I looked up words that have always tripped me up, including banal, brood, indefatigable, preternatural, conch, niche. Indefatigable, banal, and conch had some conflicting ones but the "correct" one occurred enough times that I got the idea. ("Brood" probably isn't commonly mispronounced, I just got it mixed up early in life and never quite got it sorted it out. :)
The results for "niche" are consistently mixed up though, which means that word will continue to drive me insane. Neesh or nitch!? I mix it up when I use it without any rhyme or reason.
Words which are derived or introduced from foreign languages (common in English) can have varying pronunciations. Some people tend to pronounce it close to how it sounds in the original language, others pronounce it with a more native English (be it American, Australian, British, etc.) accent. 'Croissant' 'Chic' 'Bouquet' 'Renaissance' etc.
Then other words which are more native English words (even if they have Latin, Old French, Greek or proto Germanic roots) will have regional variations.
For example 'Tuna' and 'Tuner' can have their pronunciations switched in some parts of the US.
I find it interesting that British English speakers are much more likely to pronounce the english sounding version rather than close to how it sounds in the original language.
For example, pretty much across the board I hear "filet" pronounced with the 't' in British English. But Americans almost always a silent 't' like the French.
Your comment led me to check: although there's just a few British persons saying filet, they all pronounce it the "English way", except when it precedes "mignon". Which makes sense, I guess.
If by "it exists", you mean that there are dialects in which those are the pronunciations of "piano tuner" and "tuna sandwich" then I'd like to know more, but I've met many people who speak dialects without the so-called intrusive R and don't understand how it works (but think they do). With intrusive R you get "tuner and mayo" but not "tuner sandwich".
It only seems to be some Americans pronounce it nitch, so maybe regional there, though I couldn't guess where or which is most common. Here in the UK essentially always neesh.
It is from French after all.
Edit: American audiobooks on the other hand seem to go 100% with nitch for some unexplainable reason.
It is fairly unusual for American not to Anglicise pronunciations so it seems to stand as odd one out. Then again you kept the original "correct" pronunciation of herb - it was British English that changed for some reason.
> It is fairly unusual for American not to Anglicise pronunciations
Anecdotal, but I think this is only true for French. For example, I think U.S. Americans (even those with no Latin American ethnic background) are much more likely to pronounce Spanish loanwords in a way that's closer to the original than Brits are.
If my anecdotal belief is correct, I suppose it's largely because of the very close contact between the U.K. and France on the one hand, and the U.S. and Latin America on the other.
I believe BEng distinguishes "fillet" (with a final t) from "filet" (without), the former having been borrowed from French when it still had a /t/ at the end, and the latter being a later re-borrowing (usually in phrases like filet mignon). Something like "filet of fish sandwich" comes across as a humourously fancy name for a pretty ordinary meal.
However, I'm American, and I anecdotally disagree that "nitch" is the only pronunciation. I exclusively use "neesh" and I regularly hear both pronunciations from other Americans.
When you get inconsistent answers, there might be a deeper reason.
Banal was pronounced like anal, but people got embarassed sometime in the 20th century and started starting saying canal. I like anal.
Variations of indefatigable and preternatural are probably from people who have read it but never heard it pronounced (a. The funny/common example is hyperbole/hyperbolic. It's the stress that is most butchered, which cascades into vowels being pronounced differently. Heurstics in this matter can be internalized and improved.
Niche is one possible outcome of anglicization, which is complex and has different results, mostly depending on how common the word ends up. The more foreign-like (French) is neesh. The more anglicized is nich. Neither are worthy of ridicule (which usually comes from the ignorant, and is another topic altogether). Just avoid mixing the two: Never "neech" (like Nietchze) or "nish", which will make me laugh.
The pronunciation of niche has to do with french not pronouncing ch differently from sh. This is somewhat problematic for french people pronouncing Asian words transliterated in Latin alphabets; they will consistently pronounce ch exactly like sh (« konishiwa », …) (Pikachu is mostly pronounced correctly though.)
GIF is another curiously undecided word. I'm also reminded of "gigawatt", which was widely mispronounced following "Back to the Future" in 1985, but is now generally pronounced correctly. I attribute the change to the introduction of gigabyte hard drives.
I only heard the latter pronunciation fairly recently via a YouTuber, who would say "There are riches in nitches" as a mantra. At first, I put it down to a form of colloquialism and it took me a while to figure out, that he meant 'niches'.
The first four pronounce it like I think it is pronounced
then the following five pronounce it as "click"
(ignoring mis-subtitled cases of cliché and claque)
It doesn't seem to be consistent in either British or American pronunciations.
Where are you from? I have noticed that U.S. west coast seems to usually say "neesh" but I almost always hear "nitch" in the mid-west and south. Not sure about east coast.
I looked up words that have always tripped me up, including banal, brood, indefatigable, preternatural, conch, niche. Indefatigable, banal, and conch had some conflicting ones but the "correct" one occurred enough times that I got the idea. ("Brood" probably isn't commonly mispronounced, I just got it mixed up early in life and never quite got it sorted it out. :)
The results for "niche" are consistently mixed up though, which means that word will continue to drive me insane. Neesh or nitch!? I mix it up when I use it without any rhyme or reason.