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#16015 01/18/01 05:54 PM
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This is one that gets me while traveling also...mispronouncing the name of a town.

For instance: Philadelphia to the locals is "Philla-lephia", said quickly. Or just plain "Philly". Trenton, NJ is "Treton" no "n' sound.

I was corrected for this one in New England: Haverhill pronounded "Haver(long a)ill", not "Haver-hill".

And of course, the Big Apple is "New Yawk".

"Adversity is the whetstone of creativity"

#16016 01/18/01 06:16 PM
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Wherein Schuylkill is pronounced skookle.


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Haverhill pronounced "Haver(long a)ill", not "Haver-hill".

"HAY-vrill " is just down the road from me.So there must be sub-regional-accent thingies.
Then there is Tewksbury -- Tooks-bry and
Billerica --- Bill-RICKA
and the ever popular Worcester which all the Brits will be glad to help with.
I was fine in England as so many of the names are the same ..... but a trip to Ireland tripped me up with Youghal.
It's "yawl!" or, for the Southerners, "y'all."
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Anyone wanna wrap their lips around Puyallup? (Sort of a Seattle suburb...)


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A few Oldies for completeness, you can search on them if you want to see what has gone before, otherwise just trust me.

Before entering Britain anyone from elsewhere will impress the natives if they can say:
Reading
Leicester
Shrewsbury
Cholmondley
I'll leave the Welsh to post for themselves.


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Shrewsbury

This one gave me pause- I would have assumed that it's pronounced shrewsbree, how wrong am I? The others were far to easy - I had a teacher from Redding, a good friend was born in Lester, and everybody knows chumley, don't they?


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I can't find the original posting on Shrewsbury, so here is my answer:
It depends
The posh way is Shrowsbry (rhymes with throw)
- this is perceived by non locals to be correct.

Many of the locals say Shrewsbree (as you said)

but where I lived - up the road a few miles - they said
Shoe-s-bry as in shoe (search me as to why)

So it doesn't matter how you say it, you just need the evidence to prove that you are right!


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"HAY-vrill " is just down the road from me.So there must be sub-regional-accent thingies. Then there is Tewksbury -- Tooks-bry and Billerica --- Bill-RICKA and the ever popular Worcester which all the Brits will be glad to help with.

I grew up in Boston, not far from these towns, and also near Medford - pronounced Meffuhd, even though Bedford was pronounced as you'd expect. I have to differ on the prononciation of Worcester. The Boston version is Wuh-sta, which is probably different from how the Brits would have it.


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>The Boston version is Wuh-sta, which is probably different from how the Brits would have it.

Wusta sounds close enough to Wuh-sta to me, unless I'm missing something.

The big difference with a lot of those kind of names comes in the associated counties.

In the US I tend to hear Devon-shire with the shire emphasised.

For most people, all the shires in the UK are swallowed, so you get:
Worcestershire - wustersh-r
Lancashire- lancash-r
Devonshire- devonsh-r
with the accent of the first syllable, not the last. I'm sure that Shanks will know that proper phonetic spelling.

Only in the South West would you get the full devon-shire with a full shire but still having the accent on the "de".

I suppose it is because most counties were shires and it wasthe bit at the beginning that made them destintive, rather than the shire at the end.


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From Hyla re Worcester : The Boston version is Wuh-sta,

Exactly!
And doesn't it drive you nuts when actors who are playing Boston characters call it Woo-ster?
Another town that bemuses is Taunton -- near New Bedford, Massachusetts -- which locals pronounce TAN'n with the n sort of half-swallowed !
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Taunton MA

and then there's Staunton VA, pronounced Stanton.


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In reply to:

mispronouncing the name of a town


I have to take issue with your use of mispronouncing. You, a stranger, may think the name of a place should be pronounced a certain way; but I submit that the way it's pronounced by the folks who live there is ipso facto the "correct" pronunciation.


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And doesn't it drive you nuts when actors who are playing Boston characters call it Woo-ster?

There's a city in Ohio actually called Wooster. It's near Akron. I would suspect that it was named from the pronunciation of Worchester.


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>I have to take issue with your use of mispronouncing. You, a stranger, may think the name of a place should be pronounced a certain way; but I submit that the way it's pronounced by the folks who live there is ipso facto the "correct" pronunciation.

Said the man from Ball-mur.



