Just stumbled onto this, and I had to respond to Mr. Battaglia. As a native of Cuyahoga County, I assure you that we laugh about these things. We even laugh about our formerly burning river. Besides, if you don't like jokes about these differences in American English, you'd be truly unhappy at the ways my international colleagues and I in Geneva, Switzerland teased each other about our ways of speaking English and French. Oh, and smart people say Cye ah HOG ah.

Posted by: Tracy (DC) on May 3, 2010 10:24PM

I have lived in Summit and Cuyahoga county in Stow, Tallmadge, Mogadore and Olmsted Falls. I have only ever called it Cuy-a-HOE-ga. I have never heard the 2 syllable Caw-guh, but I hear it in 3 syllables, Cuh-HOE-ga, sometimes.

Hearing it called Cuy-a-hog-a, which I never hear, was disturbing.

Posted by: Leigh (Stow, Ohio) on June 24, 2009 11:54AM

I am saddened to hear NPR personnel making fun
(don't deny your sarcasm) of linguistic differentiations. This is the heart of American multilingualism. To make jokes from inside the DC beltway is to reveal insensitivity and ignorance.
Yours?

Posted by: Joseph Battaglia (BlBloomsburg Pennsylvania) on June 23, 2009 9:07PM

I grew up in Stow. There the word |Cuyahoga| is only two syllables. |Caw' guh|. It's sort of like the way |Worcester| in Massachussetts is pronounced |Woos' ter|.

Posted by: John Duckworth (Coventry Township) on June 23, 2009 7:18PM