Now You're Speakin' My Language (or Dialect)

[Allison, Fairy Mod-mother]

or Guy (like in Guillaume) ass, and certainly not like a slur/epithet, which is another I've heard a lot. I've been very confused about characters calling them selves "ge asses" like "I couldn't say anything, not with my ge ass." Like whoa, the self talk's a little negative there friend.

[Anna]

Hehe, yeah I was quietly laughing at the Seb de Castell audio pronunciation, and I went to read your review of it to see if you'd mentioned it (you didn't) and now I'm dying because of the review XD

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

(I've also heard it pronounced like cheese.)

[Beth]

Wow, I had no idea secret-the-verb was pronounced that way. But it's also true that that specific use would practically never come up in conversation. "Hidden" would be many, many times more common, at least in the U.S.

A personal favorite example is my partner pronouncing "cache" as "cake."

[Allison, Fairy Mod-mother]

Haha I usually only mention the narrator if they change my reading experience. Aside from adding to the homoerotic overtones of the book it didn't change much for me lol

[Anna]

lol Beth, I can imagine all the cravings when told to "empty the cake" :D

[Jemppu]

Anna wrote: "Haha, I was taking another look at the Merriam-Webster link in my earlier primer post, and noticed there is a whole article about commonly mispronounced words..."

"Boatswain & Coxswain - \BOH-sun\ & \KAHK-sun\"

👀 When reading English works like reading kanji in Japanese: the words used in the combined term are pronounced completely different from their separate readings; and the letters do not portray the pronunciation of the term what so ever, but the pronunciation needs to be learned separately.

[Anna]

One of my faves: Featherstonhaugh, pronounced fanshaw!

[Cheryl]

Oh I'm loving this.

Thank you for "geese" Anna. I always thought "gayus."

And yes the school books are 'primmers' ... and though I know language evolves, it's still wrong to pronounce them as 'prymers.'

Melissa, thank you so very much for the Pac-man anecdote. I need to annoy tell everyone I know about that.

[Jemppu]

Anna wrote: "One of my faves: Featherstonhaugh, pronounced fanshaw!"

...of course?

Kun-yomi = feather
On-yomi = FAN

🙄

[Anna]

So, after several hours we've established two new facts and an old one:


1) Robin Miles' pronunciation was not wrong! (of course not, she's the queen of narrators! <3)

2) I'm very good at making things more confusing than they need to be (I edited my geese post to make it clearer)

3) English be cray

[Jemppu]

Anna wrote: "...3) English be cray ..."

Crazy-ass language.

[Anna]

I can guess what that link points to XD I don't remember his name, but yeah :)

[Jemppu]

Yup. Ismo 8)

[Allison, Fairy Mod-mother]

Some of my friends hosted a Zoom "party" for me last weekend where we reenacted an ancient Greek tradition of reading poetry and drinking whenever we messed up, because we're extremely cultured like that.

They of course chose tongue twisters, extremely fast rap songs and the worst poem in the English language, Chaos, which requires you have RP British English pronunciation from the late 1800s, otherwise the rhymes don't work.

https://pages.hep.wisc.edu/~jnb/chari...

[Anna]

Allison, I've seen that before, and spent very long hours trying to figure out some bits! XD

[DivaDiane]

Well, prymer is not wrong either. I’m American and no one would mistake me for anything but when they heard me. My grandmother was a one-room schoolhouse teacher and she gave me the “prymer” they used. She is of pure Irish descent, so maybe that’s where she got prymer from?

So, no, Robin Miles was not wrong in that instance, but she also seems to have a penchant for recessive pronunciations (in my opinion): she says long-laived (long-lived), which just grates my ear as wrong wrong wrong! But according to my dictionary, it is not wrong (arrgh!), just used infrequently.

[Anna]

I have no idea, but I'm wondering if maybe in this instance (The Best of All Possible Worlds), she is using an accent that has a tiny bit of Caribbean flare? She's not doing her full Caribbean narration (which is a thing of beauty!), but since the author is from Barbados, and the book has Caribbean influences, maybe she chose to portray a bit of that in her accent?