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Another town that bemuses is Taunton -- near New Bedford, Massachusetts -- which locals pronounce TAN'n with the n sort of half-swallowed !

I'm thinking of doing some proper research into this. It will mean, several years of travelling/traveling around with a microphone. All I need is some research funding or to persuade the taxman that all my travels are tax deductable.

I think that if I interviewed a real denizen of Taunton in Sommerset they would say Tauu-n. With an elongated first vowel, a common feature of the dialect of the South West. I was wondering if "TAN'n" has a long or a short "a"? If it is a long "a" then it is not so different.


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>I have to take issue with your use of mispronouncing. You, a stranger, may think the name of a place should be pronounced a certain way; but I submit that the way it's pronounced by the folks who live there is ipso facto the "correct" pronunciation.

I agree that the way the locals say the word is the "correct" way. In some cases, as I have mentioned before, there are a few different "correct" local versions. In fact, finding these obscure local variations is part of the fun of travelling.

I think it is different in the UK where the names tend to be older and have evolved over along time without an obvious reference point. The ones I find really strange are the ones like Cairo http://wordsmith.org/board/showthreaded.pl?Cat=&Board=words&Number=12538 which you mentioned in the cultural arrogance thread and I believe was mentioned in one of Bill Bryson's books.

I find it interesting that such a well known (and really quite easy to pronounce) place name got changed. I suppose that in the days before mass communication, it didn't really matter how the rest of the world pronounced a word, it just mattered that you said it the same way as your parents and your teacher.


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Y'all who responded to Chickie's post ought to give it a re-read: This is one that gets me while traveling also...mispronouncing the name of a town. ... I betcha the subject of "mispronouncing" is my, not their.

Anyway, down here in Joe-ja we have a couple of gems that immediately spring to mind:

Albany = Al-BEN-ny
Vienna = VY-en-na


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Georgia and Dangling Participles

Boy, the Klan has moved on, hasn't it?

The major difference between Zild and Strine, and one that appears to be obvious only to Aunty Podeans and her offspring, is the Zild swallowing of vowels that the Striners actually lengthen. So when in the Land of Oz, I and most of my country-things stand out simply because of the way we pronounce some names. The two that spring to mind are Brisbane - which Zild has as "br's-bin" and Strine has as "breez-bayne" (a little exaggerated in both casses) and Sydney, which Zild pronounces "S'd-ny" and Strine has as "Seed-knee" - again, exaggerated a bit.

For all that we understand each other except when it comes to Aboriginal and Maori place names.



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I was wondering if "TAN'n" has a long or a short "a"? If it is a long "a" then it is not so different.
A sort of semi-long a.
OK?
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>A sort of semi-long a.

I think the only way for me to get over this problem is to fly over immediately, all this second hand stuff is just not good enough. I have to hear the a's.



#16035 01/20/01 11:34 PM
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>wherein Schuylkill is pronounced skookle.

Hooray! Someone who knows the correct pronunciation of Schuylkill... :-)
One way we Berks Countians immediately identify out-of-towners is their mispronunciation of Reading (which is supposed to be "Redding") or the name of our neighboring county of Lancaster. Non-Pennsylvania Dutchies tend to say "Lan-caster" instead of the proper "Lenkister."


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The Kentucky cities of Cadiz and Lafayette are pronounced by the locals as KAYdiz and laFAYette. (AY = long a)


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Georgia and Dangling Participles

Boy, the Klan has moved on, hasn't it?

Yep. Our participles are free to dangle now. But you: keep an eye on the trees in your backyard. Or south garden. Or whatever y'all call it down there. Roger. 10-4. Over.




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JEFFREY!!

My gosh, welcome. Holy cow, another Kentuckian! I was
beginning to feel like the first lone Kiwi!(sorry, Max!)
We even used to have the same boss!
As far as I know, the town you're in is HOP-kns-vull.


#16039 01/21/01 02:24 PM
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>A sort of semi-long a.
jmh says I think the only way for me to get over this problem is to fly over immediately, all this second hand stuff is just not good enough. I have to hear the a's.

Research "on the groud" is finest kind. I'll ready the guest room, put on the tea and warm up the scones.
wow
P.S. what is correct pronunciation of "scones?"


#16040 01/21/01 03:33 PM
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>P.S. what is correct pronunciation of "scones?"

The short answer is "it depends on the way the cookie crumbles". If you have a few spare hours, it may be a good idea to run it through the trusty search engine. I seem to remember a discussion about it a while ago!

