Re: OT: code-switching (was: Re: new Klingon spelling)

--- Mark J. Reed skrzypszy

>> To me, it sounds pretentious/snobbish - and in many cases is
>> incomprehensible - when, in the middle of normal unaccented idiomatic
>> English, someone (<koff>Trebek</koff>) breaks into another language's
>> phonology just to pronounce the name of a country where that language
>> is spoken.
As if there is nothing between breaking into your own phonology and still
pronouncing a name correctly!
One of the first things we were taught after I started studying at the
Institute for East European Studies, was the following:

Never be over-correct in your pronunciation of Russian names! For exactly
the reasons you mention: it sounds pretentious and snobbish and gives the
discipline a bad reputation. However, pronounce it as correctly as the
framework of your own phonology would allow you, without pretending fake
ignorance.

For example, the name Gorbachev sounds like [g@rb@'tSOv] in Russian. The
best way to pronounce it in Dutch would be [gOrbA'tsjOv]; with stress on
the last syllable (which would not violate our phonology in any way),
unlike some politicians and news-readers who tended to put stress on the
first and sometimes on the second syllable.

However, the way the name of the Polish president Wal\e,sa used to be
pronounced, [va'lesa] crossed the line, as the Polish pronunciation is
clearly [va'wEnsa].

Jan

Reply