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harry potter - Why does pronunciation of spells matter?


Obviously, spells in Harry Potter can be cast nonverbally as well as verbally. In the first year Charms class, they haven't gotten up to nonverbal spells yet. But as they are trying to cast Wingardium Leviosa, Hermione tells Ron that the reason he can't cast the spell is because he's pronouncing it incorrectly. If the spell can be cast nonverbally, and therefore with no pronunciation at all, why should pronunciation matter for the verbal spell?


If you can cast spells by only thinking something, why does the pronunciation matter if you talk while you think it?



Answer



Yes pronunciation maters.



“STUBEFY !” Neville shouted again, pointing his wand at each Death Eater in turn, “STUBEFY ! STUBE —”



At this point we know neville is competent enough to use stupefy but because of his broken nose he cant pronounce it right, and nothing happens.



I believe that when producing non-verbal spells the caster is also THINKING the incantation in their head. will update with a link to confirm .



"Pointing his wand at nothing in particular, he gave it an upward flick and said Levicorpus! inside his head. "Aaaaaaaargh!" There was a flash of light and the room was full of voices: Everyone had woken up as Ron had let out a yell. Harry sent Advanced Potion-Making flying in panic; Ron was dangling upside down in midair as though an invisible hook had hoisted him up by the ankle.



@davidbanner, thanks for finding this, as we can see you say the word in your head, so if you cant pronounce it properly verbally, your probably will fail to cast in non-verbally since you have the wrong pronunciation in your mind.


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