Oh, and I'd like a hot water bottle!


#16041 01/21/01 03:53 PM
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>Oh, and I'd like a hot water bottle!

And James also???



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Holy cow, another Kentuckian! I was
beginning to feel like the first lone Kiwi!


You thought Kentucky was the only state that had only one board member?

Oh wait, I live in the same state as Anu!


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Oh wait, I live in the same state as Anu!

Well, that state would have to be non-corporeal or disembodied if Father Steve's view of Anu's state is to be believed.

And I beat Ted to a pun.



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Now confound it, you guys! Of COURSE I didn't think KY was the only state with one subscriber: better watch it, or you may wind up being the only octopus with seven tentacles. My uncle on the farm had a colorful saying when someone wanted the last biscuit or piece of chicken: if someone reached for it, they were going to "draw back a nub". And just for the record, I don't like jazz, either.

And as to Anu's state: he is in an exalted state, and when I think of him, I am in a state of exaltation!
Speaking of people from India, I read an article yesterday by a gentleman who has been there many times, and he asked himself: "What is it that makes India so different?...
It was the worldview these people lived by and projected in their daily activities, their hands held together in greeting to assert that you and I are one, in the belief that this world is maya--illusion."


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I don't like jazz, either

[shocked more than the shocked emoticon can describe emoticon]

how darest thou say that!?


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Now now Jazz, we can`t all like the same things. Don`t be tooo hurt, do YOU like Bob Denver? (she says while fleeing for fear of the oncoming storm)


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how darest thou say that!?

Why, because it's just squankings and honkings--positively
hurts my ears--and my ever-so-tender sensibilities.



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Jackie said, of Jazz (the music, not the man)it's just squankings and honkings

"Squankings" - bewdiful, I'll have to remember that one. While not the most devout jazz afficionado since Bix, I am quite partial to the less strident forms of the genre. I have uploaded to my driveway acount two small pieces, both involving a "fiddle", one featuring two jazz icons, the other as a supremely altruistic gesture to our beleaguered Kentuckians. I leave you to guess which one I consider just squankings and honkings


#16049 01/23/01 01:10 PM
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Dearest Max! Thank you, thank you, for putting that there! I just chortled all the way through it! Yes, I know that song very well. I've seen Bill Monroe and the
Bluegrass Boys perform several times, at the annual
Bluegrass Music Festival here in town.

Overall, I prefer the instrumental bluegrass tunes, simply because more players than not do it for love of the music, not because they have good voices. And yes, Bill sings in
true-blue Kentucky twang. Not all that pleasant, but it is
real--a true reflection of what and who we are, so I don't mind it (too much). The instrumental pieces: I double-dog
dare ANYbody to keep their toes from tappin' to the beat!
We'd sit in the sun all day at these festivals, cooler with
appropriate beverages at our side, and go home well after dark with hands and throats sore from clapping and "hollering". This was two girlfriends and me, and we got to know some of the bands rather well.

Aside: Years ago when we were young and Faldage-I-mean-foolish, we went to a costume party where a friend "wore"
the most unusual costume I've ever seen: He had a 2" square
cut out of the seat of his jeans, giving a view of his
underwear-less, blue-painted backside--he had come as
Blue Moon of Kentucky!


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Set aside any currently held bias about jazz until you watch the current Ken Burns series "Jazz." It is an education (!) and filled with terrific music, rare performance clips, all so very well done you forget it's a documantary! Covers Jazz from its beginnings to present.
On Public Broadcasting in USA -- I hope it will be available outside the country.
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re: Anyone wanna wrap their lips around Puyallup?

In the SW of Western Australia, there's a plethora of place names that end in "up" - eg Yallingup, Yunderup, Balingup, Mullallyup. Originates from the local Aboriginal (Noongyar - pron. Noong-arr, short oo, sounds like 'u' in full) language and said to mean "place of", particularly in reference to a place of water.

So how'd Puyallup get a Noongyar name??

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There's a few I've flagged before (eg Toodyay ("2-jay") & Derby (Derby - NOT Darby) in WestOz), but just thought of anotheree......Canowindra in NewSouthOz.

