Bad news: you've been making a horse's ass of yourself for your entire life. The good news is you can read this post, learn the correct, fantastically pretentious way to properly pronounce many typefaces, and then re-enter society.

Typographer Ralf Herrmann, whose claims about European typography you should trust because his name is "Ralf Herrmann," breaks it down.

Neue Helvetica isn't pronounced "Neue Helvetica," it's pronounced NOY-ya hell-VEE-tee-kah. Regular boring Helvetica should also be pronounced hell-VEE-tee-kah, too, apparently.

"Futura" should be said foo-TOO-rhlah, which is impossible unless you are German.

"Univers" is oo-nee-VEHR. I can't even type the way "Akzidenz Grotesk" is supposed to be pronounced.

Conspicuously absent: Comic Sans. Should you pronounce the final S, like a proper English speaker, or French it up? Another good question: why are you using any of these silly, effete Euro-fonts? Zapfino? Get out of here with all that—our 21st century needs strong, Yankee typefaces, like Chicago (pronounced: shi-KAAA-go), or Impact.

[h/t Joe Macleod]

[Image of a guy who almost certainly knows how to pronounce Zapfino: Christopher Neugebauer]