"The intrigue: The debate on how to say "pecan" is still nutty. According to Merriam Webster "puh-KAWN," "puh-CAN," and "PEE-can" are widely used. And depending on which survey you point to, either "PEE-can" (preferred by Northeasterners) or "puh-KAWN" is the most popular way for Americans to say it. Some people have very strong feelings about their preferred pronunciation."
" The closer you are to where the pecan trees natively grow, the more likely you might be to pronounce it that way," says sociolinguist Erica Brozovsky. But "pecan" was first borrowed by the French, and then borrowed by English speakers - some shifting the stress to the first syllable, probably because of phrases like "pecan pie," according to linguist Danny Hieber. The bottom line: There isn't one simple English pronunciation of the word, Hieber tells Axios. "This causes people a lot of angst, but that's just how language works.""
Three common pronunciations of "pecan"—puh-KAWN, puh-CAN, and PEE-can—are widely used across the United States. Surveys disagree on which form is most popular, with PEE-can favored in the Northeast and puh-KAWN common elsewhere. The word originates from Algonquian languages, whose pronunciations resemble puh-KAWN. French intermediaries and subsequent English borrowing influenced stress patterns, with phrases like "pecan pie" encouraging initial-syllable stress for some speakers. Proximity to native pecan-growing areas correlates with pronunciation choice. No single English pronunciation is definitive, and strong personal preferences make the variation a source of social debate and angst.
Read at Axios
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