Can-ow-n-dra (ow as in ouch) NOT Can-no-windra. Funny name, gorgeous town but!

stales




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I have enjoyed the PBS "Jazz" series, and as someone who has heard this information in many forms in the past, it is refreshing to see it, as well as listen to it. It is interesting to hear (second hand) that the "fools" on public radio gave this show a "less than good" review, probably for the same reason I don't listen to them often (a bit pretentious and pseudo...a lot of things).

As for "squanking and honking"... these are the sounds that some souls need for catharsis. At least it responds (somehow) to repetition(Hi Marty).

Jackie - Does the name come from the actual grass variety? Is it specifically from Kentucky? I'm with you all the way on the toe tappin' challenge - but "double-dog dare", whew, that's even futher than our "double dare" - Where does the dog come from - fit in - do - what kind of dog?




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Ah, sweet musick to my ears!

Yes, bluegrass music is named after the grass, which is our
state's nickname: Kentucky is the Bluegrass State. (Interesting, since we're really a commonwealth--see past thread.) Bluegrass is found primarily around Lexington, which is horse farm country.

Well, catharse all you want with your squankings, but please let me get out of earshot. I really dislike saxophone, most of the time. Not that fond of clarinet, either. For some reason, oboe doesn't grate like those 2.

What kind of dog? Why, a blue-tick coon hound, of course!


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You are so right, words and their correct pronunciations----Who is correct? We will never ever know. I am from Wisconsin and now live in Eastern Ohio near Pittsburgh and to hear the name Cinncinnati pronounced just kills me----the regionals say "Cinncinaata" and here is another one that kills me--------
"Awl youse" (All you) But actually, we should just learn to accept people and the way they say things---We have a German exchange student with us and he always insults the way us Americans do things or say things-----Well I think that when we go to Germany----we would be sent back if we sounded as insulting as him.
"When in Rome, do as the Romans do" as the old saying goes and it seems people have forgotten that.
And how about this one--"Are ya goin to get yor hairs cut."
jrj

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the regionals say "Cinncinaata"

Excuse me? I've never heard anyone who actually lives in the Cincinnati area call it "Cincinnaata." My grandmother who lives in northern Ohio, though . . .


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Well, catharse all you want with your squankings, but please let me get out of earshot.

How can you say this? Jazz has produced some of the most beautiful songs ever conceived. Just to name a few that you might want to check out:
Louis Armstrong: West End Blues
Bix Beiderbecke: Singin' the Blues
Rhapsody in Blue
Count Basie: Jumpin' at the Woodside
Artie Shaw: Begin the Beguine
Erroll Garner: Misty
Anything Billie Holiday or Lester Young
Miles Davis: Kind of Blue
Dave Brubeck/Paul Desmond: Blue Rhondo ala Turk, Take Five
Body and Soul

I'm sure these would change your mind about the "squankings." (Obviously, you don't want to listen to Charlie Parker.)

Jazz is America's music. It's creative, lively, beautiful and inspiring all at the same time. The amount of emotion that some of these artists had was astounding. Jazz fueled the roaring '20s and got the nation through the Depression and it's not something to brushed aside as wasteful, meaningless noise.

Info on the thrilling 'Jazz' documentary can be found at http://www.pbs.org/jazz


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To blend a couple of apposite aphorisms, or trite truisms, Jazz, we must remember that, while music may be the food of love, what is one person's meat is another's poison. For instance, and I hope Bingley will take no offence at this, gamelan music fits the "poison" category for me.


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Notice how that list uses a lot of the word "blue"...

I have to protest - even if only from exposure - Erroll Garner's Misty has lost all of it's appeal (I just played the damn thing too many times...it's that whole repetition thing (Hi Marty) - no matter who plays it, sings it, tap's it or otherwise, and it really wasn't that much of a "jazz" tune "to begin with".

She probably wouldn't want to listen to early Lester Young, either...

...but Jazz can be ugly and sickening (and wasteful and meaningless), and that, too, is appealing!

JazzO - We'll have to start A Jazz A Day if we keep this up "publicly"...


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Thanks soooo much for correcting me. Regionals could mean local area or statewide and since I am from Wisconsin, I thought that perhaps that is the way Cinncinnati is pronouced here----I never corrected those that said it. So now I know---since I live near Akron, Ohio and you said your Grandmother in Northern Ohio----well then I guess it is only the Northeast Ohio natives that say it. Thanks again, Jazzoctopus. Keep up the great work. You sound like a great kid.

