Words With Different Pronounciations
Lily Pond
I've noticed that some words are pronounced differently, depending on their
sentence:
I'll take the one on the right.
That's the only one for me.
or
I'm a cigarette smoker.
I'll take a cigarette.
In the first set, it's th-uh, and thee (the th sound is the same both times;
the second time the e is a long e).
In the second set, in the first the emphasis is on the first syllable; in
the second it's on the third.
What other words are there like this?
Jeffrey Curtis
>I've noticed that some words are pronounced differently, depending on their
>sentence:
>
>I'll take the one on the right.
>That's the only one for me.
>
>or
>
>I'm a cigarette smoker.
>I'll take a cigarette.
>
>In the first set, it's th-uh, and thee (the th sound is the same both times;
>the second time the e is a long e).
Depends on your region. I personally would pronounce it with the
"thee" sound simply because that's more common ("the" before a vowel sound
takes the "thee" - "thee" only (o sound); "thuh" one (w sound)). However,
it could go either way. There's nothing wrong with saying "thuh only".
>In the second set, in the first the emphasis is on the first syllable; in
>the second it's on the third.
I don't agree with this. I would place the emphasis on the third
syllable in both situations. Perhaps I'm just weird.
>What other words are there like this?
--
*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*
+ Jeffrey S. Curtis cur...@achilles.ctd.anl.gov (708)972-2907 B41801 AT ANLVM +
* Computing and Telecommunications, Argonne National Laboratory *
+ "The opinions expressed above are mine only. Who else would want them?!" +
*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*
Douglas West
>I've noticed that some words are pronounced differently, depending on their
>sentence:
>I'm a cigarette smoker.
There are a number of nouns having accents on interior symbols whose accent
shifts to the first syllable when followed by another noun in a noun
combination. There is a technical term for this shift. Unfortunately, at
the moment I remember neither the term nor the examples.
Daniel S. Lewart
> I've noticed that some words are pronounced differently, depending on their
> sentence:
> ...
> What other words are there like this?
Also, there are words whose pronunciation depends on their meaning:
Listen to the Didjits' record.
Didjits should record a new album.
Daniel Lewart
d-le...@uiuc.edu
"I am not a Human Being. I am ... an Animal!"
Natalie Maynor
|>or
I pronounce "the" the same in both sentences of set one.
I pronounce "cigarette" the same in both sentences of set two.
--
--Natalie (n...@ra.msstate.edu)
Simon Patience
I wonder how many people who say pronounciation know how to spell it!
> Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
> "Isreal"?
I know how you feel, I never say my surname any more, I just spell it.
My favourite mispelling of a name was a friend whose name is
Bowen-Bravery (what a great name) who once received a letter to Mr.
Brown-Gravy, from one extreme to the other.
Simon (Patients, Payshents, Paciens and an untold number of others)
Simon Patience
Open Software Foundation Phone: +33-76-63-48-72
Research Institute FAX: +33-76-51-05-32
2 Avenue De Vignate Email: s...@gr.osf.org
38610 Gieres, France uunet!gr.osf.org!sp
Simon Patience
> >>
> >>That's the only one for me.
> Where I come from (the Netherlands) people are thought to pronounce "the"
> as "thee" whenever a vowel-sound follows. I personally think that "thuh only"
> sounds rather unnatural.
Well, which I agree in general, if you say it fast enough then "thuh
only" sounds fine to me. This could be because I am really saying thee
but missing out the two "e"s but it could also be due emphasising
"That's" rather than "only". I hate it when people do this, I sit here
all day saying the phrase over and over to try and discover what I am
doing, it drives me mad!
> Things brings up a different point: what is the proper way to pronounce
> "Amanda is here?" I often here people say an "r" between "Amanda" and "is."
> Is this just a British custom, or do others also use it? It is exactly the
> same with "China in your hand" (song from T'Pau). There "China in...", as
> well as "China-r-in..." can be heard on the record. Can anyone clear this up?
The problem is following one vowel by another and having a gap in
between. Most people find this hard to do (myself included) especially
when speaking at conversational speeds. The letter 'r' is not really
there, it's just a noise that sounds a bit like the letter 'r'. I
personally say "Amanda's here".
Simon.
Simon Patience
m228...@web-2a.berkeley.edu (Ronnen Levinson) writes:
> Speaking of regional accents (ha), I'll add that many of my Australian
friends
> turn "r"s into "h"s, pronouncing "party" as "pahty" and "trailer" as
"trailah."
Although I would guess that the 'ah' is pronounced differently, this
also applies to the people in the South East of England. (and RP?) I
personally would be pushed to pronounce party and pahty differently.
Mark Israel
"Pronounciation" instead of "pronunciation" is one of *my* pet peeves.
instead of "guttural".
Strange how no one is ever tempted to say "denounciation" or
"renounciation".
Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
"Isreal"?
Mark Israel
I have heard the Wobble! user...@mts.ucs.ualberta.ca
Raymond Michiels
>In article <26...@well.sf.ca.us> l...@well.sf.ca.us (Lily Pond) writes:
>>I've noticed that some words are pronounced differently, depending on their
>>sentence:
>>
>>I'll take the one on the right.
>>That's the only one for me.
> Depends on your region. I personally would pronounce it with the
>"thee" sound simply because that's more common [...] However,
>it could go either way. There's nothing wrong with saying "thuh only".
Where I come from (the Netherlands) people are thought to pronounce "the"
as "thee" whenever a vowel-sound follows. I personally think that "thuh only"
sounds rather unnatural.
Things brings up a different point: what is the proper way to pronounce
"Amanda is here?" I often here people say an "r" between "Amanda" and "is."
Is this just a British custom, or do others also use it? It is exactly the
same with "China in your hand" (song from T'Pau). There "China in...", as
well as "China-r-in..." can be heard on the record. Can anyone clear this up?
-Raymond.
Ronnen Levinson
Speaking of regional accents (ha), I'll add that many of my Australian friends
turn "r"s into "h"s, pronouncing "party" as "pahty" and "trailer" as "trailah."
...Ronnen Levinson...
Natalie Maynor
>Things brings up a different point: what is the proper way to pronounce
>"Amanda is here?" I often here people say an "r" between "Amanda" and "is."
>Is this just a British custom, or do others also use it? It is exactly the
Do these people add the r between vowels only? Intrusive r's occur in
some dialects of U.S. English, but they are not just between vowels.
The people with intrusive r would always pronounce Amanda as Amander
or Cuba as Cuber. Another example is Warshington for Washington.
--
--Natalie (n...@ra.msstate.edu)
Jeffrey Curtis
>
>Things brings up a different point: what is the proper way to pronounce
>"Amanda is here?" I often here people say an "r" between "Amanda" and "is."
>Is this just a British custom, or do others also use it? It is exactly the
>same with "China in your hand" (song from T'Pau). There "China in...", as
>well as "China-r-in..." can be heard on the record. Can anyone clear this up?
Hardly anyone, if indeed anyone at all, in America does this. A
friend of mine visited me from Australia, and he put the "r" in between
vowels as well. We all got so used to automatically subtracting r's from
anything that he said that we all had to do a double-take when he told us
a joke, the punchline of which was "Your shirt".
Anyway, to answer your question, I believe that it is a primarily
British custom.
Jim Scobbie
> Anyway, to answer your question, I believe that it is a primarily
>British custom.
Check out my long rather confused posting for why `custom' is a bad word
here. Its like saying that the fact that English has passive voice but
not switch-reference morphemes or 20 genders is a custom.
jim
--
-------
James M. Scobbie: Dept of Linguistics, Stanford University, CA 94305-2150
Ruth Milner
>sentence:
>
>I'll take the one on the right.
>That's the only one for me.
This one's easy. Apart from the occasional regional difference where people
say "thee" (or, more rarely, "thuh") in any case, this arises because the word
following the definite article begins with either a consonant *sound* or a
vowel *sound*. What letter the word actually begins with is irrelevant. In
this example, "one" is pronounced "wun", while "only" is "oh-nly".
It's exactly the same as "a" vs. "an" (not getting into the issue of long "a"
and short "a", that's another subject :-) ). "A unique characteristic" vs.
"an unopened letter", for example. Both words begin with the letter "u", but
because of the pronunciation, the article is different.
This is something I find especially interesting when acronyms come into play.
For example, I would always write "an SMD disk drive" because I pronounce the
letters individually (even in my head when I'm reading it silently). But
sometimes I see people write "a SMD disk drive" instead, presumably because it
begins with a consonant.
Is this something that is geographical, or is it purely a matter of taste? I
don't ever remember it being addressed in school long with the other rules.
>I'm a cigarette smoker.
>I'll take a cigarette.
>
>in the first the emphasis is on the first syllable; in
>the second it's on the third.
