Worcester has the FOOT vowel whereas booster has the GOOSE vowel.

[@stevencole9387]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages In my part of USA, we say Wooster sauce using the goose vowel. My grandfather jokingly called it rooster sauce. This is in Oklahoma and Texas. My particular Texas dialect is non-rhotic unlike most American accents.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

@@stevencole9387 Interesting! Anything goes as long as you don’t say war-sester-shyer. Smile😀

[@stevencole9387]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages America has many place names that are pretty impossible to guess unless they’re famous like Yosemite. Trump completely fumbled the pronunciation of this World Heritage Site. Unfortunately there are many Americans who say Worcestershire completely wrong. And these same people are helpless when it comes to places like Port Hueneme, California.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

@@stevencole9387 I must admit I had to look up Port Hueneme, even though it’s only two hours from where I live ( on a good day)

[@user-nt1mf6do3o]

Thank you! Дякую!

[@Otacatapetl]

We may as well go back to the way we used to pronounces it, key-eff. Still not accurate, but pretty darn close.

[@hulkhatepunybanner]

*According to Teen Beat cover model, Pitbull, Miami, Florida, is also known as **_The 305._*

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Good to know.

[@SubparLoki]

Wanna go a a great reverse mongol horse trip to Ulanbarr my guys? (How that for a hipster name?)

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Hilarious. The hipster capital of the grasslands.

[@stpat7614]

Poor Churchill. All the things he dreaded came to be, and I actually pronounce Paris as "Par-ee"

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Mmm. I’m afraid I find Paree rather pretentious. Not as bad as Milahn and Feerenzay though.

[@quain5063]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages Milan came from Lombard [miˈlɑ̃ː] so i'd say Milahn is a perfect transcription. We should stop standard national language hegemony on place names tbh, Milano isn't the 'native' name.

[@davidpitkin9352]

I went to Florence years ago with an interrailing European train guide, and was alarmed to find Florence was missing. Finally found it was Firenze!

[@dixgun]

I feel silly saying, “YEW-KRAIN.” It’s really more “OO-KRAI-YEE-NEH?”

[@grandrivermarina3764]

Almost----Its "oo-kra-yee-na"! In English pronounce Ukraine as "you-crane" instead of "ookrayeena" which is the proper way to say Ukraine in Ukrainian. In German "Ukraine" is pronounced "ookrayna" that is because the oomlaut on the i (which is not normally used) has been left off. More properly the Germans would put a double dot on the i in order to pronounce the "i" in "Ukraine" as "yee" almost exactly like the Ukrainians "ookrayeena". The English and the French read the German "Ukraine" and pronounce it quite differently---"you-cren" and "you-crane" because that is how they would read it!

[@dixgun]

@@grandrivermarina3764 good points. If one tries to pronounce things as closely as possible to the native pronunciation though I think it brings about understanding however subtle that might be.

[@nicholasdalby5178]

Now I see more clearly how Clement Atlee managed to swoop in 😂 6:38

[@herbertdarick7693]

The English call Brugge Bruges, Brussel Brussels, Roma Rome, København Copenhagen, Bourgogne Burgundy, so why bother with the capital of Ukraine? Only (historically) important places have foreign toponyms, so it shows the importance of Kiev that it has its own English pronunciation, different from how the inhabitants say it. BTW, almost no native English speaker bothers with the right pronunciation of Thomas Piketty's name, although it makes more sense to make a fuss about the correct pronunciation of a biographic name, because that name identifies and marks that person. Each morning when I wake up and activate my brain, I remember my own name how my parents pronounced it, not how some stranger would say it. Then I start being myself again.

[@Zaporizhzhian]

Historically, Kyiv pronounced like Hard K, closed english I like in "did" Easy E, and Long W

[@ZiggyBoon]

My favorite town in Belgium is Wipers.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

😀

[@markmurphy1058]

Ashburton, Canterbury, NZ is locally known as "AshVegas".

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Basildon, Essex, UK is also known a Bas Vegas.

[@BrysonKeenan]

As Brisbane (Australia) is Brisvegas… 😂

[@fredcoleman6827]

Thank you. Now you just need to tell some people that Kenya is not pronounced Keenya and Zimbabwe is not pronounced Rhodesia!

