Re: Selecting name Kanji...

Don Kirkman wrote:
> It seems to me I heard somewhere that T.M. wrote in article
> <1118331164.658884.324310@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:

[...], even when a pronunciation isn't (or maybe it shouldn't
>>be) ambiguous, we English speakers will still mangle it. Case in point:
>>the words Tokyo (until I learned, I said "toe-kee-yo" myself. Now it
>>feels totally wrong to say it that way.) And Sakura (Mistakenly
>>pronounced "Sa-kur-a" although I think Sakura had help from that WB
>>translation of Cardcaptor Sakura)
>
> Your acquired pronunciation of Tokyo was probably influenced
> considerably by the many US newspapers that spelled it "Tokio" before WW
> II, [...]

I agree with Trade--it's we English speakers, regardless of spelling.
Pronouncing Tokyo with a Japanese style "ky" (and I refuse not to be
guilty of this) is much like calling Cuba 'koo-bah' or Paris "pa ree"--a
kind of linguistic snobbery to most people.

I bet you never taught Japanese to English-speaking beginners. You'd
find that many are extremely resistant to consonant-y-vowel unless the
vowel is "oo." (And if the vowel *is* "oo," as in Cuba or Uruguay or
Ukraine, they can't do without it.) When is the last time you heard
someone pronounce the "y" in Hyundai?

Bart
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: primeval
    ... Do English speakers make a difference in pronunciation between ... I pronounce 'primeval' with the stress on the second syllable. ... 'prime evil' with equal stress on the first two syllables. ...
    (alt.usage.english)
  • Re: How does one pronoune Dirichlet?
    ... Sorry, I was asleep indeed, I meant alveolar. ... The commentator ... as "i-circonflex", the pronunciation remained schwa-like. ... As a guide for pronunciation t English speakers. ...
    (sci.math)
  • Re: Pronunciation of "Russia"
    ... so I take it that's the more common of the two. ... widespread is the three-syllable one among English speakers? ... only has the missing syllable but puts the stress on it, and the unstressed o sounds more like /V/ than the o suggests to an English speaker I don't find John's pronunciation particularly unlikely. ... I can imagine that a Russian learner of English ...
    (alt.usage.english)
  • Re: primeval
    ... English speakers make a difference in pronunciation between "primeval" ... and "prime evil"? ... subtle nuances of primary and secondary stress in English, ...
    (alt.usage.english)