If you're talking about "cigarette", I'd have said it the same way both times,
cig-a-RETTE - except that I wouldn't actually say either of them :-).
--
Ruth Milner
Systems Manager NRAO/VLA Socorro NM
Computing Division Head rmi...@zia.aoc.nrao.edu
Dora Kilburn
>
> "Pronounciation" instead of "pronunciation" is one of *my* pet peeves.
>It's right up there with "dipthong" instead of "diphthong" and "gutteral"
>instead of "guttural".
Me too.
> Strange how no one is ever tempted to say "denounciation" or
>"renounciation".
I have no "explaination" for this phenonmenon. :-)
This is the one that bothers me. Doesn't it look totally wrong?
-dlk
Peter Moylan
m228...@web-2a.berkeley.edu (Ronnen Levinson) writes:
It's not a question of turning one letter into another. In Australian
English, and I believe in some other parts of the English-speaking
world, combinations such as "ar" and "er" stand for pure vowel sounds.
I think of this as a spelling convention (in much the same way as
"sh" stands for a single sound rather than for the combination of
two sounds) rather than the elimination of a consonant.
When such a combination appears at the end of a word, and the
following word starts with a vowel, the "r" sound can be heard
(although it's a much lighter sound than that used by Americans).
This is just an example of the phenomenon where Australians will
insert a linking "r" sound to separate two vowels which would otherwise
be awkward together. (Sometimes the separator is a "y", as in
"the y-only". The combination "thuh only" would be very difficult
for me to pronounce.) I think that many Americans use a glottal stop
for this purpose, but I'm not 100% sure.
When I lived in the U.S.A. for a while, I had to learn to speak
American, and a large part of this was remembering to add "r" sounds
in places where I would not normally use them. Occasionally, the
stress of this effort led to mistakes, such as pronouncing Cuba
as Cub-err or idea as idear.
Peter Moylan ee...@wombat.newcastle.edu.au
Raymond Michiels
>This is something I find especially interesting when acronyms come into play.
>For example, I would always write "an SMD disk drive" because I pronounce the
>letters individually (even in my head when I'm reading it silently). But
>sometimes I see people write "a SMD disk drive" instead, presumably because it
>begins with a consonant.
>Is this something that is geographical, or is it purely a matter of taste? I
>don't ever remember it being addressed in school long with the other rules.
I learnt to write "an" whenever the next word begins with a "vowel sound,"
so in the above case I would also write "an SMD..." The real problem,
however, is when SMD is replaced with something like "SCSI." When reading
an article I always read "scussy" and not "es-see-es-i," so I also tend to
write "a SCSI interface" rather than "an SCSI..." Does this mean that to
write proper English you have to know the preferred pronunciation of all
abbreviations and acronyms?
-Raymond.
Hazel Sydeserff
1) do you pronounce the /r/ in "party"?
If NO then you probably put an /r/ between vowels in certain environments
where there isn't one in the spelling.
2) So, is there an /r/ (in your normal, casual speech, not the "nice" way
you think you speak!) in the following places:
from the subject line, china X in your hand (X marks the spot!)
law X and order
more obscurely, raw X egg
drawXing
If you answer "YES" to both tests, then your accent is similar to RP
(the British English Received Pronunciation accent, whose speakers are
mostly found in the South East of English but by no means is RP a
regional accent). You are also what's called "non-rhotic". Scottish
speakers, like me, are mostly rhotic i.e. we pronounce an /r/ wherever
one occurs in the spelling, and tend not to put them in between vowels
as above. However, I have heard several Scottish speakers hyper-correct
and say "idears", as if Scottish English has an /r/ in every environment
where RP apparently misses it out!
--
==============================================================================
Hazel Sydeserff |"What sad times are these when passing
Centre for Speech Technology Research | ruffians can say `Ni!' at will to
80, South Bridge, EDINBURGH EH1 1HN | old ladies." - Roger the Shrubber, MPHG
G Toal
> Anyway, to answer your question, I believe that it is a primarily
>British custom.
ENGLISH ENGLISH ENGLISH ENGLISH.
Not 'British.'
Graham
(A small part of Southern England at that.)
Jeffrey Curtis
>In article <1991Aug1.1...@mcs.anl.gov> cur...@achilles.ctd.anl.gov (Jeffrey Curtis ) writes:
>> Anyway, to answer your question, I believe that it is a primarily
>>British custom.
>
>ENGLISH ENGLISH ENGLISH ENGLISH.
>
>Not 'British.'
Well, how about United Kingdomian then? B^)
(Actually, the original post that I was replying to asked if it was
a "primarily British custom" so I simply concurred using the same wording.)
>Graham
>(A small part of Southern England at that.)
Jeff
Lily Pond
Raymond writes:
Where I come from (the Netherlands) people are thought to pronounce "the"
as "thee" whenever a vowel-sound follows. I personally think that "thuh
only"
sounds rather unnatural.
Interesting! So we are actually following a rule here that we as native
born English speakers are virtually unaware of.
Ruth Milner
>
>> Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
>> "Isreal"?
>
>I know how you feel, I never say my surname any more, I just spell it.
>My favourite mispelling of a name was a friend whose name is
>Bowen-Bravery (what a great name) who once received a letter to Mr.
>Brown-Gravy, from one extreme to the other.
>
>Simon (Patients, Payshents, Paciens and an untold number of others)
Oh goody, a thread about names that cause problems for people!
My husband's last name is Frail, and *everyone* asks to have it spelled (and
then they repeat it, almost invariably with the a and the i reversed). Seems
like such a simple word.
His first name is Dale, which complicates things enormously, since not only
does it rhyme (and throw people off), but then they write either Dail Frail or
Dale Frale (or in one memorable case, Frail Dale).
I have encountered other people with names that it's hard to believe parents
could inflict on their children, such as Michael Angelo and Chester Field (yes,
that one is for real!). And I've been wondering about Lily Pond ...
Even just having your initial first, and using your full middle name, is
incredibly difficult for some people, not to mention organizations, to handle.
I get really tired of the "First Name ... Middle Initial" business.
M. Ruth Milner
Mark Israel
> I'm a cigarette smoker.
> I'll take a cigarette.
> ... in the first the emphasis is on the first syllable; in the second
> it's on the third.
> What other words are there like this?
There is a general tendency in English whereby when a word with a
stressed final syllable is followed by another word without a pause, the
stress moves forward: "kangaROO", but "KANGaroo court"; "afterNOON", but
"AFTernoon nap"; "above BOARD", but "an aBOVEboard deal". This happens
chiefly in noun phrases, but not exclusively so ("acquiESCE" versus
"ACquiesce readily"). Consider also "Chinese" and all numbers ending in
"-teen".
In a completely different class, when "have to" means "must", the [v]
in "have" becomes an [f]. Similarly, in "has to", [z] becomes [s].
In article <10...@star.cs.vu.nl>, ray...@cs.vu.nl (Raymond Michiels)
writes:
> Where I come from (the Netherlands) people are thought [taught?] to
> pronounce "the" as "thee" whenever a vowel-sound follows.
Native English speakers are also taught this rule when we sing in
choirs. (We do it instinctively in rapid speech; but in the slower pace
of singing, it has to be brought to our conscious attention.)
In article <26...@well.sf.ca.us>, l...@well.sf.ca.us (Lily Pond) writes:
> Interesting! So we are actually following a rule here that we as native
> born English speakers are virtually unaware of.
Not extraordinary. A five-year-old child follows nearly *all* the
rules of his mother tongue without being consciously aware of them. Even
most adults are unaware of allophones.
Ian Young
I'm a born and bred Bristolian, and the native Bristol accent is
strongly rhotic* (though arguably less so than Somerset (ooh aarr,
etc). Anyway, one of the standard Bristol pronunciations is for
words ending in certain vowels to take an l. The most noticeable
example of this is the word "idea" which is rendered to be at least
easily confused with "ideal". "Americal" would be another example.
Anyone know why this is?
The _al_ in my version** of a Bristol-accented _oval-shaped_ is a very
strong "aw" vowel with little, if any "l". Is this why? That's to say,
do we end up with an intrusive "l" because Bristolian is "non-lambdic"
(a neologism a day...)
Best not add any more to the confusion for now,
Ian.
__
* I seem to remember that there's a book, possibly one of a whole
series, that shows your average RP speaker how they can "speak
Bristle proper" by using RP words to give approximate renderings
of Bristolian sentences.
** I have a problem here; my accent is nowhere near as strong as it
used to be, so I have to make a conscious effort to "turn it up".
Therefore it may not be wholly accurate.
----
Ian Young <I.M....@cs.bham.ac.uk> voice: +44 21-414-3736
Computer Science, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, U.K.