[Allison, Fairy Mod-mother]

I'll be damned before I start calling primers primmers.

I will pronounce the N in damned tho XD

[V.M.]

Anna wrote: "V.M. wrote: "The internet is brilliant for m any things, but also unhelpful for many things, too. It's hard to learn what is what!"

True about all things. With language, I feel like it's possibly ..."

The worst thing with pronunciation is when people refuse to pronounce people's names correctly. Take the footballer, David de Gea. He's Spanish and so his name is pronounced de Haya. Everyone calls him such. But there's one commentator who insists on calling him De Gaya. It's rude as far as I'm concerned.
But it's the same with other words. Everyone pronounces a word in a particular way, but you get the odd person who pronounces it differently. So how come they think they are the only one who is right?

[CBRetriever]

some of us wince when we hear the more common pronunciation of words. Even after almost 70 years of hearing aunt pronounced like the insect, I still have to pause and translate to aunt pronounced like it is in haunt, taunt, daunt, flaunt, gaunt, jaunt, vaunt and gauntlet

[Beth]

Allison wrote: "I'll be damned before I start calling primers primmers.

I will pronounce the N in damned tho XD"

I nodded along through the first sentence, and then the post went cursed all of a sudden.

[Allison, Fairy Mod-mother]

haha!

VM, I agree, I've never understood why proper nouns are so hard--even countries. Why do Americans say France like lance? France with the long a sound isn't harder. Why is Angela Merkel so hard for reporters to get right? (Or Kamala Harris, for that matter). First time you see it, okay maybe some confusion, but if it's someone important, this information is readily available.

Chessie, aunt is a point of contention in my household! My folks are from the West Coast, so we say Ant. My spouse has aunties, and yells at me like I'm mispronouncing their names when I ask after his ants.

[CBRetriever]

my maternal grandmother, bless her bigoted soul, threatened to wash my mouth out with soap the next time I pronounced it like ant. She said that aunties (anties) were old colored women and I was to never refer to my white aunts in that manner. It was the only time she ever threatened me with punishment, so it really had an impact on me.

Oddly enough, the few times I've heard someone else pronounce it like I do, it has been African-Americans doing it. She was from the Tidewater Virginia area and their family was slave owning before the civil war (she was born in the 1880s), so I guess it's coming from her upbringing.

[Michelle]

I live in Tidewater- specifically Virginia Beach - and you are correct in that they say Ont for Aunt. But I'm a transplanted northerner, so I still say Ant.

[Michelle]

What drives me crazy here in the South is the was pierogies and kielbasa are pronounced the way they're spelled. I'm of Polish/Czech descent, and that's not how you say it. Although, now that I'm looking back, my Slavic relatives have probably Americanized the pronunciation somewhere down the line themselves.

[[deleted user]]

Tabarnak! I'm losing my English in this thread!

[Leonie]

CBRetriever wrote: "some of us wince when we hear the more common pronunciation of words. Even after almost 70 years of hearing aunt pronounced like the insect, I still have to pause and translate to aunt pronounced l..."

And if you were in Australia, you'd pronounce it 'Ahnt.' 🤷‍♀️

[Laurie]

V.M. wrote: "One thing that the Americans say that doesn't make sense is 'I could care less' when they mean they don't care at all. But they are, in fact, saying there is still less that they can care, so they ..."

I had an English boyfriend and this used to drive him crazy too! I now am careful to just say "I don't care."

[V.M.]

Allison wrote: "I'll be damned before I start calling primers primmers.

I will pronounce the N in damned tho XD"

What about Feb-yoo- ary, and Vunerable?
And Al-oo-minum. It's spelt with an i before the second u. (Aluminium) Al-yoo-min-ee-um. (No offense intended to our American friends. I'm sure there are things that annoy you about the way we pronounce things.)

[V.M.]

CBRetriever wrote: "some of us wince when we hear the more common pronunciation of words. Even after almost 70 years of hearing aunt pronounced like the insect, I still have to pause and translate to aunt pronounced l..."

