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The fear of long words is ironically called hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia. It may seem daunting at first, but if you take your time and break the word up into pieces, it is actually quite easy to pronounce, some might think this phobia is made up but quite frankly it is the official fear of long words.
Steps
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1Know the word. It is hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia.[1]
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2Break the word into up into its root words. Hippopoto-monstro-sesuiquipedalio-phobia. Hippopoto is the misspelled form of Hippopotamus, Monstro comes from the Latin Monstrum, meaning Monster, Sesquipedalio comes from Sesquipedalian, a very long word, and lastly Phobia, an extreme or irrational fear of something.[2]Advertisement
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3Break the word up into easy to pronounce pieces. Hippo-poto-monstro-sesqui-pedalio-phobia.
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4Start with Hippo. It is pronounced Hi-poh.[3]
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5Follow with Poto. Pronounce it as Po-toh.
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6Next comes Monstro. Say Mon-stroh.
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7Then there is Sesqui. Pronounce Ses-kwee.
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8Say Pedalio. This is pronounced as Peh-dah-leejoh.
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9Finish with Phobia. Say it like Foh-beejah.
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10Practice saying each piece.
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11Pronounce the whole word. Hi-poh-po-toh-mon-stroh-ses-kwee-peh-dah-leejoh-foh-beeja.[4]
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12Practice the pronunciation until you can say the word without hesitations.[5]
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Community Q&A
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QuestionWhy do people get scared of long words?Community AnswerPeople have all different kinds of phobias (fears), some more unusual than others. There's really no explaining why it happens, people are just born that way.
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QuestionHow do I stop being scared of long words?Community AnswerYou could start with smaller words and slowly get into bigger words.
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QuestionWhy are people scared of long words?Community AnswerIt depends for different people, because some may just not know the words while others may be legitimately intimidated by the words for several different reasons.
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