Vance Maverick
Certain words can suffer severe apparent scrambling from this
accent (as heard by one with another) -- my Philosophy of
Religion professor, Bostonian I believe, pronounced "karma"
"kahmer".
Vance
Jim Scobbie
you'll all get to see my (short) comment on Bristol L. (hint hint.)
David Grieve
>"Isreal"?
>
> Mark Israel
>I have heard the Wobble! user...@mts.ucs.ualberta.ca
At least 3 in 5 mispronounce my last name (most often with
2 long e's). And things get worse when I have to spell it
over the phone (it's hard to distinguish e from v) and I have
to resort to spelling it thus: G-R-I-Echo-Victor-Echo; or
GRI-E-V as in victor-E. Which totaly confuses some folks.
Often times I feel like telling them to look it up in the `
dictionary.
--
uunet!cos!grieve : Opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the
1750 Old Meadow Rd : Corporation for Open Systems or any standards body.
McLean, VA 22102 :----------------------------------------------------
+1-703-883-2718 : Typos are intellectual property of the author.
Quentin van Abbe
>2) So, is there an /r/ (in your normal, casual speech, not the "nice" way
>you think you speak!) in the following places:
> from the subject line, china X in your hand (X marks the spot!)
> law X and order
In good ol' Oz, most of us think 'law and order' is a person of the
female persuasion, viz - LAURA NORDER , so, at least, one would be led to
believe if listening to TV or Radio!
Victor Eijkhout
> In good ol' Oz, most of us think 'law and order' is a person of the
> female persuasion, viz - LAURA NORDER , so, at least, one would be led to
> believe if listening to TV or Radio!
>
Slightly related: I knew about the American tendency to
say 'Noo' for 'new', so I was expecting 'produce' to be pronounced
'prodoose'. Not so: 'perdoose' is what comes out.
Several similar examples exist.
Victor.
nfu...@vax.oxford.ac.uk
Oooh, gosh! Good old `intrusive r' makes an appearance. Or at
least, that's what it looks like. Ronnen, do you notice this /r/ in all
contexts, or just when the next word starts with a vowel (as in the *very*
frequent collocation `idea of') ?
It isn't very clear what you mean by your Australian examples. Do
you mean, literally, an /h/ - just the same as the first sound of `house' ?
Or do you mean that the vowel is lengthened, with no discernible trace of
an /r/ being pronounced ? From what little Strine I know, I'm assuming the
latter.
The phenomenon is regular in standard British English (ie. the
language of the educated inhabitants of south-esat England). When an
`authentic' /r/ stood at the end of a syllable, it was dropped, with one
of two results:
i) a lengthened vowel, as in March, /ma:t(sh)/, virtue,
/v3:tju:/, course, /k>:s/, martyr, /ma:t@/.
(The `>' is an attempt to represent a backwards `c', and the `@' is
supposed to be `schwa'. There will be a small prize for the first person
to spot where I got my examples... :-) )
ii) a residual schwa, as in beer, /bi@/, deer, /di@/, and so on.
On the other hand, an /r/ at the end of a word was retained if the
next word started with a vowel - it's easier to pronounce that way. And
this would all be fine, except that we now get side-effects in words which
didn't have any original /r/. Let's start with the rule for pronouncing
`deer':
Before a consonant or sentence-break /di@/
Before a vowel /di@r/
And now try to work out what to do with `idea':
Before a consonant or sentnce-break /aidi@/
Before a vowel ???????
We have a problem: there's no historical reason to change the
pronunciation in any way, but the analogy with `deer' is very strong, and
most people in southern Britain will include an /r/ in that position. In
fact, if it weren't for the deleterious effects of literacy, nobody in
southern Britain would notice anything strange at all here. American
accents are derived from English as it was before this change, and retain
the /r/, while Australians tend to share the change with the English.
Apologies to any phonologists or historical linguists out there for
the omissions and oversimplifications in all this. Most of them are
deliberate. And of course, many British regional accents *don't* show this
phenomenon. In fact, Graham Toal is probably composing a diatribe against
decadent sassenach pronunciation even now.
Of course, all of this talk of accents is irrelevant to me. I
don't have an accent. It's everyone else who has the accent!
Neil
Laura Jean Wilson
>Do these people add the r between vowels only? Intrusive r's occur in
>some dialects of U.S. English, but they are not just between vowels.
>The people with intrusive r would always pronounce Amanda as Amander
>or Cuba as Cuber. Another example is Warshington for Washington.
>--
There is a curious habit in England of inserting 'r's and 'h's and also of
dropping them too. As far as I am able to make out the 'r's are belong
to those with RP, or as we Scots say "folk wi' bools in their moo". The
working classes tend to drop their 'h's and then insert them again.
I have only heard English people doing the above, and it is certainly not
the norm across all of England, far less across the British Isles.
Laura
p.s. The spellings included are all my own. :-)
Hazel Sydeserff
|> In article <1991Aug1.0...@cs.UAlberta.CA> user...@mts.ucs.ualberta.ca (Mark Israel) writes:
|> >
|> >
|> > Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
|> >"Isreal"?
I would say that 4 out of 5 people spell my name wrong! Imagine trying to
spell my name over the phone! There are so many fricatives (h,z,s,s,f,f) in
there that when I say "Hazel Sydeserff" it sounds like I've just gone
"Sssshhhhhhhhh" down the phone!
I could say " Sierra Yankee Delta Echo Sierra Echo Romeo Foxtrot Foxtrot"
but knowing my luck a letter addressed to exactly that would come back!
I've seen some abominations, believe me!
Sybeserff
Syderserff
Sydesess
Syderess
etc., etc.
Can't wait til I get married!
Liz Broadwell
> I would say that 4 out of 5 people spell my name wrong! Imagine trying to
> spell my name over the phone! There are so many fricatives (h,z,s,s,f,f) in
> there that when I say "Hazel Sydeserff" it sounds like I've just gone
> "Sssshhhhhhhhh" down the phone!
> I could say " Sierra Yankee Delta Echo Sierra Echo Romeo Foxtrot Foxtrot"
> but knowing my luck a letter addressed to exactly that would come back!
> I've seen some abominations, believe me!
It doesn't even take lots of fricatives to produce abominations. A certain
Evelyn Hall, with whom I am acquainted, frequently receives business mail
addressed to Evlyn Hall, Elven Hall, and Evilyn Hall (shades of He-Man?).
The crowning misnomer came some years ago in a letter with a memo from the guys
in the mail room attached to it. My friend read the memo first, and was
puzzled to receive the compliment: "*We* always thought you were a ten." Then
she took a look at the letter itself and was enlightened (and amused).
It was addressed to Ms. Eleven Hall.
************************************************************************
* Liz Broadwell (broa...@penndrls.upenn.edu) * *
* Department of English * Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam *
* The University of Pennsylvania * *
************************************************************************
Ruth Milner
>
>>For example, I would always write "an SMD disk drive" because I pronounce the
>>letters individually (even in my head when I'm reading it silently). But
>>sometimes I see people write "a SMD disk drive" instead, presumably because it
>>begins with a consonant.
>
>an article I always read "scussy" and not "es-see-es-i," so I also tend to
>write "a SCSI interface" rather than "an SCSI..."
I do the same thing. From what I vaguely recall, this rule was covered
regarding words (like "one" and "only" as mentioned in an earlier posting) but
not specifically regarding acronyms. Maybe the teacher didn't like to think
that acronyms existed :-). There's certainly too many of them today. :-)
>Does this mean that to
>write proper English you have to know the preferred pronunciation of all
>abbreviations and acronyms?
I guess so, or at least of all the ones you deal with. Often this isn't as
bad as it appears at first glance, since people seem to have a tendency to
pronounce it like a word if at all possible, rather than state each letter.
"SCSI" is actually a good example of this.
Richard van de Stadt
> >>I've noticed that some words are pronounced differently, depending on their
> >>
> >>That's the only one for me.
> Where I come from (the Netherlands) people are thought to pronounce "the"
^^^^^^^
> as "thee" whenever a vowel-sound follows. I personally think that "thuh only"
> sounds rather unnatural.
I can see you're from the Netherlands. I think you mean 'taught' (from the
verb 'teach').
Richard (also from the Netherlands, but from another school)
--
R.R. van de Stadt (Richard)
Email: st...@cs.utwente.nl
Bob Davis
>
>I learnt to write "an" whenever the next word begins with a "vowel sound,"
>so in the above case I would also write "an SMD..." The real problem,
>however, is when SMD is replaced with something like "SCSI." When reading
>an article I always read "scussy" and not "es-see-es-i," so I also tend to
>write "a SCSI interface" rather than "an SCSI..." Does this mean that to
>write proper English you have to know the preferred pronunciation of all
>abbreviations and acronyms?
