Pronunciation Nazi?

[Incog Neato]

dmiessler.com/blog/this-is-how-you-pronounce-ubuntu
This is definitely a kind of personality quirk!

The fact is that Ubuntu is a foreign word. Like many non-English words, the pronunication can change or, at least, become popularized to be pronounced in a certain, English-exclusive way.

I mean, look at karaoke. It's Care-ree-oh-kee in English but in Japanese, it's roughly kah-rah-oh-keh. In Hong Kong/Cantonese, it's roughly kah-lah-oh-kay.

So, in this case, which one is right? :P

[Kimimi]

Depends on the word in my opinion - karaoke has been widely accepted as a proper word in English, so I think pronouncing that in a non-Japanese way is fine. For words that are of foreign origin and don't have a particular meaning in English (for example, "Suikoden") I'd say only the original native pronunciation is correct.

[Skeletore has a boner]

There is no such thing as "correct" pronounciation. That is called prescriptive grammar, rules enforced by "Authority" within the same language.

As soon as you cross the language boundry you automatically enter into descriptive grammar.

In descriptive grammar, if you say a word or phrase, and the listener understands it, you have completed a successful linguistic exchange, and are as "correct" as anyone who says it differently.

The differences in pronounciations arises from differences in sound inventories. Each language and it's various dialects have an inventory of sounds they commonly use.

When presented with a foreign sound, their brain naturally substitutes sounds not in their inventory with the closest approximation(ex: there is no "th" sound in French and they substitute it with Ze, "I love ze breads!"), this is subconsious and beyond the speaker's control they physically cannot pronounce it the same way without first expanding their sound inventory(which typically doesn't happen till near-fluency or a lot of practice for one or two *specific* words).

Anyways, descriptive grammar always trumps prescriptive grammar.



Edit:

I also want to point out the inherit hypocrisy of grammar nazis =).
When you correct someone's pronounciation, spelling, etc you are making an *assertion* that you understood what they *intended* to say.
Once you make that assertion you have also asserted that a successful linguistic exchange has taken place, at which point, if you "correct" them... you're wrong, cause you just self-owned yourself

[Incog Neato]

Sept 27, 2008 8:53:46 GMT -5 Skeletore has a boner said:

There is no such thing as "correct" pronounciation. That is called prescriptive grammar, rules enforced by "Authority" within the same language.

Bwahaha! The spelling Nazi strikes! It's written as "pronunciation"! XD Ooh, I spot a "it's" too!

Nyuk nyuk nyuk~! :B

Seriously, though. I usually just go with either the first pronunciation I hear (like for the "xeno" in Xenogears/Xenosaga, I say Zeh-noh cuz the katakana is written as such XD) or what I feel comfortable with. I think it's silly to argue over the way Ubuntu is "supposed" to be pronounced.

I actually like it as "Oo-bun-too". :D

[Justin]

Pronunciation is different everywhere, especially compared to Canada and the lower states. Listening to Retronauts is always a blast because they really ignore syllables, and Japanese game names sound so different coming from their mouths.

[Yakra]

I can sometimes get halfway psychotic over bad pronunciations. :'D Very obvious bad pronunciations that is! (That makes me... a half-hearted pronunciation Nazi?)

For me, the right pronunciation of any word would be the way it is pronounced in its actual native language? Er... I can't exactly describe very well what exactly would be the 'perfect' pronunciation, since even the natives have different accents buuut... I believe its the way certain core individuals speak that language. 'The true speakers of the language'.

...ah... that makes no sense. I'm explaining very badly. (Its kind of like how over here, hindustanis are considered to speak Urdu in the 'best' way. They never speak the gibberish I sprout out.)

Sooooo... while I can kind of understand and relate to darusgrey's explanation, I don't think 'as long as you can understand that pronunciation stands' works for some words. Words like Ubuntu should be pronounced the way they are in the language they are from! (Another example of this is how English speakers call Pappar 'Papadum'. X( Or... 'Pappad' . Its not Papadum or Pappad! Pappar I say!)

[Oh... incase anyone wants to know what on earth I'm babbling on about... Pappar!]

Well... um... its kind of like if someone comes up to you and calls Ys 'Why-z'! Or Y S! Wrong, I say!



For all my correct pronunciation ranting though, I usually end up saying things the way I heard them being said the first time. :'D So, yip, I probably say things pretty badly! XD

[Skeletore has a boner]

Sept 27, 2008 12:21:24 GMT -5 Yakra said:

I can sometimes get halfway psychotic over bad pronunciations. :'D Very obvious bad pronunciations that is! (That makes me... a half-hearted pronunciation Nazi?)