[@messer12]

Kinda a funny dude. My dude I want to tell you to look into the pronunciation of thing in New Orleans Louisiana. I am from Nola. I want to give you a taste of the fun you’re missing. New Orleans (ore-lens) like the thing in your glasses. In in Orleans Parish (county) Louisiana. When referencing the Parish, it is pronounced (ore-leans) like someone leaning on a wall. If you are from Nola, you may call it Nola or New (Ore-lee-ens), if you sing it you may say Nawleans (n’lens) or how British people say it (new or-leans). Honestly the last two should only be done by a singer or a jazz dude. It’s an easy was to spot a Brit/mick. It comes from the French town where Joan d’arc is from. The proper French is (ore-lee-oNh) making N nasal. So what’s right? They all wrong. I could go for days on shit like this in Nola. If you ever plan to do it let me know. Also Houston Texas the city, and Houston street in nyc are pronounced differently. Now try arkansas and Kansas.

[@jardbinkley3144]

Small correction there. You've overlooked the accent aigu in the French name, which means it is not "ore-lee-oNh," as you write it, but rather closer to "ore-lay-oNh."

[@jim9689]

Some people from Kansas refer to Arkansas as "Ar Kansas"

[@tchristianphoto]

@@jim9689 From a native Arkansan, I offer this tidbit from Wikipedia: "The name Arkansas... derives from a French term, 'Arcansas,' their plural term for the Quapaw people... 'Kansa' is likely also the root term for Kansas, which was named after the related Kaw people."

[@lornadupre2458]

Is it only me for whom this otherwise brilliant video gets mashed up at the end?

[@christophervollick4634]

At 00:51 you read a tweet in what I think is meant to be a Canadian accent. As a Canadian myself I had a few notes which, for lack of a better means, I've uploaded to an unlisted video response here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/jHyplZWhlpiHg8U If you're interested in my notes, feel free to take a look. If not, please ignore at your leisure!

[@andyharpist2938]

I love Eye-rack ! But also Eye-ran. Dubai, but not Abu Dubai !

[@ralphclark]

What on Earth happened at the end there?

[@Marc42]

The outro is now censored...?

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Someone claimed the copyright to the Ukrainian national anthem, so I had to mute it.

[@toddtrimble2555]

Thank you. I am so sick and tired of "keev", universally spoken with feigned assurance on the news broadcasts here in the US.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Indeed. It's that assurance that's the most annoying!

[@PJTraill]

It seems to me that though you say it should be pronounced ki-yee-w, towards the end you say kee-ye-v (sorry I cannot input IPA without extreme effort!). As to the pronunciation of foreign names, I think what one should generally aim for is the closest approximation within the phonetic system of the dialect in which one is speaking to the native sound, closeness being judged in terms of that dialect. Of course that begs a few questions, but it seems likely to promote better communication. Of course one can use the native form too if one knows it, it is not too much of a leap and it will not confuse the listener.

[@EssexJames65]

To pronounce the capital of the UK like its locals, it's Land'n with the a elongated. There's an optional "innit" on the end. As for "direr", surely it's "more dire"?

[@gadgetc1]

No, direr is correct

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Hi James. The 'rule' is that one- and two-syllable adjectives take -er and longer ones take more. I agree that direr sounds weird, which is why I said it. The weirdness probably comes from the fact that dire isn't a very common word.

[@bertsanders7517]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages So 'direr' is correcter than 'more dire'?

[@awfullufwa]

All I know is the Ukrainian guy I work with pronounces it "Kuh-YIVF." I don't know if he's got a regional dialect (like East Ukraine vs. West Ukraine, if there is a difference) but I'll stick with his 'cause he's, you know, from Ukraine. Horse's mouth and all.

[@mOnocularJohn]

The way you say it and "Keev" sounds the same to me. I've heard Ukrainians say it slightly different too. I think my problem is I'm losing my hearing. I can't pick up subtle close vowel sounds anymore. One channel I watch trying to learn Ukrainian pronounced the i sound with some kind of partially glottal/nasal u/y-type sound that I can't even reproduce. I wish I'd learned it as a kid. I think I'm too old to teach my mouth new sounds. 😄

[@moonbeamchaos]

Oh, how I wish I could spend a month with you!

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

I don't really know how to respond to that!