>
A writer who in good faith and competence writes a sentence
with 'SCSI' in it, will know that it is 'scuzzy' and not ess-see-ess-eye.
Any writer who writes a sentence with an acronym in it (and his audience)
had better know its accepted usage -- just as the accepted usage of all
other letter groups used will be known. If the writer is writing for an
audience that doesn't know an 'ess-see-ess-eye' from a 'scuzzy', the writer
will write about a 'Small Computer System Interface (SCSI, pronounced
"scuzzy").' [Is that what SCSI means? :-)]
_____________________________________________________________________________
Bob Davis, UofALA alum \\ INTERNET: so...@trantor.harris-atd.com | _ _ |
Harris Corporation, ESS \\ UUCP: ...!uunet!x102a!trantor!sonny |_| |_| | |
Advanced Technology Dept.\\ AETHER: K4VNO |==============|_/\/\/\|_|
PO Box 37, MS 3A/1912 \\ VOICE: (407) 727-5886 | I SPEAK ONLY | |_| |_| |
Melbourne, FL 32902 USA \\ FAX: (407) 729-3363 | FOR MYSELF. |_________|
John Haxby
|> It doesn't even take lots of fricatives to produce abominations. A certain
|> Evelyn Hall, with whom I am acquainted, frequently receives business mail
|> addressed to Evlyn Hall, Elven Hall, and Evilyn Hall (shades of He-Man?).
Unless your name is `Smith' (and maybe I'm being optimistic), people will
try to mis-spell it. My name (Haxby) is spelt pretty much as it is pronounced, but
over the years I have got used to saying 'John Haxby, aitch, ay, ex, be, wye.'
But still I get letters addressed to 'Hacksby', 'Hardy', 'Harvey' and so on. My wife
was glad to change her common surname to something unusual and pronounable
(her sister married a gentleman of Russian extraction) and was surprised when one
of the first letters adressed to us had our name completely wrong.
I guess the people whose names get spelt wrong are those that take care to
spell other peoples correctly, Lyz.
:-) (just in case, you know how these multi-national jokes fail to get translated.)
--
John Haxby, Definitively Wrong.
Digital <j...@wessex.rdg.dec.com>
Reading, England <...!ukc!wessex!jch>
----------------------------------------------------------------
The opinions expressed herein are my own, not my employers.
Jane Philcox
>"renounciation".
I have heard "denounciation."
> Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
>"Isreal"?
>
> Mark Israel
No I didn't, but I'd believe it. I used to work in the administrative section
of a tertiary college, and come enrolment time, we would find that something
like that number of men whose middle name is "Michael" spell it "Micheal." It
doesn't seem to happen with men whose always used given name is "Michael," only
the ones whose unused given name is "Michael." In not one single case, on
investigation, did we find that the student's name was actually "Micheal."
I even used to get it on graduation forms, under the section "What name do you
wish to have inscribed on your testamur?" where you'd really think they'd take
some care, if only a little.
Make you feel any better?
Regards, Jane.
--
What appears to be a sloppy or meaningless use of words may well be a
completely correct use of words to express sloppy or meaningless ideas
Anonymous Diplomat
Derek E. Terveer
> Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
>"Isreal"?
Americans seem to have a real tough time with my last name, "Terveer", which is
a pretty simple Dutch name. They almost always pronounce it "Trevor" even
after writing it down and spelling it correctly! I shrug this off as the
"ter" sound being uncommon in names in American.
derek
--
Derek "Tigger" Terveer d...@hawkmoon.MN.ORG
(The I.V. League, referring to "nasty" landfills in 'goo')
"Your DNA will be D.O.A. if you dare to cross this line."
Evan Kirshenbaum
> I even used to get it on graduation forms, under the section "What name do you
> wish to have inscribed on your testamur?" where you'd really think they'd take
Australian for "diploma"? Or just a general "credential"? I'm not
sure exactly what a "tertiary college" maps onto here.
Evan Kirshenbaum
HP Laboratories
3500 Deer Creek Road, Building 26U
Palo Alto, CA 94304
Daniel Rosenblum
>In article <10...@star.cs.vu.nl> ray...@cs.vu.nl (Raymond Michiels) writes:
>>
>>Things brings up a different point: what is the proper way to pronounce
>>"Amanda is here?" I often here people say an "r" between "Amanda" and "is."
>>Is this just a British custom, or do others also use it? It is exactly the
>>same with "China in your hand" (song from T'Pau). There "China in...", as
>>well as "China-r-in..." can be heard on the record. Can anyone clear this up?
> Hardly anyone, if indeed anyone at all, in America does this. ...
> Anyway, to answer your question, I believe that it is a primarily
>British custom.
And parts of the northeastern U.S. Listen to Brooklynites
(Brooklyners?), especially older ones, and you'll hear that "r" stuck
in, along with the addition of "r" where it doesn't occur in standard
American pronunciation in words ending with schwas or diphthongs the
second element of which is more or less a schwa: Asier (Asia), idear
(idea). And Brooklyn is not unique in this regard; who, who is old
enough, can forget John F. Kennedy's references to Asier and Cuber
(Cuba)?
Question: why do so many Americans love to hear this, and even regard
it as upper class, when English people do it, but look down on it and
think of it as connoting boorishness when Noo Yawkuhs and New
Englanders do it?
Daniel M. Rosenblum, Assistant Professor, Quantitative Studies Area,
Graduate School of Management, Rutgers University (Newark)
ROSE...@DRACO.RUTGERS.EDU \/ same machine,
ROSE...@DRACO.BITnet /\ different networks
ROSE...@CANCER.RUTGERS.EDU \ / CANCER & PISCES are machines in a
ROSE...@PISCES.RUTGERS.EDU >< VAXcluster called ZODIAC, so these
ROSE...@ZODIAC.BITnet / \ 3 addresses all go to the same place.
d...@andromeda.rutgers.edu (uucp) (mail sent here forwarded to DRACO)
Jim Scobbie
>Question: why do so many Americans love to hear this, and even regard
>it as upper class, when English people do it, but look down on it and
>think of it as connoting boorishness when Noo Yawkuhs and New
>Englanders do it?
Good usage is arbitrarily assigned to opposite sides of the coin
in these non-rhotic US & English accents, although the actual grammar
(phonology) involved is remarkably similar.
As for why this happens, why shouldn't it? There's nothing intrinsically
good or bad about rules of grammar.
Dan Tilque
>
>And parts of the northeastern U.S. Listen to Brooklynites
>(Brooklyners?), especially older ones, and you'll hear that "r" stuck
>in,
Reminds me of a story that goes back at least 40 years.
In those days, (40's and early 50's) Brooklyn was the home of the Dodgers
baseball team and one of their star players was named Hoyt (William Hoyt,
I believe). Well, once Hoyt was hit by a pitch and fell to the ground.
When he didn't get up immediately, a concerned and excited fan jumps up
and yells "Hurt's hoyt!".
---
Dan Tilque -- da...@logos.WR.TEK.COM
Jim Scobbie
>Now, how did 'r' come to sound like 'v' in Bvooklyn? You can hear
>people saying 'Vockefella's a vevvy vich man.'
Don't know. A lot of RP speakers have a labial [v] approximant for their
r sounds however, which is probably the same thing. Its a cross
between [v] and [w], roughly. No friction, but very like a [v].
It arises in RP becase [r] is given secondary lip rounding, which
has taken on the contrast.
Its also possible that it comes from an [r] pronounced way back in the
mouth at the soft palate. the acoustic similarity between sounds
produced there and sounds at the lips could have been a factor.
I'm bouncing this message over to sci.lang and back to see if anyone
can help.
Followups to alt.usage.english please.
Kivi Shapiro
>Now, how did 'r' come to sound like 'v' in Bvooklyn? You can hear
>people saying 'Vockefella's a vevvy vich man.'
My guess is it comes from the extremely large Jewish population in that
area. The Yiddish "r" is sounded from the back of the throat, like the
French, yielding a sound much like that of "v."
According to Leo Rosten, the word "copasetic" also came from this
region, as an adaptation of the Yiddish "col b'seder," meaning
"everything is in order."
-Kivi
--
jksh...@trillium.waterloo.edu, or jksh...@trillium.uwaterloo.ca,
or even ki...@watcsc.waterloo.edu if you feel lucky
de...@twg.com
>In article <47...@cos.com>, gri...@cos.com (David Grieve) writes:
>|> In article <1991Aug1.0...@cs.UAlberta.CA> user...@mts.ucs.ualberta.ca (Mark Israel) writes:
>|> >
>|> >
>|> > Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
>|> >"Isreal"?