For me, the right pronunciation of any word would be the way it is pronounced in its actual native language? Er... I can't exactly describe very well what exactly would be the 'perfect' pronunciation, since even the natives have different accents buuut... I believe its the way certain core individuals speak that language. 'The true speakers of the language'.

...ah... that makes no sense. I'm explaining very badly. (Its kind of like how over here, hindustanis are considered to speak Urdu in the 'best' way. They never speak the gibberish I sprout out.)

Sooooo... while I can kind of understand and relate to darusgrey's explanation, I don't think 'as long as you can understand that pronunciation stands' works for some words. Words like Ubuntu should be pronounced the way they are in the language they are from! (Another example of this is how English speakers call Pappar 'Papadum'. X( Or... 'Pappad' . Its not Papadum or Pappad! Pappar I say!)

[Oh... incase anyone wants to know what on earth I'm babbling on about... Pappar!]

Well... um... its kind of like if someone comes up to you and calls Ys 'Why-z'! Or Y S! Wrong, I say!



For all my correct pronunciation ranting though, I usually end up saying things the way I heard them being said the first time. :'D So, yip, I probably say things pretty badly! XD

It works for all words, everywhere. No exceptions. If the listener understands you, a successful linguistic transaction has taken place. If he does not understand, than you spoke in an ungrammatical way(ungrammatical in terms of descriptive grammar).

As I explained about sound inventories, it's actually impossible for people to pronounce foreign words, and they will substitute the appropriate sound from their own inventory to replace ones they can't perceive. They don't even realize they're doing it.

People can expand their sound inventories but very few ever do.

Expecting foreign words to be pronounced in english like they are in foreign languages is just impractical on a neurological level.

[Nalacakes]

I attended several schools that stressed the whole multicultural thing when I was younger, so I became kind of used to speaking English with people who spoke it as a second language. As a result, pronunciations that are strange or a little bit off don't especially bother me. ^_^; I'm very much with darus in that so long as your pronunciation doesn't get in the way of you being comprehended, it's a-okay. Actually, I think I prefer when people just speak with their own inflections and pronunciations instead of straining to meet a 'standard' form. I find it quite pleasant to be able to hear my native language being spoken in about a hundred different ways. ^_^;

Besides, I'd question if there even really is a standard when I can pronounce words like 'tomato' completely differently to an English native from a different region, and both of our pronunciations can be completely correct. I don't know. The way I see it, it's absolutely futile to fight the evolution of a language. It's simply not something anyone can control, and thus there's not really much point in getting stroppy over it. You can make as many rules as you want, but if enough people read a certain word a certain way, it will be accepted. It's only a matter of time.

I think the only grammar nazi-ish quality I have is that I cannot stand lazy typing. Typoes don't bother me, and people who just genuinely aren't very good spellers don't either. Heck my spelling is hardly perfect. ^_^; Still, when people intentionally don't type correctly it really rubs me up the wrong way. I can understand gratuitous abbreviations when you're using some sort of live messenging program, or when you're texting via your phone. In the first case it allows you to keep up with the conversation if you're not the fastest typer, and in the second it's almost a neccesity because writing via a phone is just so horribly slow. ^_^; But why-oh-why when people are typing an email or forum post, and they have all the time in the world to compose it, do they still send you things like 'hi hope ur wel!! wan 2 do sumthin on fri?? ill call jane k. c u l8r!!!'? It's just...really, really ugly. And often rather hard to understand~ <_<;

Oh, and I also hate when songs or poetry intentionally change the rhythm or pronunciation of certain words for the sake of making them fit. It always struck me as extremely lazy on the part of the writer. <_<; But that's kind of another matter altogether, as using a language creatively and using it to communicate are two very different things. ^_^;

[Incog Neato]

Sept 27, 2008 13:17:59 GMT -5 Nalacakes said:

Besides, I'd question if there even really is a standard when I can pronounce words like 'tomato' completely differently to an English native from a different region, and both of our pronunciations can be completely correct.

I think the whole problem stems from the fact that people are insistant that because a native speaker or, in Ubuntu's case, the creator(s) pronounce it a certain way, or if the phonetics (that the word I want?) next to the word in the dictionary outlines the way it's pronounced, it means THAT IS THE DEFINITE ABSOLUTE WAY. ALL OTHER PRONUNICATIONS ARE WRONG! GRAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have NEVER EVER pronounced Linux as Lih-nux or whatever the hell they're saying it's "supposed" to be pronounced. So the man says his last name a certain way; big freakin' deal. Doesn't mean it's THE definitive way of pronouncing it and that there is 100% no variations of it. 9__9 (Well, unless he's written some ultimatum that reads "THIS IS HOW YOU PRONOUNCE LINUX.") I mean, maybe there's some other Linux d00de in the world that pronounces the last name as Lin-nex.

