Mayoral

I heard a man say mayor on the radio recently as though it were mayo (of the kind that one goes easy on) followed by ‘r’. I suspect that this weird pronunciation (which could only be adopted by someone who had never heard Larry the Lamb bleat at ‘Mr Mayor’) was influenced by mayoral.

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Douglas Murray

Britain is losing friends – and making enemies

Mayoral is almost always yoked with elections, especially with Boris Johnson around. Indeed mayoral and electoral are mispronounced on the same principle, with the stress on the or. That is no doubt an Americanism, but I think it is more often adopted by speakers who do not remember having heard the words pronounced at all. They see it in print often enough and then decide to make up a likely pronunciation.