Açaí berries have firmly established themselves as a superfood. And, unlike some other superfoods, have the advantage of actually tasting nice and looking good however they are served. But they do have the common superfood problem: it’s not obvious how their name is pronounced.
English has long imported words from other languages, and when it does, there is often a conflict between the ‘correct’ and the English pronunciation. Açaí, with the cedilla on the ‘C’, and accent on the ’I’ might have been designed to trip up English speakers.
To understand how to say açaí correctly, we need to look at the berry’s origins.
The History and Origins of the Word Açaí
Açaí originates in northern Brazil, and 85% of the world’s berries are still grown there. A key part of the local diet, it is drunk as a juice and eaten as a dessert, as well as being served hot and seasoned with salt.
The berries are full of fiber, antioxidant, healthy fats and even calcium, which makes them a great part of a healthy diet, and has spurred their popularity in the rest of the world.
The name’s origins come from Old Tupi, a now extinct language that was spoken by the local tribes. Old Tupi was used widely by colonial Europeans, who used it to communicate throughout Brazil. As Portuguese displaced Tupi, words moved between the two languages, including açaí.
The fruit was known in Tupi as ‘ïwaca’i’, which can also mean ‘cries’ or ‘tears’. This is thought to derive from the fruit’s juiciness, but there is also a Tupi legend that describes an ancient famine, and the first açaí growing where the tears of a mourning mother fell. As the word transitioned to Portuguese, the beginning of the word was simplified to just an ‘a’, the soft ‘c’ was marked by a cedilla and the final ‘i’ gained an acute accent to signify the stress on that letter.
Having come to English from Tupi via Portuguese it’s not surprising pronunciation mistakes are made.
Mispronunciations of Acai According to Starbucks Employees
When Starbucks introduced açaí to its menu, a reddit forum comprised of Starbucks baristas shared some of the mispronunciations they heard. These ranged from understandable mispronunciations like ack-i and a-ki to those that sensed there was an unusual way of saying it but got it wrong, like ‘a-key-ee’ and ‘ac-ee-yeh’. And then there were the truly bizarre, like one customer who was convinced it was an acronym, and another who thought it was pronounced ‘Ikea’! The winner of them all has to be ‘asiago’, yes, like the cheese. “Can I have one strawberry lemonade asiago drinks please. For real!?
Açaí Pronounced on Late Night TV
The debate continued on late night tv in a bit with Seth Meyers and his staff referring to the berry as ‘a-ki’ only to be corrected with Acai’s proper pronunciation as can be found below.
How to Pronounce Açaí
The trick to correct pronunciation is to remember the word’s Tupi and Portuguese roots, and suppress any urge to Anglicize it with the hard ‘c’ that would usually occur (think of words like ‘vacant’ or ‘academic’).
Instead, focus on the accents. The cedilla softens the ‘c’ into an ’s’ sound. The accented ‘I’ becomes stressed, and more like ‘ee’.
The remaining letters almost blend to give the correct pronunciation: a-sigh-ee.
While your precise pronunciation will differ depending on accent and dialect, when you say it, it should feel like a single word — it should be hard to detect when the three individual syllables start and finish — but you should feel the added stresses on the ‘ç’ and ‘í’.
And that’s it, say it quietly to yourself a few times, and you’ll have got it. And then you’ll never need to worry about mispronouncing your favorite superfood again, and know the story behind the word if you ever have to teach anyone else.