You give a list of words with au in them, but there are words that have the same group of letters but are not pronounced the same way. Through, Thought, Bough, Trough, etc.
I don't pronounce Aunt like the insect, but I don't pronounce it like Taunt. I suppose it's part way between the two. More like Arnt. The people who do pronounce it like the insect are from the north of England where the shortened a is much more prevalent. I used to live there as a child, and pronounced it like that then, but since moving to the south, the way I pronounce it has changed.

[CBRetriever]

V.M. wrote: "CBRetriever wrote: "some of us wince when we hear the more common pronunciation of words. Even after almost 70 years of hearing aunt pronounced like the insect, I still have to pause and translate ..."

that list of words are ones that I, and most Americans, pronounce the same as far as the vowel combinations, though I hav occasionally heard haunt pronounced like hant (pronounced like the insect)

[Michelle]

Laurie wrote: "V.M. wrote: "One thing that the Americans say that doesn't make sense is 'I could care less' when they mean they don't care at all. But they are, in fact, saying there is still less that they can c..."

I always say "I couldn't care less"; maybe it's evolved from that? Who knows!!

[Mel]

Me, an intellectual: I couldn't care fewer!

[Mel]

Anna, I'd never heard of Featherstonhaugh! Place-names can be just impossible as local shibboleths.

Jemppu, now you got me thinking of what kun-yomi and on-yomi words would look like in English. Like writing the word "cow-meat" but pronouncing it beef. Although that's a bit reversed, in terms of native/foreignness. (牛肉 (ギュウにく) as a mixed on-kun word would be like reading it vache-meat.)

Numbers are probably the best example, since the meaning doesn't change, but the pronunciation does.
200 = two-hundred
200ennial = bicentennial

[Beth]

V.M. wrote: "And Al-oo-minum. It's spelt with an i before the second u. (Aluminium) Al-yoo-min-ee-um. (No offense intended to our American friends. I'm sure there are things that annoy you about the way we pronounce things.)"

In U.S. English, aluminum is neither spelled nor pronounced with the second "i." The story behind the difference is here.

[DivaDiane]

Thanks, Beth! I knew there was a method to our madness. It is interesting to not that in the European languages I know the element includes the second “i”.

[Jemppu]

Melissa wrote: "...Numbers are probably the best example, since the meaning doesn't change, but the pronunciation does...."

Yes! Exactly!

I actually wrote a whole reply about this last night, but in the end decided not to post... seemed to go so off-topic. Hold on. I gotta dig it up in the tabs...

[Jemppu]

Ah. Here it is... //

Speaking of the Japanese reading concept (of one character representing a 'meaning' with different readings depending on the context): same principle is in use in several languages worldwide in addition to using alphabet. With the characters we use to represent numbers; 1 2 3 4 etc...

With basic knowledge of Latin alphabet one can try and read this word for a number: "twenty-six". Depending on the language one bases the pronunciation on, the results way vary, but you'd be able to link sounds to the letters (and possibly recognize the language as English).

Not so much, if one were just given the number "26" and were told to read that out loud. "Twenty six"? Naw. In Finnish, please. (view spoiler)[ (Kaksikymmentäkuusi) (hide spoiler)]

Because, much like Chinese characters, numerals like 2 and 6 represent concepts, rather than sounds like alphabet do (more or less: as apparent in this thread :D).



Just the character "1" as an example, in English. It - like the rest of its ilk - has several readings, depending on the context. (There is obviously great variance throughout different languages, both in pronunciation and with ways of counting; but the principle of not representing a consistent single sound applies)

1 = one
1st = fir(st)
10 = (ten)
11 = (eleven)
12 = (twelve)
14 = (four)teen (bonus points for reverse reading order)
163 = one hundred (sixty-three)
1141 = one thousand one hundred (forty)one or (eleven hundred) (forty)one
10 111 = (ten thousand one hundred, eleven)
111 111 = ...

You get the idea.

Oh. One order of numbers to cause common mix-up/confusion in readings (especially if relying on machine reading capabilities):

9/11 vs 911



Out of curiosity. How would you write out, in Latin alphabet, the following number in your native tongue?

