Re: National Spelling Bee - national shame?

Neeraj Mathur wrote:
"Seán O'Leathlóbhair" <jwlawler@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1149607882.597705.190670@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Neeraj Mathur wrote:

Leaving aside 2 for the minute, it certainly is my impression that AmE
applies the marker far more often than BrE does; in particular, AmE
applies
it to names and things far more consistently than BrE does. I've also
noticed that North Americans are generally quite concerned with names,
and
will often ask and spend a few minutes trying to imitate how a person
with a
non-acclimatised name will like it pronounced; if they can't interpret it
in
an obvious way with the [+foreign] marker, they will far more often be
completely baffled and stifled into silence until they've asked. In
Britain
this happens rather less.

I expect that it varies considerably for sociolinguistic reasons in
both countries which would make a fair comparison even harder.

My experience with proper names in America is rather different to
yours. One obvious example is Iran and Iraq with initial long English
I which is common in the US but not here. Once, I tried phoning a man
called Feuer in America. This appeared to be German (it was combined
with an apparently German first name) so I attempted a German
pronunciation. The receptionist denied that anyone of that name worked
there. I was puzzled for a moment since I had just received a fax from
him then I realised the possible problem and asked for Mr Fewer. Ah,
we have a Mr Fewer she said and then connected me to the correct
person.

That's the same social phenomenon, actually. Here's how it works: once the
contract has been established as to how the name is to be pronounced, then
people will vigorously stick up for that. This means that, if the foreign
person himself initially decided to Americanise his name, he will be
introduced like that to everybody, who will then learn him only as that
(since they obviously won't know the phonology of the original language).

Here's an example: there was a girl in my school (Toronto area; in fact, the
suburb where four of those alleged terrorists were from, Mississauga) named
Kavita. This is an Indian name (Sanskrit originally), that means 'poem,
song'; it is pronounced ['kVvIta:] in Sanskrit (and Hindi, and Punjabi; she
was Punjabi). The pronunciation which had been agreed, however, was
[k@'vi:ta] (with the normal rhoticised intervocalic dental - what's that in
Kirshenbaum?). I don't know when or how this pronunciation became what was
fixed for her; it probably happened when she first started school. Anyway,
what happened was that everybody was introduced to her as [k@'vi:ta] - and
that is how she gave her own name Nobody ever had the sense that they were
mispronouncing it, because that was how they learned it after their initial
moment of confusion. Supply teachers - always a good benchmark - when they
got to her name, when they stumbled, would be supplied with [k@'vi:ta] by
the class. Most impressively, even Indian-origin people who knew the name
and pronounced it like in Hindi were 'corrected' back to the accepted
pronunciation by the classmates, generally in great exasperation and with
much sighing and rolling of eyes.. This happened consistently - not just
with Indian names, but also with Polish, Chinese, or any of the other fruits
of Toronto's cosmopolitan diversity.

The key point is that they as. What I wrote above is that "North Americans
are generally quite concerned with names, and will often ask and spend a few
minutes trying to imitate how a person with a non-acclimatised name will
like it pronounced". The thing is that they have no way of knowing if the
answer they get back is 'authentic' - they will accept whatever the person
says to them. Some people are pickier with their names than others,
insisting on vowels or consonants which just aren't there in English, but
most people will supply the American enquirer with a reasonably Americanised
version of their name. My point is just that the American will ask, and then
stick to the answer, much more often than British people do; Americans seem
to be more concerned or more aware of foreignness, and I think that that
might be connected to a greater number of word to which [+foreign] is
applied.

I don't think that we are disagreeing but just according different
weights to different aspects. You claim that the the North Americans
are more concerned than us about how to say someone's name whether it
has retained its (approximate) original pronunciation or has been
naturalised. I am happy to accept that.

What I see is a fairly strong tendency to naturalise names such as my
Mr Feuer and your Kavita. Why did Mr Feuer choose to become Mr Fewer?
I also have a fairly strong dislike of hyper-correction or
inappropriate [+foreign] markers such as the /Z/ in your name. I would
prefer that a word or name be pronounced as if it were English than
with an inappropriate [+foreign] marker, especially when the English
pronunciation would be closer.

So better or worse? It depends on what you are measuring.

--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: National Spelling Bee - national shame?
    ... applies the marker far more often than BrE does; ... This means that, if the foreign ... The pronunciation which had been agreed, however, was ... What I wrote above is that "North Americans ...
    (sci.lang)
  • Re: Vale of Rheidol railway question
    ... closer to the way Americans would pronounce "doll" (slightly elongated ... "o") than the usual English pronunciation. ... If you can roll your Rs you shouldn’t have too much trouble with RH. ...
    (uk.rec.models.rail)
  • Re: Pronunciation of Moscow
    ... More Beastly Mispronunciations and Sound Advice ... to latch onto a certain pronunciation, and then prefer to pronounce all ... Americans sometimes seem reluctant to use the 'correct' pronunciation, ...
    (alt.usage.english)
  • Re: AmE "processes"
    ... Most Americans normally say /'prA,sEs@z/. ... I'd always heard the PRAWcessez pronunciation ... cells conducted impulses to complete the various PROcesseaze. ...
    (alt.usage.english)
  • Re: Silly apostrophe in name
    ... The logo has an acute accent on the middle vowel, reportedly to keep Americans from pronouncing it as "poak-mon" (the trademark is an abbreviation of the Japanese pronunciation of "pocket monster"). ...
    (alt.usage.english)