BS: BBC America and names

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 12 Sep 12 - 05:53 PM

Jokavitz plays Humoreski

What does the man on the street in Blighty call Djokovic?
Perhaps one in a thousand is Serbian and would call him JOCKovich.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Bill D
Date: 12 Sep 12 - 11:28 AM

My Italian wife says it's "pahst-a"... no 'W' sound, but not 'paasta'....

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Mr Happy
Date: 12 Sep 12 - 04:58 AM

I'm in UK & I've never heard anyone say 'pot -art- oes'

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 12 Sep 12 - 01:30 AM

Why do the Americans think that the name of one of the world's top tennis players is a joke? ~~ nobody else calls him

Joke-ah-vitz

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Ross Campbell
Date: 11 Sep 12 - 08:53 PM

It would be simpler if British restaurants served water as a matter of course, as American eating places (used to?) do. The fact that you still have to ask is ridiculous.

Ross

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 11 Sep 12 - 06:14 PM

Heck, I still haven't become used to the way many Americans say pasta. Its pasta, past-a. Not Pauwsta! Look at the word. See how it is spelled!! I blame Julia Child. Just because she was the first person you ever saw who could cook anything but meat and potahtoes it doesn't mean you have to talk like her.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Sep 12 - 05:55 PM

We (not all 300,000,00 of us... but..) often DO say something like "ornge". That's an easy one to slur.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 11 Sep 12 - 05:09 PM

St. John's, Newfoundland, chartered by Sir Humphrey Gilbert in 1583; seasonal settlements ca. 1520;[2] informal year-round settlers before 1620.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 11 Sep 12 - 01:00 PM

The sound of orange often is close to 'ornge', the 'a' is given short shrift. In Canada also.

Digression:
Naranja, is Spanish for orange, from Arabic Naranj. Kids often say something that sounds like "nornge."
(naranjo means an orange tree, but in slang, it means an ignoramus, a 'noodle').

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Mr Happy
Date: 11 Sep 12 - 12:22 PM

There's currently an ad on UK TV channels with some Americans talking about oranges.

The way they say it sounds like 'ornges' to me!

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Allan Conn
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 07:11 PM

"it is not common for women to shorten the name to one which means "boy" in Scots."

Tam means boy? That's a new one on me!

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 06:53 PM

I've heard both Tamaras.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: gnu
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 05:29 PM

Water, fer fuck sake. Ya wanna tip, get me a drink a fuckin water. Ya don't speak English? Let me spell it... w a t e r. There ain't no fuckin O in wAter and there ain't no fuckin AH in ER. Jesus H Christ! YOU guys WROTE the fuckin language and YOU can't fuckin pronounce it? What the fuck is that?

Somehow, tho, I don't believe that would have helped. Tho, ya just wanna say it, eh?

Try... my I ave some aitch 2 ow in a glahhhss?

Yeah... it's just pissin. But if Bill's wife had that much of a problen getting a quaff there is sommat wrong wif tha staff eh wha?

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Jack Campin
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 04:58 PM

Well well well. These Georgians are singing the name as "TAM-er-a".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuY0I7IyUlA

Maybe they have different pronunciations of it there too.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 03:53 PM

I know a Ta-mar'-a in Texas; no Tam'-er-a.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 02:40 PM

Tamara rhymes with Camera? You aren't likely to find anyone pronounce it that way in England, or I suspect anywhere outside America.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 01:46 PM

You may be trying too hard.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 01:36 PM

I went to school in southeast Virginia with 5 other Tamaras (rhymes with camera) and in central Virginia had a Biology professor from the midwest with same pronunciation.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 12:42 PM

I have tried pronouncing 'panda attack' with a glotal stop (see Jack Campin, above), but I can't manage it. I am very familiar with the glottal stop, and became used to using it in Hawai'i (common in Polynesian languages as well as Turkish, etc.); I pronounce panda attack with a short hiatus, but have to "wind up" and make a face when I try those words with a glottal stop.

As I said, we must speak different "dialects."

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 10:00 AM

As far as I can tell - and would expect - "Obama" is pronounced more or less the same everywhere, except that people with strong Southern accents will nasalize the central "a" (because it's followed by an "m").

The difference probably wouldn't register unless you're listening closely.