Is there is term for such people? Dyslexics may not be correct
since the AHD describes dyslexia as "Impairment of the ability to
read."
>
>I would say that 4 out of 5 people spell my name wrong! Imagine trying to
>spell my name over the phone! There are so many fricatives (h,z,s,s,f,f) in
>there that when I say "Hazel Sydeserff" it sounds like I've just gone
>"Sssshhhhhhhhh" down the phone!
>I could say " Sierra Yankee Delta Echo Sierra Echo Romeo Foxtrot Foxtrot"
>but knowing my luck a letter addressed to exactly that would come back!
>I've seen some abominations, believe me!
My name is Deven Naniwadekar.
I would have to go one step beyond and say that 4 out of 5 people
don't even _dare_ to spell my name, let alone spell it wrong!! ;-)
Not only most people cannot spell my name, but most of them cannot
even _read_ it. Granted that it is not an "anglo" name, but
as with many Asian names, it is read just as it is spellt. Yet
people give up the moment they _see_ it. It is as if something
in their brain says, "this looks/sounds like a foreign name,
therefore, I cannot possibly read/spell it." Not only is it
a "foreign" name, but most people give up because of its length
as well. Yet, it is not as long as Schwarzenegger or Fenstermacher,
and it is equal in length to Kirkpatrick or Fitzpatrick. But it has
5 vowels which I think throws people off.
Deven
Roger Lustig
20's and 30's, and his name was Waite Hoyt. Played for the Yankees, and
was the broadcaster for the Cincy Reds for many years. A Hall-of-Fame
pitcher.
The story, however, is true.
Now, how did 'r' come to sound like 'v' in Bvooklyn? You can hear
people saying 'Vockefella's a vevvy vich man.'
Roger
G Toal
>According to Leo Rosten, the word "copasetic" also came from this
>region, as an adaptation of the Yiddish "col b'seder," meaning
>"everything is in order."
Anyone remember the hip version of Julius Caesar? "Copacetic
with Brutus and the cats". It's been 12 years since I heard
it last. Quite amusing. Somebody must have it on file somewhere?
G
j.
>In article <1991Aug6.1...@aifh.ed.ac.uk> ha...@cstr.ed.ac.uk (Hazel Sydeserff) writes:
>>In article <47...@cos.com>, gri...@cos.com (David Grieve) writes:
>>|> In article <1991Aug1.0...@cs.UAlberta.CA> user...@mts.ucs.ualberta.ca (Mark Israel) writes:
>>|> >
>>|> >
>>|> > Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
>>|> >"Isreal"?
>>
>>spell my name over the phone! There are so many fricatives (h,z,s,s,f,f) in
>>there that when I say "Hazel Sydeserff" it sounds like I've just gone
>>"Sssshhhhhhhhh" down the phone!
>
way that rolls off the tounge!
Over the last twenty years I have come accross these various spellings
of my surname:
Part Parthane
Partaben Parthanona
Partaka Parthathaninn
Partake Partheenn
Parta Parthenen
Partanan Parthenin
Partanen Parthenonn
Partani Partinann
Partanoon Partinene
Partata Partininn
Partaten Partneen
Partathan Partonan
Partathen Partonen
Partathin Partsanen
Parteen Partsen
Parten Partsinin
Partenan
Ten points to whoever can guess which one of the above is correct!
j.
Roger Lustig
>>Now, how did 'r' come to sound like 'v' in Bvooklyn? You can hear
>>people saying 'Vockefella's a vevvy vich man.'
>My guess is it comes from the extremely large Jewish population in that
>area. The Yiddish "r" is sounded from the back of the throat, like the
>French, yielding a sound much like that of "v."
Yet the sound I'me talking about is produced far FORWARD, with the lips.
It's halfway between 'v' and 'w', actually -- quite the opposite of the
guttural 'r'.
>According to Leo Rosten, the word "copasetic" also came from this
>region, as an adaptation of the Yiddish "col b'seder," meaning
>"everything is in order."
I'd like to see a bit more evidence for that. The OED doesn't even
mention Rosten's surmise, and its oldest cites give it a better chance
of coming from southern Black speech. Rosten likes to exaggerate a bit.
Roger
Benno Overeinder
>In <13...@idunno.Princeton.EDU> ro...@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig) writes:
>>Now, how did 'r' come to sound like 'v' in Bvooklyn? You can hear
>>people saying 'Vockefella's a vevvy vich man.'
>Its also possible that it comes from an [r] pronounced way back in the
>mouth at the soft palate. the acoustic similarity between sounds
>produced there and sounds at the lips could have been a factor.
Maybe it is a heritage of the Dutch living in Breukelen (Brooklyn).
Our Dutch 'r' is more like the Scottish 'r', while the British 'r' is
more (in our ears) to the 'v' or 'w'. Being incapable to pronounce the
British 'r' correctly, they transformed it to the known sound of 'v' or 'w'.
Just a try :-)
-Benno
--
===========================================================================
Benno Overeinder Computer Systems Department
University of Amsterdam
e-mail: over...@fwi.uva.nl The Netherlands
G Toal
:Over the last twenty years I have come accross these various spellings
:of my surname:
:
: Part Parthane
: Partaben Parthanona
: Partaka Parthathaninn
: Partake Partheenn
: Parta Parthenen
: Partanan Parthenin
: Partanen Parthenonn
: Partani Partinann
: Partanoon Partinene
: Partata Partininn
: Partaten Partneen
: Partathan Partonan
: Partathen Partonen
: Partathin Partsanen
: Parteen Partsen
: Parten Partsinin
: Partenan
Give us a clue: are you Finnish or Greek? If Finnish I'd guess
Partonnen, which isn't in your list :-)
G
j.
>In article <1991Aug14.0...@watdragon.waterloo.edu> ako...@dahlia.waterloo.edu (j.) writes:
>:Over the last twenty years I have come accross these various spellings
>:of my surname:
>:
>:
>
>Give us a clue: are you Finnish or Greek? If Finnish I'd guess
>Partonnen, which isn't in your list :-)
Partonnen is'nt on my list, although I called my Father and
he confirmed that it was on his. My paternal antecedents have been
doing this for decades, which certainly bolsters the idea that I am
Finnish.
Unfortunate, that, since I can never get enough olives and feta
in my salad. But then, Finnish meatballs, in my opinion, are just heavenly,
so I guess there are positive aspects to both cultures.
I think my blonde hair and sky-high cheek bones decide the issue
though. :-)
Telliah^2
j.
Kathleen Much
>>|> > Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
>>|> >"Isreal"?
>
>>I would say that 4 out of 5 people spell my name wrong! Imagine trying to
>>spell my name over the phone! There are so many fricatives (h,z,s,s,f,f) in
>>there that when I say "Hazel Sydeserff" it sounds like I've just gone
>>"Sssshhhhhhhhh" down the phone!
>>I could say " Sierra Yankee Delta Echo Sierra Echo Romeo Foxtrot Foxtrot"
>>but knowing my luck a letter addressed to exactly that would come back!
>>I've seen some abominations, believe me!
>
> My name is Deven Naniwadekar.
>
> I would have to go one step beyond and say that 4 out of 5 people
> don't even _dare_ to spell my name, let alone spell it wrong!! ;-)
I think I can top all of you. My name is Much (pronounced just like it
looks). The trouble is, no one believes it can be that easy. I get
Mutch, Munch, Murch, Mulch, Mouch, Muech, Muche, Match, Mach, Mache,
Minch, March, Manch, Mich, Mech, Moch, Moche, Motch, and probably some
others I've mercifully forgotten. When I give my name to anyone who
needs to write it, I say Much-em-you-see-aitch--saves time in the long
run. One despairs of modern spellers.
Mark Israel
writes:
>>>>> Did you know that one person in five misspells my last name as
>>>>> "Isreal"?
>
> Is there a term for such people? Dyslexics may not be correct since
> the AHD describes dyslexia as "Impairment of the ability to read."
Impairment of the ability to write is known as "dysgraphia" (or
sometimes "agraphia"). A few types of dysgraphia are:
*phonological* dysgraphia, where the patient can spell familiar real
words but can't plausibly spell nonsense words;
*deep* dysgraphia, where errors are often related in *meaning* to the
target word ("flower" => "blum", "cake" => "bun");
*surface* dysgraphia, where the patient can spell nonsense words fine,
but can't spell irregular real words ("biscuit" => "bisket");
*spatial* dysgraphia, where the patient spaces letters abnormally on the
page.
This information is from _The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language_,
which has an 18-page chapter on language disorders.
But most people who spell "Israel" as "Isreal" do so through
inattention, not because they're dysgraphic!
Mark Israel
I have heard the Wobble! user...@mts.ucs.ualberta.ca
Mark North
>I think my blonde hair and sky-high cheek bones decide the issue
>though. :-)
OH! A Russian Finn. Reminds me of a story about Ano and Heike...