[@herbertdarick7693]

​@@DaveHuxtableLanguagesTry it out!

[@andrewh175]

The hipster issue is anytime some event happens, pseudo-intellectuals who are impressed that they are enrolled or went to college use Google to learn trendy facts they can drop in conversations at their Starbucks in their yoga pants like "Have you heard about the new Ibis Hotel that opened on Tarasa Shevchenko Blvd in KEEV?" I worked in Kyiv one year and Ukrainians I know think that it is stupid to pretend you (the Royal you) are an expert on Ukraine when you never spent any time there and they also understand there are English pronunciations to Russian and Ukrainian words. They share memes they showed me mocking how Westerners are suddenly Ukraine experts because it's trendy. So, why don't you pronounce Germany as Deutschland?? BECAUSE "GERMANY" IS THE ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION and Deutschland is an exonym. Also Prague... Czechs say "Praha" and those rude Germans say "Prag." Austria is Österreich. Those mean Germans pronounce France as "Frankreich." To get revenge, the crafty French call Germany "Allemagne." Bottom line... your Kyiv word sounds native. But they don't really care how you say it at Starbucks in your yoga pants. One must have an insane sense of ego to think some Ukranian child gives a hot s*** that you are pronouncing their city one way or the other. Now please force these nations fix all the other nomenclature issues I mention. Otherwise you are all backwards and rude. :)

[@interkit2387]

This one gets it

[@andrewh175]

@@interkit2387 Thanks 🙏 These people just want to feel superior that they think they know how to pronounce a city they have never been to and they are the same a$$ clowns who love to correct others so they feel superior… so lame. And the funniest part is KEEV is completely wrong 😅

[@ixchelkali]

I think that's a false comparison. It's more like insisting on continuing to call Tanzania, Tanganyika or to call the Republic of Benin, Dahomey. New country, new name. Using the old name is both incorrect and suggests support for colonialism. BTW, just wondering, do you call Volgograd, Stalingrad? Or maybe Leningrad?

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

I’m not aware that Germany has every requested that we ditch the exonym and call it Deutschland. You mention Prague. The government there requested that the international community call their country Czechia in English. That usage has become official at the UN, NATO, the EU, the CIA and the Associated Press. I know that people in Ukraine have bigger issues to deal with, but some of them clearly do care that we avoid the Russian name of their city and comply with their request made in 1995 to use the Ukrainian version. Many comment to this video reflect that. In fact though, the point of this video was to correct the yoga-pant wearers who are getting all pretentious about pronouncing Kyiv Keev.

[@reeb3687]

outlaangbaatr

[@brassen]

São Paulo to Rio de Janeiro: "That's our guy!"

[@davepubliday6410]

Turns out the “cool” way to say Ulaanbaatar is U.B.

[@kyleklukas4808]

Captain Canuck

[@parabot19]

I suppose that’s why we don’t say Tiflis any more

[@dixgun]

All very interesting but maybe the differences are still too subtle for me, although now I understand why some people say, “KEY-EV” and others say, “KE-EV.”

[@notwithouttext]

actually, the russian pronunciation is "kyeef" (at least that's what it says online, i'm not russian)

[@dixgun]

@@notwithouttext interesting. Thank you.

[@OstblockLatina]

4:42: Hello, a born and raised Varsovian here. There is no "ch" (as in "cheese") sound in Warszawa. Polish "sz" sounds like English "sh", Mr. Superior Phonetician Guy.

[@scorch1968]

Ï exists in common English in Naïve with a similar pronunciation… both like Þ and Ð, because it can’t be found on a computer keyboard without mapping a shortcut they will never make a comeback and Ye olde oak will never return to being Þe (The) Old Oak. Gutenberg has a lot to answer for. 😏

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

The ï in naïve comes from French, where it indicates the a and i form separate syllables. Yes, it's a shame we lost Þ and Ð. It would be fun if they came back!

[@thaw3converge5resoort]

Even though I pronounce Keev， they could understand which place I want to express. But now I have learned the standard pronunciation of Kyiv.

[@Graymenn]

what did you call it 2 years ago, or were you totally unaware of it's existence like most people in the west?

