The L.A. Dodgers (as well as the eliminated Taiwan team in the World Baseball Classic) have a pitcher named Hong-Chih Kuo.
When he made his major league debut, we were told to pronounce the first name as if it started with an English language “K”.
But the announcers on ESPN, who presumably got a pronunciation guide from someone in Taiwan pronounced “Kuo” like “Go”.
What would be the best approximation?
Here’s the pinyin for his name: Gūo Hóngzhì. I’m out of practice and someone will likely come and correct me, but I believe that (ignoring tones) would be pronounced something like Gwa Hong Jer.
That’s about right. I’d say that the best approximate pronounciation would be something like: Gwoh Hoong-jer. Typically, in the Taiwanese transliteration system (which I think is Wade-Giles), the “k” in “kuo” would be pronounced as “guo” while the “k” in “k’uo” (with the apostrophe) is pronounced as a regular “k” sound. Unfortunately, most people don’t use the apostrophes when they transliterate their names, so it’s difficult to tell.
Yes, and most people don’t know the significance of apostrophe/no apostrophe in Wade-Giles so they’d pronounce it as in English anyway.
Try Goo-aw Hoeng Zh.
That’s as far as you can go without throwing in IPA or actual pinyin.
Assuming this is mandarin we’re talking about, of course.