Mark
Daniel Rosenblum
>sco...@Csli.Stanford.EDU (Jim Scobbie) writes:
>>In <13...@idunno.Princeton.EDU> ro...@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig) writes:
>>>Now, how did 'r' come to sound like 'v' in Bvooklyn? You can hear
>>>people saying 'Vockefella's a vevvy vich man.'
>>Its also possible that it comes from an [r] pronounced way back in the
>>mouth at the soft palate. the acoustic similarity between sounds
>>produced there and sounds at the lips could have been a factor.
>Maybe it is a heritage of the Dutch living in Breukelen (Brooklyn).
>Our Dutch 'r' is more like the Scottish 'r', while the British 'r' is
>more (in our ears) to the 'v' or 'w'. Being incapable to pronounce the
>British 'r' correctly, they transformed it to the known sound of 'v' or 'w'.
>Just a try :-)
Doubtful. I'm pretty sure that the Brooklyn [r] is pretty much a
phenomenon of more recent (in Brooklyn!) ethnic groups than the Dutch.
Here's my uneducated guess. Jews and other white non-English speaking
groups immigrating to Brooklyn had tongue-trill or uvular [r]s. They
heard the American [r], which I don't even know how to describe, and
the thing that sounds in between [v] and [w] was the best they could
do. The American [r], after all, includes, in addition to the partial
retroflexion of the tongue, a slight pursing of the lips in which the
upper lip is protruded forward and raised slightly and the lower lip
is raised and moved in front of the upper teeth. (One of my house-
mates in graduate school, who was from India, couldn't hear the
difference between this and [w], and always made fun of me for
speaking of "wabbits".) Note that this lip position is really quite
close to the lip position of [v], the main difference being that the
lips are not protruded for [v] so that the lower lip comes into
contact with the upper teeth. So for someone who was used to the
uvular [r] in particular (like many Yiddish speakers), that [v]-like
sound may have been the right compromise. Hmmm... -- it seems like
I've just come around to Jim Scobbie's comment, above, with a little
more elaboration.
This non-uvular non-tongue-trill [r] that we have in the States and
that also seems to exist in parts of England seems to be tricky for
a lot of people, even native speakers. There's a National Public
Radio who covers Yugoslavia and Albania and who's obviously British,
whose [r]s sound awfully [w]-ish. (He may also report for the BBC;
I can't recall his name, but I think it's a French-sounding name.)
I can't imagine him getting a reporting job in the uniform-as-white-
bread commercial radio/TV news media in the States, but fortunately
NPR and other countries' media care more for good reporting and
being comprehensible than for the presence of idiosyncracies of
speech that don't damage comprehensibility.
Daniel Rosenblum
>In article <68...@wrgate.WR.TEK.COM> da...@logos.WR.TEK.COM (Dan Tilque) writes:
>>d...@andromeda.rutgers.edu (Daniel Rosenblum) writes:
>>>[stuff about Brooklyn people adding /r/s to ends of words like "idea".
>>Reminds me of a story that goes back at least 40 years.
>>[story about old Brooklyn Dodger player named Hoyt being hit by a pitch
>> and a fan yelling "Hurt's hoyt!".
>20's and 30's, and his name was Waite Hoyt. Played for the Yankees, and
>was the broadcaster for the Cincy Reds for many years. A Hall-of-Fame
>pitcher.
>The story, however, is true.
And the other related story from Brooklyn is about the fellow named
Earl who worked in a factory who was asked to lubricate a piece of
equipment: "Oil, go and earl that machine!"
Actually, the sound being written "oi" or "oy" in these two examples
("Earl" pronounced /oil/ and "hurt" pronounced /hoyt/) is _not_ the
/oy/ of "boy" or "poison". The first element of the diphthong is
the "u" of "put" or the "oo" of "book", and not the "o" of "ore" or
the "aw" of "awe". Non-Brooklyners trying to imitate Brooklyn
accents often make this mistake, to the amusement of New Yorkers with
keen ears for this sort of thing (no comments about oxymorons, please :-) ).
William F Phillips
:And the other related story from Brooklyn is about the fellow named
:Earl who worked in a factory who was asked to lubricate a piece of
:equipment: "Oil, go and earl that machine!"
:
:Actually, the sound being written "oi" or "oy" in these two examples
:("Earl" pronounced /oil/ and "hurt" pronounced /hoyt/) is _not_ the
:/oy/ of "boy" or "poison". The first element of the diphthong is
:the "u" of "put" or the "oo" of "book", and not the "o" of "ore" or
:the "aw" of "awe".
Having grown up among relatives and neighbors who spoke this dialect
(which, amazingly, somehow never rubbed off on me), I can attest that
this is approximately correct. The sound is something like the French
word `oeil', in fact.
Also, the sound represented above by `earl' isn't quite that either.
This one is harder to describe ... if you try to say `earl' with your
lips pursed slightly, you might get it -- not guaranteed. The `r'
sound, often missing or represented by a -- would a `liquid v' make
sense? -- is definitely there, but not as fully-rounded (?) as a
General American `r'. Another way to describe it occurs to me --
say `earl', but push it all closer to the front of your mouth,
including the `r'.
All that said, Oeil vrememba, faugh vrexaemple, wenda yold coal foeinace
was convoeidid dintur ra moddin earl boeina, an'd'yicebox was vreplacet
witta nice noo vrefidgevrayda. Evvy Febyuevvy 14th, in schoo-ul, we
god doubt da loeibevvy paste and made Ballantines faugh vrowwa fvriends outta
vred paypa 'nd woeit payapa derrlys.
A Nuff! Noeity-noeit!
--
___ ___ _ | Bill Phillips,
(/__) . /) /) (/__) /_ . /) /) . _ _ | Friend Of A Friend
/__) (__(__(___ / / )_(__(__(__(_ /_)_/_)_ |
( ( ( | w...@world.std.com
Jane Philcox
>In article <1991Aug9.0...@latcs1.lat.oz.au> ja...@latcs1.lat.oz.au (Jane Philcox) writes:
>> I even used to get it on graduation forms, under the section "What name do you
>> wish to have inscribed on your testamur?" where you'd really think they'd take
> ^^^^^^^^
>Australian for "diploma"? Or just a general "credential"? I'm not
>sure exactly what a "tertiary college" maps onto here.
testamur, n. (univv.). Certificate that one has passed examination. [L, = we
testify] (Concise Oxford Dictionary)
Personally, I hate the word, but it's used amongst university admin staff for
the piece of paper that says you have your degree. I understand that the
degree is not something material. The piece of paper is _not_ your degree,
it only says you have qualified to be admitted to the degree.
Tertiary college. Well, a university is a tertiary educational institution,
and a tertiary college is a tertiary educational institution which isn't a
university. Does that help? We refer to the first year of school as "Prep" or
"Bubs," where one usually starts at age 5 or 6. The next 6 years of school is
"Primary School", the second 6 years of school is "Secondary School", and
anything after that is "Tertiary". Roughly. There are a few exceptions, but
mostly it goes something like that. I used the qualifier "tertiary" to
distinguish from the sort of colleges that are private schools, at the
secondary level. From which one does not graduate, and does not get a testamur.
Now. Would someone like to explain what the hell all those strange American
terms map onto? Things like Junior year, Senior year, middle school, and,
heaven help us, sophomore!
Jane Philcox
> My name is Deven Naniwadekar.
> Not only most people cannot spell my name, but most of them cannot
> even _read_ it. Granted that it is not an "anglo" name, but
> as with many Asian names, it is read just as it is spellt. Yet
> people give up the moment they _see_ it. It is as if something
> in their brain says, "this looks/sounds like a foreign name,
> therefore, I cannot possibly read/spell it." Not only is it
> a "foreign" name, but most people give up because of its length
> as well.
No, I think the big problem is having absolutely no idea where to place the
accent. My doctor's name is Mariampillai, which I don't find at all difficult,
once I know that it's accented on the first syllable. But most of our locals
call him "Doctor Anthony", which is his given name, and give up altogether on
his surname. In fact, to my knowledge his partner, his wife, and I are the
only local people who even _know_ his name. Everyone else just looks blank
if you say it.
Jane Philcox
>Over the last twenty years I have come accross these various spellings
>of my surname:
>
>Part Parthane
>Partaben Parthanona
>Partaka Parthathaninn
>Partake Partheenn
>Parta Parthenen
>Partanan Parthenin
>Partanen Parthenonn
>Partani Partinann
>Partanoon Partinene
>Partata Partininn
>Partaten Partneen
>Partathan Partonan
>Partathen Partonen
>Partathin Partsanen
>Parteen Partsen
>Parten Partsinin
>Partenan
>Ten points to whoever can guess which one of the above is correct!
