-----Original Message-----
From: Wordsmith <wsmith@wordsmith.org>
To: linguaphile@wordsmith.org <linguaphile@wordsmith.org>
Date: Thursday, March 26, 1998 1:35 PM
Subject: AWADmail Issue 8
AWADmail Issue 8, March 26, 1998
A Compendium of Feedback on the Previous Week's Words in AWAD,
and Other Interesting Tidbits about Words and Languages
------------------------------
From: Anu Garg (anu@wordsmith.org)
Subject: AWADmail is back!
AWADmail is back after a long hiatus. Last week's theme, "Words whose
pronunciations differ a lot from their spellings" generated a huge
response.
Some sent their favorite words in this category (colonel coming at the top
of the list), while others forwarded poems lamenting the intractability of
English orthoepy and orthography. Here are selected responses.
------------------------------
From: E. Richard Cohen (ercohen@aol.com)
Subject: Phonetic Pronunciation
In line with this week's critique of English pronunciation, dare I bring up
George Bernard Shaw's plea for spelling reform with the word 'GHOTI"
GH as in "rough"
O as in "women"
TI as in "nation"
GHOTI = "fish"
Also noted by Marc J. Broering (dad@louisville.edu), Ted Schipper
(ted.schipper@utoronto.ca), (Tim Nelson) tsn@deakin.edu.au, Sheila
Crosby (sheila@ing.iac.es), Vimala Rodgers (vimala@iihs.com) and
martina@aol.com. -Anu
------------------------------
From: Derek Winkler (derek@aim-systems.on.ca)
Subject: Ruminations & Ponderances
It's funny that a couple of the words you're featuring for being pronounced
differently than they are spelled have French origins. Being from Canada
and
therefore being exposed to French, I look at the word and think "What do
you
mean pronounced differently then they are spelled, how else would you
pronounce oeuvre."
------------------------------
From: David Isaacson (isaacson@wmich.edu)
Subject: Another Pronunciation for "chaos"
One of the characters in Sean O'Casey's play, "Juno and the Paycock," (it's
either Captain Jack Boyle or his sidekick "Joxer" Daly) regularly
mispronounces this word as "chassis."
------------------------------
From: Fred Bartlett (fredb@springer-ny.com)
Subject: Chaos
When I traveled to the old Soviet Union to edit the proceedings of a
conference on nonlinear dynamics, I was baffled by the (English) speech
of my Russian colleagues. They kept talking about "House" -- that is,
"chaos". It was all perfectly reasonable (though wrong, of course):
transliteration to Cyrillic and then pronunciation as if it were Russian.
------------------------------
From: Steve Royster (roysters@sec.gov)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--rendezvous
I was willing to let oeuvre pass after I mistook it initially for the
French
word for "egg." I learned something on that one. But isn't "rendezvous" a
direct French import?
See next message. -Anu
French, as the comedian Steve Martin has noted, is more torturous than
English: "It's like those French have a different word for everything!" On
the album "A Wild and Crazy Guy," from early in his oeuvre, Martin
describes
a man who dies trying to speak French.
------------------------------
From: Ken Maher (ken_maher@nhmbm1.dos.nortel.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--chaos
Your note on the need for pronunciation guidance in English reminds me of
what I used to tell students when I taught English as a second language for
ten years, mostly to native speakers of Spanish, Arabic, or Swahili. All
languages are thieves, but most languages have the good sense to hide what
they've stolen by making it look like their own. English, however, is more
vain or, perhaps, careless, and often keeps the stolen goods in their
original forms. For example, when Spanish stole the word for driver from
French, it changed the spelling to "chofer," whereas English kept it as
"chauffeur." This linguistic practice makes English one of the most
difficult of the Latin-alphabet languages to learn to spell.
In polite company it is called borrowing. Whether these
loanwords are ever returned is another matter. -Anu
------------------------------
From: Bob Simmons (bsimmons@compassnet.com)
Subject: (Mis)pronunciation Guide
While I applaud your intention to include pronunciation in AWAD, I think
you
should look for another source. Specifically, I have a problem with each of
the last three days' pronunciations:
oeuvre (oe-VRUH) -- since this one retains its French pronunciation, it is
just about impossible to render in English. When I say it, it sounds more
like e(r)-vra (with neither syllable accented). The way you've written it,
I
would say e(r)-VREW.
segue (SAG-way) -- I have never heard this pronounced other than SEG-way
rendezvous (RAN-day-voo) -- I would argue that RON-day-voo is closer.
While reducing a spoken sound to its written form is tough enough
in any language, it is nearly impossible to accurately represent
pronunciation information using only the lowest common denominator
of characters -- those found on a standard English keyboard. Not
all systems have the capability to show phonetic characters. (Once
Unicode is more widely adopted, it would be possible to show all
IPA characters but for now we have to do with the seven bit ASCII
character set). It must also be noted that the pronunciation of
words varies a great deal from region to region and any single way
of pronouncing a word cannot be called the only correct one. In that
spirit, the pronunciation guide provided with the words here should
be taken as an approximation and not as a precise phonetic equivalent.
If you disagree with a given pronunciation or anything else in AWAD,
please drop me a line at anu@wordsmith.org. Due to large volume of
messages, I can't always respond to you but I do read all
messages. -Anu
...........................................................................
...
Every other author may aspire to praise; the lexicographer can only hope to
escape reproach. -Samuel Johnson
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