How to say: Vladimir Putin
A weekly guide to names and words in the news, from Lena Olausson of the 91Èȱ¬ Pronunciation Unit.
"This week's pronunciations are related to the killing of the Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Her name is pronounced AN-uh puh-leet-KOF-skuh-yuh, and the newspaper she worked for, Novaya Gazeta, is NOV-uh-yuh guhz-YET-uh. A frequently mispronounced name, which is likely to be mentioned in the same context, is Vladimir Putin. The stress on the first name falls on the second syllable, and there is no "pew" sound in the surname: vluh-DEE-meer POO-tin."
(For a guide to our phonetic pronunciations, click here.)