None of the above?
Ron Newman
|> Now. Would someone like to explain what the hell all those strange American
|> terms map onto? Things like Junior year, Senior year, middle school, and,
|> heaven help us, sophomore!
Well, this can be tricky, because the American educational system is very diverse
and decentralized. Public schools (meaning, "tax-supported elementary and
secondary schools") are generally controlled at the municipal level, and vary
widely in details such as which grades are housed together in the same building.
Nevertheless, I'll try:
Elementary (or "primary", or "grammar") school: grades 1 through 5 or 6. Sometimes also includes a kindergarten, which a 5-year old can optionally
attend for a year before the first grade.
Middle school: grades 6 through 8.
Junior high school: grades 7 through 9. A local school system usually has either middle schools or junior high schools, but not both.
Senior high school (or just "high school"): grades 9 or 10 through 12.
Secondary schools: any of the above three.
Tertiary: this term is never used in the U.S.; instead, we say "post-secondary education" if we have to say it at all.
College: a four-year post-secondary institution, granting degrees of Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) and/or Bachelor of Science (B.S.). A "college", unlike a "university", usually emphasizes undergraduate study and has few if any graduate or professional programs.
Freshman: a 9th grader or a first-year college student. The term
is usually not used in systems where 9th graders share the same building as 7th and 8th graders.
Sophomore: a 10th grader or a second-year college student.
Junior: an 11th grader or a third-year college student.
Senior: a 12th grader or a fourth (and presumably final)-year college student.
--
Ron Newman rne...@bbn.com
Evan Kirshenbaum
> Now. Would someone like to explain what the hell all those strange American
> terms map onto? Things like Junior year, Senior year, middle school, and,
> heaven help us, sophomore!
Certainly! Follow closely:
"Preschool" is more or less an organized daycare for pre-kindergarten
age kids (usually age three or four, although "Montessori" schools
(named after Maria Montessori) often start at age two). Students are
called "preschoolers".
"Kindergarten" is for five year olds and is the first official
"school" provided in the public (government financed and run) schools.
Students are called "kindergarteners".
Children then proceed through "first" through "twelfth" grades at a
rate of one per year ("skipping a grade" or "being held back" if
necessary). These grades are split into "elementary (or "grammar" or
"grade" or "primary") school" and "high school". Many "school
districts" insert a "junior high (or "middle") school" between
grammar school and high school. If there is no junior high,
elementary school runs from first through eighth grade and high school
runs from ninth through twelfth. If there is a junior high, it
usually encompasses seventh and eighth or seventh through ninth.
Students at these levels are called "nth graders", except that the
traditional high school years (ninth through twelfth) are called
"freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior year", and the students are
called "freshmen", "sophomores", "juniors", and "seniors"
respectively.
One is said to "graduate" (not "be graduated") each of these schools
(not each grade), and the schools usually have a graduation ceremony
and hand out a certificate. The only one that is socially meaningful
is graduation from high school, from which you get a recognized
"diploma". (Note that a student can "drop out" of school anytime
after his/her sixteenth birthday, so not all adults are high school
graduates.)
Schools can either be "public schools", meaning that they are financed
by (generally property) taxes and run by the government or "private
schools", meaning that they are privately run and financed by
"tuition" paid by the parents of the children attending them. Private
schools run (and usually subsidized) by religious institutions are
called "parochial (or "church") schools". (These should not be
confused with "Sunday schools" or "Hebrew schools" which provide
religious instruction and are attended in addition to regular
schooling.)
In technical and legal jargon, grade schools (and, I believe, junior
highs) are considered "primary schools", high schools are "secondary
schools", and anything after high school is an "institute of higher
education (or "learning)".
After high school, one can choose to go on with one's education,
proceeding either to "college" (an academically oriented school) or to
"trade (or "vocational") school" (a school designed to teach
job-related skills).
There are several types of colleges. "Community colleges" are two-year
institutions usually heavily subsidized by the government which grant
"academic associate (AA)" degrees and various credentials, prepare
students to transfer into four-year colleges, and provide "continuing
(or "adult") education" programs for the local community.
An unqualified "college" is a four-year institution which grants
"bachelor's degrees" (generally "bachelor of science (BS)" and
"bachelor of arts (BA or AB)", although there are a couple of others).
Colleges are broken up into "departments" (e.g., mathematics,
political science). A student "applies to" a college and is either
"admitted" or "rejected". If admitted, the student runs through the
same cycle of freshman year through senior year again. At some time,
he chooses a subject as a "major" and is said to "major in" that
subject. His major indicates a course of study which includes some
"required classes" and some "electives". He may also choose a "minor"
which imposes fewer requirements than a major. Furthermore, the
school may have some "breath (or "distribution") requirements".
Generally, each course is worth a certain number of "units (or
"hours")". Most colleges don't require any dissertation to get a
bachelor's degree, although some have "honors programs" which are
optional and require an in-depth (but not necessarily original)
project and write-up. When he has enough units and has satisfied the
requirements for his major, he "graduates" and receives a "diploma".
If he has done well, he may graduate "with honors (or "cum laude")".
If extremely well, he may graduate "magna cum laude" or even "summa
cum laude (or "with highest honors")". Hist diploma will reflect
this.
A "university" is a superset of a college which also grants
"post-graduate" degrees, notably "master's degrees (MS, MA,...)",
"doctorates (PhD)", "medical degrees (MD)", "law degrees (JD)" and
"MBAs" (master's in business administration). Universities are
organized into "schools" (e.g., law, arts, sciences, engineering)
which are in turn organized into departments. I could go into the
whole range of "dissertations", "theses", "comps", "quals", "orals",
"thesis defenses", "post-docs", "coterms", and "JD/MBAs", but it's
lunch time, and this is long enough as it is (and there's probably
nobody still reading, anyway).
Hope this helped!
Jeffrey Curtis
> [...]
> Middle school: grades 6 through 8.
>
> Junior high school: grades 7 through 9. A local school system usually
> has either middle schools or junior high schools, but not both.
> College: a four-year post-secondary institution, granting degrees of
> Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) and/or Bachelor of Science (B.S.). A "college",
> unlike a "university", usually emphasizes undergraduate study and has few
> if any graduate or professional programs.
I thought I would add two things - first, a school which has grades 6 through
8 can also be called a "junior high" (as was the one which I attended).
Second, a college is not necessarily a four-year institution. Two-year,
post-secondary institutions are also referred two as "colleges", albeit one
usually calls them a "junior college".
--
*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*
+ Jeffrey S. Curtis cur...@achilles.ctd.anl.gov (708)972-4750 B41801 AT ANLVM +
* Computing and Telecommunications, Argonne National Laboratory *
+ "The opinions expressed above are mine only. Who else would want them?!" +
*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*
Natalie Maynor
>age kids (usually age three or four, although "Montessori" schools
Another common term for "preschool" is "nursery school."
>"Kindergarten" is for five year olds and is the first official
>"school" provided in the public (government financed and run) schools.
>Students are called "kindergarteners".
Not all cities provide government-financed kindergartens.
>"diploma". (Note that a student can "drop out" of school anytime
>after his/her sixteenth birthday, so not all adults are high school
>graduates.)
The legal age for dropping out of school is determined by state law.
It is not always sixteen.
--
--Natalie (n...@ra.msstate.edu)
David L. Phillips
In article <KIRSHENBAUM....@hplerk.hpl.hp.com>,
kirsh...@hplabs.hpl.hp.com (Evan Kirshenbaum) says:
>
>necessary). These grades are split into "elementary (or "grammar" or
>"grade" or "primary") school" and "high school".
Nitpick here: when I attended 7th and 8th grades (too many years ago) I was
said to be attending grammar school. Also: another way of identifying the
two types of public schools is "elementary" and secondary."
>
>A "university" is a superset of a college which also grants
>"post-graduate" degrees, notably "master's degrees (MS, MA,...)",
>"doctorates (PhD)", "medical degrees (MD)", "law degrees (JD)" and
>"MBAs" (master's in business administration). Universities are
>organized into "schools" (e.g., law, arts, sciences, engineering)
>which are in turn organized into departments.
Colleges and universities are commonly referred to as "post-secondary
institutions." To confuse matters even more, typically universities are
organized into "colleges" as well as "schools." Although there is no standard
terminology, "schools" most often apply to professional training (law, medicine
journalism, music, etc.), "colleges" to other academic pursuits. But that
certainly isn't true in all cases.
Evan Kirshenbaum
> >"Preschool" is more or less an organized daycare for pre-kindergarten
> >age kids (usually age three or four, although "Montessori" schools
>
> Another common term for "preschool" is "nursery school."