Anyway, I brought this up since I found it funny how stressed out the author of the blog post sounded and wanted to know if anyone else had such a pet peeve. I think most of my rageful journal posts from the late 90's to early 2000's were usually rants on silly things like this. :E

Hum~ Other than Xenogears (where I hear a lot of people read it as Zeenogears), my pronunications for Grandia and the name, Mario, seem to be against the masses. :P

Power to personal preference, I say!

[Yakra]

Sept 27, 2008 13:12:54 GMT -5 Skeletore has a boner said:

As I explained about sound inventories, it's actually impossible for people to pronounce foreign words, and they will substitute the appropriate sound from their own inventory to replace ones they can't perceive. They don't even realize they're doing it.

I actually do agree with what you're saying, but at times people pronounce things SO wrongly, its incredibly glaring. And irritating! And at times, it crosses the point that one normally just would not understand if the object the person was talking about was not in front of you. Soooo... I suppose here your point of 'if the listener understands you, a successful linguistic transaction has taken place' would apply (and mean the person was not successful in his/her linguistic transaction with me?)? But what if ten other people around me, who grew up speaking in that particular accent understood that person and not me? Does that mean my 'correct' version is wrong?

Random example of this would be how some people here (non-english speaking/fluent) would pronounce a bowl as 'bau-well'. The first time I heard that, I thought the person was referring to my bowels. Then there are some words in which a slight difference can make it mean something else entirely!

And Elin's mentioning of abbreviated typing in messages reminded me how much that irritates me. I just cannot stand butchered and shortened messages like so. Not even on instant messages on your phone. It just seems so cold, so impersonal, and so lazy! And while I can excuse it with close friends at times (they might be in a rush), I absolutely cannot stand it if one gets a professional message worded like so! (That is, a gallery owner or an acquaintance inviting you to a show or something.)

[Incog Neato]

Sept 27, 2008 13:56:56 GMT -5 Yakra said:

I actually do agree with what you're saying, but at times people pronounce things SO wrongly, its incredibly glaring. And irritating! And at times, it crosses the point that one normally just would not understand if the object the person was talking about was not in front of you. Soooo... I suppose here your point of 'if the listener understands you, a successful linguistic transaction has taken place' would apply (and mean the person was not successful in his/her linguistic transaction with me?)? But what if ten other people around me, who grew up speaking in that particular accent understood that person and not me? Does that mean my 'correct' version is wrong?

Would this fall under the prescriptive grammar mentality though? D: I mean, you've pronounced a certain word a certain way ever since you knew how to pronounce it but maybe those other people have always pronounced it another way? DDD:

From what I understand of this, it wouldn't mean your pronunication any more incorrect than the other way. :o!

Random example of this would be how some people here (non-english speaking/fluent) would pronounce a bowl as 'bau-well'.

And in cases like that, a North American speaker would smile and try hard as hell to get those people to pronounce it more like "boll". :P

[Skeletore has a boner]

Sept 27, 2008 14:12:04 GMT -5 Incog Neato said:

Sept 27, 2008 13:56:56 GMT -5 Yakra said:

Would this fall under the prescriptive grammar mentality though?

That's just in the border area where they're very close to being linguistically ungrammatical.

[macroidtoe]

From what I understand of this, it wouldn't mean your pronunication any more incorrect than the other way. !

Pretty much. But the only thing to watch out for is not to confuse the "prescriptive mentality" and "descriptive mentality" as two sides to some sort of debate.

The prescriptive rules are a thing which really does exist (for some languages) -- although their exact nature and their merit, impact, role in society, etc. can certainly be debated.

The descriptive perspective, on the other hand, is basically a scientific tool, the purpose of which is to encourage the objective observation of linguistic phenomena without any prejudice regarding "correct" or "incorrect" usage.

In other words, it's a lot like the "cultural relativism" perspective taken on by sociologists -- a lot of students incorrectly interpret that as meaning that the sociological field asserts as fact that "all value systems are equally valid." Really, no such assertions are made in either direction, since it is not the role of science to make any such assertions. All that's really going on is that for purposes of objective study, a value-neutral perspective is taken on.

But what if ten other people around me, who grew up speaking in that particular accent understood that person and not me? Does that mean my 'correct' version is wrong?

I believe a linguist (properly operating under the descriptive perspective) would simply say that you and the ten other people are actually speaking different languages/different "linguistic varieties" -- not that either side is more correct than the other.

Now if you've got one guy who NOBODY understands -- that's what you call an idiolect.

[Falcom Director of Fanservice]

The only people who complain about pronunciation are the ones who do it wrong. =|

YEAH I BLAMED THE VICTIM WHAT!