Re: Let Me Introduce Myself

Can someone confirm what the Japanese pronunciation is?  Here in Israel,
I've seen it alleged (on Internet sites) that the word is pronounced
"sunami."  Hebrew has a letter for the sound "ts" which often occurs at
the beginning of words so I don't think any Hebrew speaker is going to
find it hard to say tsunami.



> -----Original Message-----
> From: Constructed Languages List
> [mailto:CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU] On Behalf Of Tristan McLeay
> Sent: Saturday, January 01, 2005 7:34 AM
> To: CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU
> Subject: Re: Let me introduce myself
>
>
> On 1 Jan 2005, at 3.12 pm, Ph. D. wrote:
>
> > Local newscasters here seem to pronounce "tsunami" as
> > though the |t| is silent. I don't seem to have trouble
> pronouncing all
> > the letters. Is this the normal pronunciation in English? Should I
> > even care?
>
> Normal English pronunciations of words beginning with
> unenglish affricatives convert them to fricatives. German
> words/names beginning with <Pf> are usually pronounced /f/
> (I'm aware of the current discussion and don't mean to say
> this is universal amongst English speakers either); words
> beginning with a foreign /ts/ are pronounced as either /z/
> (zeitgeist, tsar) or /s/ (tsunami) in English. Words like
> tsunami and tzaziki (a cucumber and yoghurt dip, I believe)
> can get a /ts/, though.
>
> I used to pronounce 'Mitsubishi' as /mItSubIsi/ when I was
> younger (until I eventually got my tongue around the /ts/),
> and I still often pronounce schnitzel as /snItS@l/.
>
> Caring about this seems a waste of energy, so I wouldn't be bothered.
>
> #include standard disclaimer
>
> --
> Tristan.
>