Yeah, and that's what we called it when I went there! :-)
I also blanked on "junior college" for "community college", forgot
that junior highs can start at sixth grade, and left off
o "undergrad" (or "undergraduate")--a college student going for his
bachelor's degree),
o "underclassmen" and "upperclassmen"--usually "freshmen/sophomores"
and "juniors/seniors" respectively),
o "PTA (or "PTO")--a "Parent/Teacher Association (or
"Organization")", an organization which allows parents to express
their concerns to the school board.
o "field trip"--an organized excursion as when a class visits a
museum.
o "principal"--the head of a school (generally through high school).
His underlings are "vice principles".
o "dean"--the head of a college or a school within a university
(some high schools have deans as well). His underlings are
"assistant (or "vice") deans".
o "extracurricular (activity)"--an activity such as football, band,
or a school newspaper or yearbook which is sponsored by the school
(usually through high school) but takes place outside of school
hours and does not count toward graduation.
o "solid"--a (high school) class in a major academic subject
(usually, math, English, science, social studies, and foreign
languages) as opposed to shop, gym, or orchestra.
o "shop"--a (junior high/high school) course in
woodworking/metalworking.
o "gym (or "PE" or "phys ed")"--A physical education class (i.e.,
sports and exercise). Also the room in which such a class meets.
o "IMC (or "LRC")"--A library ("Instructional Materials Center",
"Learning Resource Center"; how many other silly names did people
have for their libraries?). Most schools just call them
libraries.
o "special ed"--Classes (through high school) for students with
learning disabilities.
o "honors (or "advanced" "accelerated" or "AP") classes"--High
school classes whose pace is faster. "AP" courses are geared
toward preparing students for the "Advanced Placement" tests.
o "PSATs, SATs, ACTs, APs (or "AP exams"), Achievements (or
"Achievement Tests")--various tests that students take in high
school to help them get into college and "place out" of
requirements in college. PSATs ("preliminary SATs") help
determine which colleges send you brochures and also make you
eligible for the "National Merit Scholorship". SATs ("Standard
Aptitude Test") and ACTs (??) are used in admission decisions
(most schools use one or the other). APs and Achievements are
used to place out of requirements.
o "gifted program"--a program in which academically superior
students from several elementary schools in a district are brought
together for a few hours a week (to convince them that not
everybody their age is a dolt :-)
o "tracking"--in high schools, having several classes in a subject
at each grade level which proceed at different paces.
o "in service"--a part day holiday for the students while the
teachers are all meeting. (I'm unsure of the etymology of this
one.)
Doubtless many others. But it's a start.
[As an aside, this was easier than sitting in the stands at
Candlestick park trying to explain the game of baseball to a German
housemate who spoke English but had no knowledge of the game. You
think you understand a subject, but when you have to explain it, you
find that there are a *lot* of terms and it's more confusing than you
thought.]
> >"Kindergarten" is for five year olds and is the first official
> >"school" provided in the public (government financed and run) schools.
> >Students are called "kindergarteners".
>
> Not all cities provide government-financed kindergartens.
>
> >"diploma". (Note that a student can "drop out" of school anytime
> >after his/her sixteenth birthday, so not all adults are high school
> >graduates.)
>
> The legal age for dropping out of school is determined by state law.
> It is not always sixteen.
This is true. I avoided discussing who makes what decisions about
public schools. There is a great deal of variation around the
country. I also left off terms that tend to be politically charged,
like "bussing", "choice", "vouchers", "tuition tax credits",
"bilingual education", "phonics", and "magnet schools".
Peter B. Glenn
Phillips) writes:
|>
|> In article <KIRSHENBAUM....@hplerk.hpl.hp.com>,
|> kirsh...@hplabs.hpl.hp.com (Evan Kirshenbaum) says:
|> >
|> >necessary). These grades are split into "elementary (or "grammar"
or
|> >"grade" or "primary") school" and "high school".
Around here we have three types: "elementary", "junior high", and "high
school". The "junior high" school is 7th, 8th and 9th grades. We
consider the first two types "primary" or "grammar" schools, and "high
school" as "secondary school". We consider a university or college a
"tertiary" type of school.
|>
|> Nitpick here: when I attended 7th and 8th grades (too many years ago)
I was
|> said to be attending grammar school. Also: another way of
identifying the
|> two types of public schools is "elementary" and secondary."
|>
Pete
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
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Bellcore (MRE 2E-375) | INTERNET: pe...@bellcore.bellcore.com
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rose...@zodiac.rutgers.edu
d...@andromeda.rutgers.edu (Daniel Rosenblum) (that's me on another system)
writes, inter alia:
>
> This non-uvular non-tongue-trill [r] that we have in the States and
> that also seems to exist in parts of England seems to be tricky for
> a lot of people, even native speakers. There's a National Public
> Radio who covers Yugoslavia and Albania and who's obviously British,
> whose [r]s sound awfully [w]-ish. (He may also report for the BBC;
> I can't recall his name, but I think it's a French-sounding name.)
> I can't imagine him getting a reporting job in the uniform-as-white-
> bread commercial radio/TV news media in the States, but fortunately
> NPR and other countries' media care more for good reporting and
> being comprehensible than for the presence of idiosyncracies of
> speech that don't damage comprehensibility.
The reporter I was thinking of is Pierre Vickery (I'm not sure how he
spells his last name). The ghost of "Pierre" in my memory is what made
me think he has a French-sounding name. I've heard a lot of him lately,
thanks to events in Yugoslavia and Albania.
--
Mary Shafer OFDD
high school. Many smaller school districts have grade/grammer schools;
larger districts are more likely to peel the last two or three years off
as junior high school or middle school.
The origin of the name "grade school" is, of course, that each year is
referred to as a grade (first grade, sixth grade). This is in distinction
to high school, where each year has a name (freshman year, senior year).
--
Mary Shafer DoD #0362 NASA Ames Dryden Flight Research Facility, Edwards, CA
sha...@pioneer.arc.nasa.gov sha...@skipper.dfrf.nasa.gov
Of course I don't speak for NASA
"Turn to kill, not to engage." CDR Willie Driscoll
"Hey, Willie, how long can you tread water?" CDR Randy Cunningham
Mark Brader
> high school. Many smaller school districts have grade/grammer schools;
> larger districts are more likely to peel the last two or three years off
> as junior high school or middle school.
>
> The origin of the name "grade school" is, of course, that each year is
> referred to as a grade (first grade, sixth grade). This is in distinction
> to high school, where each year has a name (freshman year, senior year).
Fascinating. I was aware of both of these bizarre (to me) American
usages, but I never connected them with each other.
I went to *elementary* school (grades 1 to 6 -- note that the cardinal
form is usual) in Alberta; but then before I finished that, we moved to
Ontario and I found myself in *public* school (kindergarten and grades
1 to 6). In Alberta and some parts of Ontario this would have been
followed by junior high school (grades 7 to 8 or 9), but in the
particular part of Ontario where I was, this was instead called *senior
public* school (grades 7 and 8).
And yes, this too seems bizarre to me, though not as much so as the
British usage where "public school" and "private school" refer to two
different types of private school!
I found it particularly silly because "public" was also the word for
the school system that most people paid for through their taxes, with
students having the right to attend without a direct fee being paid,
characterized by an absence or (then) near-absence of religious teaching.
Roman Catholics have the right here -- it's grandfathered in from before
religious-equality days, and I think it was assumed originally that the
public school system would teach Protestant Christianity -- to direct
their school taxes and send their children to schools where their own
religion is taught. These are called "separate" schools to contrast
with the "public" school system. (This system continues up to the
high school level too.)
When I started high school, it was grades 9 through 13, but by the time
I finished, it had been changed to years 1 to 5. On the other hand,
when I went to university, I found that undergrads (undergraduate students
- those without a university degree already, working on a Bachelor's degree)
were there referred to as being in first year through fourth year, using
the ordinal form. "Freshmen" or slang "frosh" also referred to first-year
students, but was mostly used at the start of the academic year when they
were, um, extra-fresh. The university was Waterloo.
--
Mark Brader "Actually, $150, to an educational institution,
Toronto turns out to be about the same as a lower amount."
utzoo!sq!msb, m...@sq.com -- Mark Horton
This article is in the public domain.
G Toal
:The real weird thing, of course, is that thise people call *themselves*
:"sophomore" at some point in their study.
Aha! The oxymoron thrad again :-)
J. A. Durieux
>(...) high school, where each year has a name (freshman year, senior year).
The real weird thing, of course, is that thise people call *themselves*
"sophomore" at some point in their study.
It is (for a non-American) an incredible experience to hear someone say,
with a completely straight face, "I'm a sophomore".