“Pah-stah” and “tah-ko” are not much better than the British “pass-ta” and “tacko” - the correct pronunciations are somewhere in between. I’ve noticed a tendency among Americans to pronounce all foreign 'a’s as if they were ‘ah’, for example the “Kahn” (Cannes) Film Festival, when the correct French pronunciation is very close to English “Can”.
r_k, I like this little limerick, but aside from its Menzie cleverness, it shows that in English, at least, the vowel “a” has no one particular sound, so why should anyone presume that vowels in other languages have the same singular sound?
Does wasp rhyme with gasp to any native English speaker?
Mucked up with the copying and pasting there, sorry about that.
Oh, and now I see that I am agreeing with Usram
Excellent.
Actually, they say “pass-ter”.
And then there’s the really dimwitted one:
“jag-yoo-arr”.
Both Americans and Brits mangle foreign pronunciations, but not surprisingly, Americans have a better handle on Spanish pronunciation, while most Brits have enough French to make a reasonable attempt there.
I think the Nicaragua example is a good one- I know that’s how it’s pronounced by native speakers, but there’s no way I’m going to say ‘Neehaarahwaa’ to indicate that country without being laughed out of the room. Similarly, I don’t bother pronouncing the name of the French carmaker Renault correctly (with a neutral ‘e’- it should sound almost like ‘Ruh-no’, not ‘Reh-no’) because nobody gives a shit this side of the channel.
Making youself understood to the local population is more important than protecting the lingustic sensibilities of speakers of the foreign tongue. Furthermore, you’re on a hiding to nothing, because even if your pronunciation is closer to the original, it still won’t be spot on- I can’t pronounce the ‘R’ of Renault well enough to pass muster with a Frenchman anyway, so there’s no justification in my getting snooty!
We don’t “go out of our way to pronounce foreign words incorrectly” at all. Rather, we don’t go out of our way to pronounce common English words of foreign origin in the way that we think a native speaker of a foreign language might pronounce them. And there’s no reason why we should, either – who made a rule that we have to pronounce Italian words as an Italian-speaker would, or Spanish words as a Spanish-speaker? And which pronunciation should we use? Mexican? Castillian?
You know what the Italian is for steak? “Biftek”. Derived from the English “beef steak”. You think they make any effort to pronounce it as an Englishman would? Or an American? They don’t even spell it properly. And why should they? It’s their language, they get to do what they like with it.
English is full of words which originally came from other languages. Something like half the most commonly used words in the language come from Norman French – should we pronounce all of those as the French would?
It’s really not a matter of correctness, but it’s curious nonetheless. The OP specifically mentions words with a flat a where Americans would use a broad a. This is particularly striking because the usual pattern is quite the reverse; broad as abound in British usage, while American speech tends toward the flat version. Other examples of the type in the OP: aqua, Wotan, Valhalla, and wigwam.
I haven’t turned up anything that shows how this came about, but it’s not surprising that different regions have different pronunciation preferences . A discussion at Bartleby includes a quote by Joseph Emerson Worcester, the nineteenth century New England lexicographer: “To pronounce the words fast, last, glass, grass, dance, etc.,” he said, “with the proper sound of short a, as in hat, has the appearance of affectation; and to pronounce them with the full Italian sound of a, as in part, father, seems to border on vulgarism.”
And ** Dogface**, I really don’t think it’s right to call any regional variant “dimwitted”.
I had to move away from St. Louis to discover that anyone ever pronounced it like that.
There are some people, apparently, but I suspect it’s like people who say " 'Nited States 'v Muraka"
And, in fact, there is a manufacturer of zone valves for boilers by the name of “Taco”, which is pronounced “tay-ko”.
The one that grates on my ears, Brit-wise, is the pronounciation of Nicaragua. Brits say “Nicker-ag-you-ah”, which is not even in the ballpark. Americans say “Nicker-ah-gwah”, which is still not correct from a Spanish language viewpoint, but much closer.
This reminds me of Waco and Waco. The city in Texas is pronounced “WAY-ko”. The airplane manufacturer is pronounced “WAH-ko”.
I do. :shrug:
As a Spanish-speaker, I usually giggle a bit when I hear British people saying Spanish words. But one thing I have noticed is that some British people do use the Castillian ‘th’ sound when pronouncing z’s and soft c’s. Perhaps some of the pronunciations of “Ibiza” and “chorizo” reflect that.
As am Aussie here on the sidelines, I’ve always gotten the impression that Americans tend to mangle foreign words more than the Brits (with exceptions, such as Spanish words). An it’s not through ignorance, either. Americans often seem to make a point of doing this. Not judging here; just my observations.
As for “Menzies”, because a very famous former Australian Prime Minister of that name pronounced it “Men-zeez”, I didn’t know there was a “correct” way of saying it. I was surprised when I saw an ABC (Australia) newsreader’s name in print, and that it was Menzies. He always signed off on the radio as “Mingis”.
SMYTHE. “Smith”, or “Smythe” (rhymes with “writhe”)?
The strange thing about this is that here and now, it is the long “a” (as in “father”) that would sound affected in words like “fast”, etc.
I notice that “bruschetta” always seems to be pronounced “brushetta” - possibly because when people see “sch” in a word they pronounce it as if it were German.
I’m all in favour of people adapting foreign words to the phonology of their own language. I don’t think it’s appropriate to try to replicate the Spanish pronunciation of Nicaragua, or the French pronunciation of Renault when speaking English.
What about “Porsche”? Many English-speakers pronounce it “porsh”; but it’s a surname, and the Porsche family pronounce it “por-shuh”. I think it is appropriate to pronounce it the way the it’s supposed to be pronounced. Why would Renault be any different?
I have no problem with people saying “por-shuh” - it uses only sounds that exist in English. I never said people should pronounce foreign words according to English spelling rules. But to pronounce “Renault” in the French manner, you would have to use sounds that don’t exist in English.
As a native of the Free State, I can advise you that many of my fellow residents, especially those born in our largest city, pronounce it “Merlin.” (BTW, that city: Bawlamer.)
However, most other Americans pronounce it correctly: MARE-i-lund.
I always find it amusing that my British friends, from places like Leicester or Worcester, assume we Americans pronounce this state as if it were a religious theme park: Mary-Land.
This seems to be the place to ask about this:
Why do Brits pronounce Richard Strauss’ Don Juan Don Jew-an? Yes, it looks like that, but this seems like a pointed refusal to pronounce a foreign word.
And what about Jag-ew-ar?
They also say “jun-ta” instead of “hoon-ta”.
Relevant Anectdote:
The first week on the job at a consulting firm, I’m having lunch in the breakroom with two other new hires, both new to the area. One is a native east Texan, the other is from England and of Indian extraction. The discussion turns to how they were quickly stocking their freezers with conveineince foods, when the Texan mentions a frozen-veggie-and-meat-in-a-bag product called “Chicken Voila!”
Of course, what she said was “Chicken Wallah.”
Confused, our British coworker asks “What’s Wallah?” Which elicited a confused look from the Texan, who explained that it’s not a preparation style, but an expression roughly equal to “ta-da.”
Being knowledgable about French (16 semester hours worth, anyhow) I could have corrected or clarified, but I didn’t want to embarass the Texan…she was pretty cute.
Also: Hereabouts, “Renault” is gonna be pronounced “Ren-alt” about 80% of the time. And even though we’re well-nigh saturated with spanish-speaking cultures, Pedernales is Per-duh-nal-ez, Menchaca is Man-shack and San Jacinto is San Juh-sinto (well, cuz “we” won that one…)