BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound

Subject: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Dec 07 - 03:07 PM

well..there is now a site that gives the pronunciation of English word & phrases.. http://www.howjsay.com/, with instant sound.

It IS done from a Brit perspective, but they do recognize that alternatives exist...*grin* I tried it on aluminium/aluminum and you can almost hear the disdain for 'aluminum' in the speakers voice....but I have to say, the site is VERY well done and could be much help to non-English speakers who want to practice.

These disclaimers are priceless!
"Where alternative pronunciations are given, they are either
a widely used World English alternative (Eg "cóntroversy" versus "contróversy"). In these cases the first alternative has the status of being the recommended one, on the basis of its having the widest acceptance globally or...etc...."

"Some people are quite passionate about the pronunciation of, for example, "contróversy". But it is our task here to record the sounds of current educated English rather than to prescribe them. The fact is that the American "cóntroversy" now enjoys wide acceptance throughout the English-speaking world (not least perhaps due to the phonologically seditious work of CNN), and so it is our duty, however sombre, or indeed somber, to offer it as an alternative to "contróversy". It is of such stiff stuff that the upper lip of the British phonetician should be fashioned, giving short shrift to chauvinism."

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: katlaughing
Date: 10 Dec 07 - 03:20 PM

Well, drat! Tried loading it and it said it was not available at the moment. Sounds like a lot of fun. You're right the disclaimers are BRILL!:-)

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 10:02 AM

It's working fine as I type...


(I think I need to learn to create more provocative thread titles....*wry grin*)

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 10:10 AM

Despite the claim that they give the US pronunciation (even if second in order) I notice that the common word "can't" is given only as "cahhn't". Far and few, far and few are the Americans who say "cahhn't".

Interesting, though.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 11:13 AM

Hey! It worked this time. What fun! I could get lost in there for ages. I love learning the different ways of pronouncing words.

Thanks, Bill!

(Alternative thread title: Get your tongue around this!?)

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 11:34 AM

LOL! Yeah...that oughta do it, Kat! I guess I'm too formal.

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 11:38 AM

and yes, Dave..."cahnt" does show the bias of the site's creators. They try, but there are just areas where they "cahnt bear" to hear it any other way.

It emphasizes the old line.."two countries divided by a common language."

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: s&r
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 05:55 PM

Many years ago I was taught that controversy with the stress on the first syllable was preferred (UK)

Stu

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 06:05 PM

Really? That's the only way I have EVER heard it in the US...perhaps some sort of international consensus is being achieved.

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Rowan
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 06:38 PM

Consensus across the north Atlantic pond perhaps, but not yet the Pacific.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Jeanie
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 04:32 AM

Thanks for the link to the website, Bill.

There's a very interesting article here: 'Whatever Happened to Received Pronunication ?' written by Professor John Wells of the Department of Phonetics & Linguists, University College, London, discussing the changes that have taken place in what is/was sometimes called standard or "BBC English" over the 20th century, and the implications of these changes on broadcasting and on the teaching of English.

As far as broadcasting and performance are concerned, I think it's good that attitudes about accent have changed, provided that whichever accent a person is speaking in, it is clear and well enunciated. The only thing I do find disconcerting is when, in a play, a group of actors who are apparently - according to the storyline - all from the same family, but are speaking in very distinct and different regional accents from each other. This summer's touring production of 'Romeo & Juliet' from the Globe had a Romeo with a very marked Glaswegian accent, although none of the other Montagu family spoke that way - and although he played the part wonderfully, it took me a while to set the difference in accent to one side.

- jeanie

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: clueless don
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 09:50 AM

Tried the website for "bogle", but it said that the closest entry it had was "ogle". I've been trying to find the pronunciation of bogle (Scottish word for ghost, essentially) - does the first syllable rhyme with "bow", as in bow and arrow (or George Goble - anybody remember him)? or is it pronounced like "boggle"?

Looks like a useful site even so.

Don

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Amos
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 10:49 AM

While wearing his infared goggles
The ghost-buster's mind was quite boggled!
Just outside the nursery,
Despite controversy,
He swears he saw Queen Mary's bogle!


A

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Rowan
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 07:29 PM

As was commonly said in bushwalking circles

The mind boggles,
the intellect reels,
the imagination staggers;
the bladder dribbles!

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 09:35 PM

Bogle pronounced bow-gle, Scottish for goblin, ghost or phantom; in print in 1500. The OED says its use by Walter Scott, Burns, etc., has introduced it into English usage. Also seen as bogy or boggle. Included in Webster's Intercollegiate Dictionary.

The OED has contro'versy.The reason is that the word is borrowed from the French, controversie.

The site is interesting, but there is no way that it could cover all of the words in the Oxford English Dictionary (some 20 volumes, but also available in a reduced size edition which requires a lens to read). The 1991 micrographic edition on sale at Amazon for $251.97.
The cd-rom version $230. It has good coverage of Scottish, etc.