The stressed "a" in "Obama," of course, sounds like "ah," unlike the one in "Alabama" (which is like the one in "hat").

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Jack Campin
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 09:55 AM

Isn't "Tamara" Georgian?

My Georgian neighbour over the road pronounces her name the usual British way, ta-MA-ra. I didn't realize until just now that anybody rhymed it with "camera".

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 09:28 AM

I have learned, living in the UK, to use my singing pronunciation of the letter t in the middle of words in order to make myself more easily understood. No more diddo (ditto)and dayda (data) and wahteh for warder (water).

I have even given up on my own given name in this country as even when I introduce and correct several times, people still pronounce my name a timahra instead or Tamara (rhymes with camera). I now introduce myself as simply Tam which often gets a bit of argument because it is not common for women to shorten the name to one which means "boy" in Scots.

I give up.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Jack Campin
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 05:24 AM

As I pronounce , "the ear" has no glottal stop - instead there is a barely perceptible "y" in the gap. But "panda attack" does have a glottal stop. (That sort of differentiation is made more explicitly in Turkish, where the "soft g" letter has two distinct recognized pronunciations depending on whether it occurs between front or back vowels).

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Howard Jones
Date: 01 Sep 12 - 03:28 AM

The pronunciations the OP is complaining about look like regional accents to me. Surely the same thing happens in the US? Is "Obama" pronounced exactly the same way in New Jersey and New Orleans?

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 08:49 PM

I guess we speak different dialects. I don't run the words together (McGrath examples), but no glottal stop, just a pause between the words when I 'enunciate'.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 05:11 PM

That's my story, and I'm sticking with it and with Eliza.

In a "careful" enunciation of "panda attack," the way they're most likely to do it on the news, there is both a pause (hiatus) and a glottal stop. Just say "attack," out loud, all by itself. It's difficult to do without the initial stop, and if you omit it you may sound like you're about to expire.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 04:47 PM

And obviously some Scots have no sense of humo(u)r.

http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/hiatus
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/glottal%2Bstop?q=glottal+stop

Hiatus
..."a pause or break in continuity in a sequence or activity:
Prosody and grammar- a break between two vowels coming together but not in the same syllable, as in the ear and cooporate.

Glottal stop
"a consonant formed by the audible release of the airstream after complete closure of the glottis. It is widespread in some non-standard English accents and in some other languages, such as Arabic, it is a standard consonant."

In Hawai'i, designated by ' (as previously posted).

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 04:06 PM

Many people would pronounce it "pandratak". Or even "panratak". It's amazing we can understand each other so much of the time.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Bill D
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 03:53 PM

I just practiced saying 'uh...uh' as if they were the end of 'panda' and beginning of 'attack'. I can detect no glottal closure at at all.

On the other hand, there can easily be a glo'l in 'glottal.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 03:45 PM

Some people may have a hiatus. Others may have a glottal stop. Scots speech is peculiar to Scotland, English speech is peculiar to England, and Q's speech is peculiar to Q (check up 'idiolect').

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 02:44 PM

The glottis shouldn't close between panda and attack. There is a small hiatus between the words.

(Of course Scots speech is peculiar to say the least. I remember asking for directions from the people at the next table when I was in Edinburgh. The dialect of many is difficult).

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 02:18 PM

Sorry but I do know what I'm talking about. The glottis forms a closure in between panda and attack. The Professor at Edinburgh Uni who taught us explained all this quite clearly. Glottal stops (and in fact any other sounds, eg devoicing or other closures) occur as speech flows, not always just between words.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 02:12 PM

Folks, please learn the difference between hiatus and glottal stop- see MtheGM post.

Having had to read much scientific German in connection with my work, I am well aware of the compound words, but their pronunciation has nothing to do with glottal stops.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 09:37 AM

Try saying "panda attack" with and without the glottal stop. You'll hear and feel the difference.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Jack Campin
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 07:19 AM

The glottal stop is there whether you see it as ending the first word, starting the second or floating between them.

