Zohran Mamdani and the Louvre make the list of most mispronounced words of 2025

DALLAS (AP) — From the election of Zohran Mamdani to the intrigue surrounding the jewel heist at the Louvre, keeping up with this year's news also left some Americans struggling with pronunciations. That's put both the name of New York City's incoming mayor and the famed Paris museum on a list of the most mispronounced words in 2025.

The language-learning company Babbel and closed-captioning company The Captioning Group on Thursday released a list of the words that news anchors, politicians and other public figures in the U.S. struggled with the most this year, giving an overview of the people and topics that had Americans talking.

As Mamdani made his political rise, the democratic socialist's name often was mangled. When he takes office in January, the 34-year-old will become the city’s first Muslim mayor, first born in Africa and first of South Asian heritage. Babbel said his name — which should be pronounced zoh-RAHN mam-DAH-nee — was most commonly mispronounced when people swapped the “M” and “N” in his last name.

Mamdani has said he doesn't mind if someone tries to pronounce his name correctly and misses but that some mispronounce it intentionally. During one mayoral race debate, he chided former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's pronunciation of his name, telling his opponent: "The name is Mamdani. M-A-M-D-A-N-I.”

The theft of France’s crown jewels from the Louvre in October had many people mispronouncing the name of the world’s most-visited museum. Babbel says the correct pronunciation is LOOV-ruh, with a very soft pronunciation on the “ruh,” which can be a challenge for English speakers.

“A lot of these words come from different languages and so we have to adapt to a sound that we’ve never made before,” said Esteban Touma, a linguistic and cultural expert at Babbel.

Other words and names on the list include:

— Acetaminophen, the active ingredient in the Tylenol, is pronounced uh-SEE-tuh-MIH-nuh-fen. President Donald Trump gave comedians plenty of material when he stumbled over the word as he implored pregnant women to avoid taking the painkiller despite inconclusive evidence about whether too much could be linked to autism.

— Alex Murdaugh, the prominent South Carolina attorney who was sentenced to life in prison for the 2021 fatal shootings of his wife and son, is pronounced AL-ick MUR-dock. This year the case was dramatized in a series on Hulu.

— Mounjaro, pronounced mown-JAHR-OH, is part of a wave of diabetes and obesity medications that soared in popularity because of the weight people have lost while taking the injections.

Several words on the U.S. list, including Louvre and Mounjaro, also made the list for the U.K., which was compiled by Babbel and the British Institute of Verbatim Reporters, an organization for subtitling professionals. Storm Éowyn, which battered Ireland, Northern Ireland and Scotland in January, put that name on the U.K. list. Babbel says the correct pronunciation is ay-OH-win, said with a three-beat pattern.

Throughout the year, captioners note words that come up over and over as difficult to pronounce, spell or are newly emerging. Linguists at Babbel also track new pronunciation challenges they see.

In a pronunciation surprise of the year, actor Denzel Washington told late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel that he was named after his father and their first names are actually pronounced DEN-zul. But, he said, that became confusing so his mother decided to pronounce her son's name Den-ZELLE.

FILE - Denzel Washington arrives at a special screening of "Highest 2 Lowest" on Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello, File)

FILE - Alex Murdaugh, convicted of killing his wife, Maggie, and younger son, Paul, in June 2021, listens during a hearing on the motion for a retrial, Jan. 16, 2024, at the Richland County Judicial Center, in Columbia, S.C. (Gavin McIntyre/The Post and Courier via AP, Pool, File)

FILE - Generic acetaminophen capsules are shown Wednesday, Dec. 18, 2019, in Santa Ana, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson, File)

FILE - New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani listens as President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, Friday, Nov. 21, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)

FILE - A carpet at Le Louvre museum, Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2025 in Paris. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena, File)

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. stock market is edging back from its all-time high Thursday following mixed profit reports from Tesla and other big companies. Oil prices, meanwhile, are swinging higher on continued uncertainty about what will happen next in the war with Iran.

