Word Pronunciation & Dictionary

mississippi

/ˌmɪ.sɪˈsɪ.pi/

Word Rarity Uncommon

Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.19 in modern English

Syllables: mis-sis-sip-pi
IPA: /ˌmɪ.sɪˈsɪ.pi/

17

Scrabble Score

11

Letters

4

Syllables

4

Unique Chars

Meaning

name

A state of the United States.

name

A major river in the United States, flowing southward from north-central Minnesota through Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Minnesota and Louisiana, emptying into the Gulf of Mexico.

intj

Used in a common chronometric counting scheme, in which each iteration is sequentially numbered and supposed to equal approximately one second in length.

noun

A recitation of Mississippi (the interjection).

noun

A variant of bagatelle.

name

A river in Canada that flows from eastern Ontario into the Ottawa River.

Example Sentences

"Mississippi mud is soaked in black blood / How many more must die?"
"That’s right. In fact, a law which passed in Mississippi is so restrictive, it could close the one remaining abortion clinic they have in the entire state, meaning a Mississippi woman, right now, could be saying to herself, “I need to go someplace more progressive like Alabama.”"
"The vote was 213-209 along party lines. Republican members of the House Ethics Committee – Michael Guest of Mississippi, Dave Joyce of Ohio, Andrew Garbarino of New York, John Rutherford of Florida and Michelle Fischbach of Minnesota – voted present. GOP Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado also voted present but he is not on the Ethics Committee."
"Any reader who uses the old “One Mississippi, Two Mississippi, etc.” method to estimate distance to a storm, and doesn't get any further than a count of five to eight had better be in a safe shelter."
"I counted five Mississippis between each flash of lightning and the thunder crash that followed."
"We had lungs like camel bladders by then; we sledged each other mercilessly, each daring the other to break the two-minute limit beneath the diving board. In the summer sea when it was flat-calm and there was nothing else to do but dive down and lie on the clean, ribbed bottom and hold our breaths to count Mississippis we got pretty close to our goal."

Etymology

Borrowed from Ojibwe misi-ziibi, ᒥᓯ᐀ᓰᐱ (misi-siipi, “great river”).

Regional Pronunciation

American English: /ˌmɪ.sɪˈsɪ.pi/

Inflected Forms

Missippi (alternative, nonstandard) Mississippis (plural) the Mississippi (canonical)

Derived Forms

Mississippian MS

Phrases

Mississippi Bubble Mississippi catfish Mississippi County Mississippi Delta Mississippi gopher frog Mississippi kite Mississippi Mills Mississippi mud pie

Frequently Paired Words

Kichi Sipi Kitchissippi Nipissing

Synonyms

the Magnolia State the Hospitality State MS MS. Miss. MISS the Big Muddy Big River Body of a Nation El Grande El Grande de Soto the Father of Waters

Rhymes With

hippie skippy chippy zippy tippy philippi nippy dippy lippy filippi rippy rippey

Questions

How do you pronounce mississippi?: The recorded pronunciation is /ˌmɪ.sɪˈsɪ.pi/.
What does mississippi mean?: A state of the United States.
Where does mississippi come from?: Borrowed from Ojibwe misi-ziibi, ᒥᓯ᐀ᓰᐱ (misi-siipi, “great river”).

How to pronounce mississippi

Open the pronunciation page — Open the Speakur entry for “mississippi”.
Read the phonetic spelling — Read the IPA spelling (/ˌmɪ.sɪˈsɪ.pi/) so you know which sounds to aim for.
Play the audio — Click Play to hear reference audio for “mississippi”.
Repeat and practice — Say “mississippi” aloud, matching stress and vowels until it feels natural.