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: HouseCat
Date: 13 Dec 07 - 11:18 AM

In regards to the pronunciation of "can't" versus "cahn't", if you come down South in the States you're very likely to hear "cain't".

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Bill D
Date: 13 Dec 07 - 05:33 PM

As in "Ah cain't hep how I talk...hit's how Ah was brung up an' y'all cain jes' live wid it!"

Which tells us something about other aspects of large segments of Southern culture.

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: clueless don
Date: 14 Dec 07 - 09:35 AM

I appreciate the responses indicating the pronunciation of "bogle", except that the advice differs! The poem posted by Amos on 12 Dec 07 - 10:49 AM implies that it is pronounced like the word "boggle", whereas Q on 12 Dec 07 - 09:35 PM indicates that the first syllable is pronunced "bow", as in bow and arrow.

My daughter is a storyteller, and she is considering learning a story, set in Scotland, called "The House that Lacked a Bogle". I am hoping to help her with the pronunciation.

Don

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: maeve
Date: 14 Dec 07 - 10:08 AM

I've only heard it as "bow", as said by Scots storytellers.

maeve

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Bill D
Date: 14 Dec 07 - 11:36 AM

Is there a connection the the word "boogie/boogy man"? I remember hearing that as a child, as something that might 'get' me in a dark closet.

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 14 Dec 07 - 02:32 PM

'bow'gle, in Oxford English Dictionary and in Webster's Intercollegiate Dictionary.
boogeyman is a corruption of bogeyman (a rather late word; in print 1890s and usu. bogy in UK).

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Rowan
Date: 14 Dec 07 - 10:48 PM

bogeyman (a rather late word; in print 1890s and usu. bogy in UK)

Puckoon's famous line takes on new meaning.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: katlaughing
Date: 14 Dec 07 - 11:18 PM

I've always seen it spelled "bogeyman" and for both it and bogle I've always heard it as bow-gull...as in Eric Bogle..:-)

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Jeanie
Date: 15 Dec 07 - 08:49 AM

Regarding the origin of "bogle", I have also seen it linked to Welsh.
I came across it in lines spoken by Hermione in Shakespeare's "The Winter's Tale" : "Sir, spare your threats. The bug which you would fright me with, I seek", where the footnotes describe "bug" as "bugbear" and "bogey", giving the origin as obsolete Welsh bwg, meaning ghost, hobgoblin, with the modern Welsh bwgan.

I believe scarecrows are sometimes known in Scotland as "tatty bogles" ?

- jeanie

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 15 Dec 07 - 09:50 AM

When people say it sounds like 'bow' is that 'bow' as in 'bow wow' or 'bow' as in 'bow and arrow'?

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Bill D
Date: 15 Dec 07 - 10:36 AM

you mean like in 'bough' or like in 'beau'?

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Dec 07 - 01:58 PM

Bough? Doesn't that rhyme with lough? Beau? Neau!

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 15 Dec 07 - 02:11 PM

JTT, as you and Bill D infer, trying to indicate sound merely by using other words that have a 'similar' sound is not very sucessful. That is why most dictionaries use symbols for phonetic sounds.
We may have learned one of these schemes in school, but they are easily forgotten, and html doesn't help to reproduce them in a post.

For the sound wanted here, Webster's uses bo, with a macron (little dash) above the o. Unfortunately, this is hard to reproduce in a post. Words using this convention for the sound are beau (but not in the south where it may become 'bew-fort' in Beaufort), bogle (ghost), bow (as in a hairbow or bow and arrow but not as in the bow of a ship or a curtsey)---, etc. etc. etc.

The Oxford I have also uses bo with a macron over the italicized o.

Gates and the other wizards who devise computer programs, being short on literacy, have not considered these problems.

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 16 Dec 07 - 10:08 AM

Well, they may have considered these problems, but they've not dealt with them.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 16 Dec 07 - 03:22 PM

You think so? Their language is confined to basic English, with the exception of computerese.

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: clueless don
Date: 17 Dec 07 - 10:08 AM

The consensus seems to be that the first syllable of "bogle" is pronounced as in bow and arrow - i.e. with a long O sound. Thanks to everyone who weighed in!

Don

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Mr Happy
Date: 19 Dec 07 - 07:07 AM

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=KH_kOjsXakM&feature=dir

Subject: RE: BS: howjasay- phonetic pronunciation w/sound
From: Bill D
Date: 19 Dec 07 - 10:53 AM

But....there were no subtitles!

'Ow'm oi 'sposed to wartch zutch tarkin' wiffout nae 'elp, then, I arsk ye, maite?
(that was as bad as some of the video 'help' these guys offer.)

(try this one)

Tis truly amazing that we communicate at all.