Word boundaries are often arbitrary. There are phrases in English which translate word-for-word into long compound words in German. The breaks between the component words are no more audible in English; it's purely a spelling convention that English writes these phrases with spaces and German doesn't.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 07:17 AM

The stop in 'panda attack' [Eliza's example above] is a hiatus rather than a glottal stop. It sometimes gives rise to an intrusive r ['panda-r-attack'], which many, including me, dislike ~~ though it might be perhaps defended as analogous to the correctly used t in French 'y a-t-il?' - on the analogy presumably of 'il est' - 'est-il?'. No-one would object to the r being heard in 'particular occasion'; so a similar sound is introduced as a bridge, although not there in the spelling: as is approved usage in the French example above.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 07:03 AM

A glottal stop is an interruption. Between an ended word and an unstarted word there is no such.

To quote: -

"Its manner of articulation is occlusive"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glottal_stop

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 05:46 AM

Eliza's example contains a glottal stop between two words - just because it's between "properly completed words" doesn't negate its existence.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 04:21 AM

Those are within the words - in that they replace part of the word.   Eliza's first example was allegedly of glottal stops between properly completed words.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 03:17 AM

I disagree, Q. Glottal stops can occur anywhere. I remember my sister saying, over half a century ago:

"I go'a ge my pe'icoa' on'"

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Mike in Brunswick
Date: 31 Aug 12 - 12:30 AM

I knew a woman from Atlanta who pronounced a certain New England state Mass a TU setts.

Mike

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 30 Aug 12 - 08:47 PM

Glottal stops are within words, such as O'ahu and Hawai'i.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 30 Aug 12 - 05:08 PM

Eliza, I disagree. One word ends, the sound dies, another begins. There is no glottal stop in the examples you have given.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 30 Aug 12 - 04:19 PM

Q, sounds like a Bristol accent to me. They stick an 'r' on the end of many words where there isn't one!

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 30 Aug 12 - 04:14 PM

The only person I remember who said warter was a colleague from England. He also said Alabamer and generally added an 'r' to any word ending in 'a'. He was a graduate of Sheffield University, but I don't know if he came from that area.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 30 Aug 12 - 04:00 PM

My impression is that trying to pronounce foreign names in the way the foreigners would pronounce them is seen as a bit unpatriotic by some people, especially in the States. That can be true in the UK, but more typically attempting the foreign pronunciation is seen as the better thing to do, not so much as a matter of courtesy, but as a way of showing off - "I've been abroad you know..."

Americans don't seem to do it that way.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: katlaughing
Date: 30 Aug 12 - 03:22 PM

I've noticed another one on some of the BBC detective shows we watch: "seconded" to describe a temp. assignment of one cop to another "patch" than their own. Over here we would say SEC un dud. On the shows, it is seh CON did.

The "r" in wash, etc. came to Colorado from the South, as far as i know. Some of my family still pronounce it "warsh." Water has always been wah-ter.

I hear you, Bill. Drove me nuts when we first moved back to CO. No one broadcaster knew how to pronounce place names and proper names from our past, i.e Ouray is a town named after an Ute chief. It is supposed to be "you RAY" but they all say "OO ray" or somesuch. Likewise Montrose..they say MON (full stop) trose, whereas we would say mawn TROSE.

With the oil boom, there are a lot of places which get mangled in pronunciation such as Piceance Creek which we pronounce "pee ANTS Crick."

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: GUEST,wyrdolafr
Date: 30 Aug 12 - 03:16 PM

oops, that was me above.

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Aug 12 - 03:13 PM

Regarding Elizabethan accents, this Open University clip on 'Shakespearean' accents and writing is an interesting and informative 10 minutes.

Makes sense to me, much stronger 'regional' influences, less 'R.P.' influence &c. backed-up with contemporary evidence.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPlpphT7n9s

Subject: RE: BS: BBC America and names
From: Bill D
Date: 30 Aug 12 - 02:36 PM

Well... that howjsay page is fairly accurate about a 'standard' (or 'fairly' common) pronunciation. But I hope no one takes it as universal for either version. I hear the 't' form as often as the 'd' here. I just almost never hear the 'wor-duh' and its cousins that seem to be fairly common in the UK.

And lor' lov a duck... they DO say Nic-uh-rag-u-a.

Interesting--- they give CON-tro-versy as the preferred version *worldwide", rather than the con-TROV-ersy I hear on BBC. That seems to be quite a point of contention in some places. That one makes no difference to me... it is a matter of local acceptance and not a proper name.