135 246 (view spoiler)[ (In Finnish: satakolmekymmentäviisituhattakaksisataaneljäkymmentäkuusi) (hide spoiler)]

How about this?

135 246th (view spoiler)[ (In Finnish: sadaskolmaskymmenesviidestuhanneskahdessadasneljäskymmeneskuudes) (hide spoiler)]

How about as just separate numerals?

1 3 5 2 4 6 (view spoiler)[ (In Finnish: yksi kolme viisi kaksi neljä kuusi) (hide spoiler)]



Edit: fixed a typo, knocked off some 'ands'.

[Jemppu]

Melissa wrote: "...as a mixed on-kun word would be like reading it vache-meat..."

:D Loved this excellent extension of a thought!

[Mel]

Haha, Jemppu, we're so similar, because I also was going to go on a tangent about "ateji" but also thought it was too much. Thus emboldened, however... *pulls up tab*

This reminds me of one of my favorite linguistic capabilities of written Japanese - 当て字 (ateji) and 熟字訓 (junjikun), or the writing of pronunciation independent of the kanji character's meaning. The effect is showing the shadow-meaning behind someone's words, adding layers and nuance. Sometimes poetic, sometimes ironic, but always interesting. The pronunciation stays the same, but the implied, *literal subtext* is made explicit.

For example: this person is saying: "Hey, it's me!" 「オレ」But the character 神 means "god," adding an arrogant flourish to the announcement.

(view spoiler)[ (hide spoiler)]

A poetic example is the Evangelion lyric: この宇宙（そら）を抱いて輝く. "Sparkling as you embrace the (sky)" but writing the characters for universe.

Or it's used to represent speaking a dialect, showing both the regional word and Standard Japanese. Or a foreign language for that matter. Or slang. "Surface-to-Air Missile Launch" captioned as (YEET!)

It can also be used for additional clarification. Going back to numbers, it would be like saying, "I'm in a polyamorous relationship," but writing it as 5amorous.

Of course, that's the joy of most kanji really, distinguishing on paper the nuances between homophones, or a single word.
硬い "katai" as in hard like diamonds
固い "katai" as in hard-headed
難い "katai" as in hard/difficult
堅い "katai" as in hard/stiff/inflexible
カタい "katai" if you want to "italicize" for emphasis or to ambiguously embrace multiple meanings

You would lose out on so much meaning if you listened to a Japanese book as audio.

</kanji rambles>

[Mel]

BTW, I found your Finnish numbers to be a fun language puzzle, trying to break down the long numbers into chunks.

sata/kolme-kymmentä/viisi-tuhatta/kaksi-sataa/neljä-kymmentä/kuusi

sadas/kolmes-kymmenes/viides-tuhannes/kahdes-sadas/neljäs-kymmenes/kuudes

So today is the 23rd --> kahdeskymmeneskolmes?

[Anna]

Jemppu, sullon typo/ajatusvihree numeroissa! :P Huomasin vasta kun luin Melissan aukikirjottamana.

#vainsuomijutut

[CBRetriever]

The French system for 17, 18 & 19 is odd

13 — treize
14 — quatorze
15 — quinze
16 — seize
17 — dix-sept
18 — diz-huit
19 — dix-neuf
20 — vingt

as is the one for

70 = soixante-dix (60 + 10)
80 = quatre-vingts (4 X 20)
90 = quatre-vingt-dix (4 X 20 +10)

91 — quatre-vingt-onze (four-twenty-eleven)
92 — quatre-vingt-douze (four-twenty-twelve)
93 — quatre-vingt-treize (four-twenty-thirteen)
94 — quatre-vingt-quatorze (four-twenty-fourteen)
95 — quatre-vingt-quinze (four-twenty-fifteen)
96 — quatre-vingt-seize (four-twenty-sixteen)
97 — quatre-vingt-dix-sept (four-twenty-seventeen)
98 — quatre-vingt-dix-huit (four-twenty-eighteen)
99 — quatre-vingt-dix-neuf (four-twenty-nineteen)

no wonder I was perpetually confused with larger numbers when I was in France. The Swiss have a 70, 80 & 90.