[@thaw3converge5resoort]

@@Graymenn De facto, I just knew a piece of information about Ukraine before 2022.Just a neighbour of Russia. I believe that Ukraine shall never surrender as Britain shall never surrender(cite: Winston Churchill's lecture in WW2). Ukrainian is indomitable and admirable for its persistent fighting and counteroffensive.

[@Graymenn]

@@thaw3converge5resoort I dont think anyone would doubt the bravery of their soldiers, but wars are not won by bravery, they are won by logistics.... unless you are willing to send your children, brothers, cousins to go die for them, Ukraine will fall. Western economies can not keep up the level of support we have been giving to them and soon enough they will. Ukraine is hardly indomitable... it have been conquered scores of times throughout history. Your reply is fascinating, such heart and passion for something you know nothing about. God bless women... tyrannies and dictatorships couldn't exist without the blind moral superiority of the average female.

[@thaw3converge5resoort]

​@@Graymenn I think there is no winner in the war. Only loser. And no matter how exquisite the pretexts are, they can not cover the essence of invasion. The Tsar shouts loudly and shouts slogans beautifully for nationalism, class conflict and so on, but in the end, it's not just fooling others to die, but also making Tsar's own fortune and fame.

[@Graymenn]

@@thaw3converge5resoort what century do you think this is?

[@nathanaelanheim9591]

If we are at the topic of capital city names then the capital of Poland is Warszawa (Var-shah-vah), not WarszCZawa (Var-Sh'Chah -Vah)

[@yuryd5164]

The original pronounciation is "kyiv" the ukrainian way, which is about a thousand years old. The Russian version came centuries later after Russian language was developed.

[@witthyhumpleton3514]

I mean, neither Russian nor Ukrainian existed at the time the city was founded.

[@Zaporizhzhian]

​but it was pronounced with hard throat K and Y. Also, russian pronunciation is so far from Old East Slavic. They are pronouncing like Bulgarians. @witthyhumpleton3514

[@jeanier7185]

The news announcers pronounce it like that

[@alexd3253]

I thought Istanbul is how the Osman invaders chose to pronounce "Constantinople" once they captured the city.

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Hi Alex. There seem to be varying accounts of where the name Istanbul originates. The Turkish government officially changed the name in 1930. Last year, they requested that the country be referred to as Türkiye internationally. It will be interesting to see how that catches on and how it ends up being pronounced.

[@nicholasdalby5178]

This appears to me, not an expert in your fields, to be a possible quite direct connection/similarity to the Polish language. Is this one example of this relationship? If you are unsure, even speculation would be appreciated. The history between the regions is so deep and lengthy, and even in recent times, much of what is now western Ukraine was officially Polish territory between 1921 and 1938. I always wonder how much Lechitic influence there is on MODERN Ukrainian pronunciation 3:26

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

Slavic languages are all very closely related. More so than Romance languages, for example.

[@merelynominal]

Fair dinkum I've got no idea why I'm watching this, for I'm a Ukrainian

[@nickbarber2080]

I went to school with a family of Ukrainians who pronounced it Kyeff...It was their home town...did it change between 1945 and today?

[@xq233]

It did. Those were Soviets. Now there's Ukrainians. The Russian and Ukrainian spelling and pronunciation for the city have always been different but in the Soviet Union people tended to use the Russian pronunciation unless they were speaking Ukrainian specifically. Those were Soviets speaking Russian rather than Ukrainian. Until the 1990s the English spelling and pronunciation followed the Russian rule, of the Soviet Union, so everyone in the English-speaking world used to say "Kiev".

[@nickbarber2080]

@@xq233 Well they were refugees having fought the Soviets,and they said "Tak" rather than "Da" but what do I know?

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

That’s the Russian pronunciation.

[@nickbarber2080]

@@DaveHuxtableLanguages What I'm suggesting is that the truth may be more complicated than that,based upon my limited experience.

[@txikitofandango]

Okay... your point?

[@DaveHuxtableLanguages]

That Kyiv in English doesn’t rhyme with Steve.

[@nicholasdalby5178]

And Americans such as myself are often derided for pronunciation.. it is the same us vs them nonsense everywhere. I say, be respectful of those who INHABIT the location one states. You may never reach proper, local pronunciation, but the attempt is what counts imo. Churchill here is as off as he was at Gallipoli--hyperbole, i know 7:19