The S&P 500 slipped 0.1% following a big rally that erased all its losses because of the war and then carried it to records. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 71 points, or 0.1%, as of 10:15 a.m. Eastern, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.5% lower after setting its own record.

Tesla dragged on the market and fell 4.3% even though it reported better results for the latest quarter than analysts expected. Investors may be focusing instead on Tesla’s increased forecast for spending this year, as it builds factories to make robots and other products.

“You should expect to see a very significant increase in capital expenditures,” Elon Musk told investors late Wednesday, “but I think well justified for a substantially increased future revenue stream.”

ServiceNow dropped even more, 16.2%, even though its results for the latest quarter matched analysts’ expectations. The company has been under pressure, along with much of the broad software industry, because of worries that rivals powered by artificial-intelligence technology could undercut its business.

Analysts said investors may have also been underwhelmed by its forecast for a declaration in growth for an important measure of revenue.

Texas Instruments helped limit Wall Street's losses after breezing past analysts' expectations for profit in the latest quarter. CEO Haviv Ilan said the semiconductor company is benefiting from growth led by industrial and data center customers, and it gave forecasts for profit and revenue in the spring that cleared analysts' estimates.

The 16.6% leap for Texas Instrument's stock was the strongest single force pushing upward on the S&P 500.

In the oil market, prices swung higher as uncertainty continues about what will happen with the Strait of Hormuz. A ceasefire is still in place between the United States and Iran, but oil tankers aren’t able to get through the narrow waterway off Iran's coast to exit the Persian Gulf and reach customers.

The U.S. military on Thursday seized another tanker associated with the smuggling of Iranian oil, ratcheting up the standoff a day after Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guards took control of two vessels in the strait. President Donald Trump also said Thursday he ordered the U.S. military to “shoot and kill” small Iranian boats that deploy mines to gum up traffic in the strait.

The price for a barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, rose 1% to $102.97 after bouncing between roughly $101 and $106 overnight. It’s unclear whether U.S.-Iran peace talks, previously hosted by Pakistan, would resume anytime soon.

More expensive oil has hurt airlines in particular because of the industry's already big fuel bills, and stocks diverged in the industry following the latest profit reports.

American Airlines Group rose 4% after reporting better profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. Even though winter storms hurt its revenue during the first three months of the year, American said demand was strong for flights, and it saw the nine best weeks for revenue intake in its 100-year history.

Southwest Airlines, though, lost 2.2% after reporting weaker quarterly results than analysts expected. It said it would not give an updated forecast for profit this year because of “the ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty.”

Also on the losing end of Wall Street was IBM, which sank 9.7% despite reporting better profit and revenue for the latest quarter than expected. Analysts said investors were focusing on some potentially discouraging numbers underneath the surface, including decelerating growth in trends for its software business.

In stock markets abroad, indexes fell across much of Europe and Asia. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 0.9%, and Japan’s Nikkei 225 sank 0.7% for two of the bigger losses.

South Korea’s Kospi climbed 0.9% after the government reported better-than-expected economic growth for the start of the year, boosted by strong exports, particularly of computer chips used in the AI boom. Semiconductor supplier SK Hynix said its revenue for the latest quarter jumped more than analysts expected largely because of AI-related demand.

In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury edged down to 4.29% from 4.30% late Wednesday.

A report in the morning said slightly more U.S. workers applied for unemployment benefits last week, but the number is still at a historically healthy level. A separate, preliminary report on U.S. business output from S&P Global also suggested growth is improving a bit from its near-stagnation seen in March.

AP Business Writers Chan Ho-him and Matt Ott contributed to this report.

Trader Edward Curran works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Wednesday, April 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

The sun rises behind tankers anchored in the Strait of Hormuz off the coast of Qeshm Island, Iran, Saturday, April 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Asghar Besharati)

A board above trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange displays the closing number for the Dow Jones industrial average, Wednesday, April 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

A person takes a photo of an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index outside a securities firm Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

A person walks in front of an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

A person stands in front of an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

A person looks at an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)