[Emmett]

Melissa wrote: "Me, an intellectual: I couldn't care fewer!"

I love this, haha

[Emmett]

If anyone is in the mood to hit their head against a wall, translate "near" and "far" into Thai on google translate and listen to them.

[Beth]

Jemppu wrote: "163 = one hundred (and sixty-three)
1141 = one thousand one hundred (and forty)one or (eleven hundred) (and forty)one
10 111 = (ten thousand one hundred and eleven)"

There are no "ands" in any of these in English. This is a very fiddly trivial thing that would never come up unless you're, say, writing a check (what is that?), and even if a vagrant "and" sneaked in, the bank would take it anyway.

163: one hundred sixty-three
1,141: one thousand, one hundred forty-one
10,111: ten thousand, one hundred eleven

I'm enjoying these super detailed posts about languages I am unlikely to ever speak. Seriously!

[V.M.]

Melissa wrote: "Me, an intellectual: I couldn't care fewer!"

Haha.

[V.M.]

Beth wrote: "V.M. wrote: "And Al-oo-minum. It's spelt with an i before the second u. (Aluminium) Al-yoo-min-ee-um. (No offense intended to our American friends. I'm sure there are things that annoy you about th..."

Thanks for that, Beth. An interesting article. But it seems the whole world, including chemists in the US pronounce (and spell) it with the -ium ending.

[Jemppu]

Melissa wrote: "...So today is the 23rd --> kahdeskymmeneskolmes?..."

Yes! Wow. Perfectly formed! 'Kahdeskymmeneskolmas" - my bad with the typo! ^^'

CBRetriever wrote: "The French system for 17, 18 & 19 is odd..."

*haha* Yes! Thank you for opening those up! I was recalling French specifically with that 'counting variance', but have never dived further into that pool to investigate <:D

English (German, Swedish...) has a tiny bit of that 'specificity in counting' with "eleven" and "twelve", too: Finnish goes straight into 'teens' after ten.


Anna wrote: "Jemppu, sullon typo/ajatusvihree numeroissa! :P Huomasin vasta kun luin Melissan aukikirjottamana.

#vainsuomijutut"

Ah! So there is! Thank you, Anna! Glad, if it's only that one; I was expecting there might well be more :D


Melissa wrote: "...the writing of pronunciation independent of the kanji character's meaning. The effect is showing the shadow-meaning behind someone's words, adding layers and nuance. Sometimes poetic, sometimes ironic, but always interesting...."

One of those riches, its a pity to lose in translation <:)

Melissa wrote: "...You would lose out on so much meaning if you listened to a Japanese book as audio...."

An *excellent* point! There must be a lot of casual usage of written specificities which do not transfer into audio, even within the very language itself.


Beth wrote: "There are no "ands" in any of these in English. This is a very fiddly trivial thing that would never come up unless you're, say, writing a check (what is that?), and even if a vagrant "and" sneaked in, the bank would take it anyway...."

Thank you! You hear it in use all the time, but I *was* wondering how 'official' that might be just as I was writing these out. Legal documentation would indeed be a good place to look for the spelling!


Emmett wrote: "If anyone is in the mood to hit their head against a wall, translate "near" and "far" into Thai on google translate and listen to them."

Aaagh! Maddening indeed :D (Especially in writing!) A fine example to demonstrate the difference in those tones, tho! Thank you. (I love, how the actual sounds seem to express the distance! Seems very logical in relation to each other).

[V.M.]

Jemppu wrote: "Ah. Here it is... //

Speaking of the Japanese reading concept (of one character representing a 'meaning' with different readings depending on the context): same principle is in use in several lang..."

You mention 9/11 vs 911. That makes me think of the different way the US and Europe show dates. The US puts the month first, while Europe puts the day first. So your example 9/11 would mean 11th September in the US, but 9th November in Europe. Therefore, it's important to know if we're dealing with the US or Europe, or it could be disastrous.