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As catalyst for the sidetrack onto jazz and the relative merits (or demerits) of jazz and bluegrass music, I wish to state for the record that this Kentuckian owns a number of jazz tapes and CD's, but none of the bluegrass variety. I must confess a preference for horses to octopi, but this could be due to lack of familiarity with the latter, and should not be taken as any sort of personal slight.


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A lot of people in Kentucky say "Cincinnaata".


#16063 01/24/01 04:23 AM
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In reply to:

For instance, and I hope Bingley will take no offence at this, gamelan music fits the "poison" category for me.


Well, there's gamelan and gamelan. I find Sundanese music pleasant background music, but I'm not too keen on Balinese -- it sounds very jerky to me. Javanese can be very soothing. Of course, Indonesians have a very different attitude to it from what we have. You're not really supposed to sit down and listen to it as "great art". It is there for accompaniment to other activities. It's always fun to watch foreigners sitting very seriously at a performance while the locals wander about chatting and occasionally glancing at the stage.

Bingley



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#16064 01/24/01 08:51 AM
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Love jazz, Jazz.

In particular Dave Brubeck's "Take Five". I've been playing it a lot recently, having taken the decision to mark the end of the last millennium by purchasing all the recordings that I had always planned to get but had never got round to.


#16065 01/24/01 10:02 AM
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Brubeck is great. if you like that add something by The Modern Jazz Quartet to your collection.


#16066 01/24/01 12:19 PM
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To the belle Canadienne:

Yep, pure antithesis to jazz, but he did do a mean rendition of "Gilligan's Island" [my-turn-to-run-and-duck emoticon]


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Excuse me? I've never heard anyone who actually lives in the Cincinnati area call it "Cincinnaata."

It sort of gives a whole new aspect to Cincinnati to hear Proper Bostonians call it "Sin-Sin-Naughty!"
wow


#16068 01/24/01 04:40 PM
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Paul Desmond's sound is one of my favorites (I think even Jackie would approve), however, Stan Getz should be right up your...

What are some other words for "alley" (that place behind your garage (car port) that one keeps the trash cans (rubbish receptacles) here in the "Very Large Northeastern Town in Illinois"?


#16069 01/24/01 05:09 PM
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What are some other words for "alley" (that place behind your garage (car port) that one keeps the trash cans (rubbish receptacles) here in the "Very Large Northeastern Town in Illinois"?

I don't know about Illinois but I can give you some Canadian (Manitoba) alternatives. I would call it a "back lane", where people keep their "garbage cans". Also, for me, a garage has a door and is completely enclosed, whereas a carport is sort of a roof on legs, with some walls, or no walls, but definitely not enclosed.

However - now that I've moved the "the oldest city in North America" I have come to realize that back lanes and garages are relatively new things. We live in an older part of St. John's so there are no back lanes - everyone's yard abuts everyone else's. Everyone parks on the street, unless they've paved their front "lawn" (postage stamp size) into a parking pad. And no one has garbage cans because the wind would make the neighbourhood into a very dangerous place on garbage day!


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If you ever visit Newfoundland you should basically assume that no matter how you THINK a name is pronounced, be it ever so simply spelled, you're probably wrong (compared to what the locals would say). For example

Pouch Cove = "Pooch cove"
Baie d'Espoir = "Bay despair"
Baie Verte = "Bay vurt"
Topsail = "Topsl"
Baccalieu = "BaccaLOO"
Quidi Vidi = "Kiddy Viddy"

The list goes on...I've become so used to most of them that I no longer notice them as odd pronunciations!


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This Board always makes me realize how varied English really is. In the last three posts we have had three different definitions for the same item: rubbish receptacle, trash can, and garbage can.


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You can add dustbin for the one outside your home and rubbish bins for the ones in public places.

Bingley


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Recently read an article in a UK publication about something being "ready for the pedal can". Loved that. We have one in our kitchen but I'd never heard that term before.


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Euphemism in South changes "pecan" to "p'cahn" to avoid causing hearer to think of vile urine container.


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Why do people pronouce Missouri "Missoura" but Mississippi is not "Mississippa"?


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>Why do people pronouce Missouri "Missoura" but Mississippi is not "Mississippa"?<

Hmmm, is this a reversal of putting an "r" on the end of "idea?"


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Missouri
Even stranger, I'm told that while Arkansas is pronounced Ar-ken-saw when referring to the state, the eponymous river is pronounced the way it's written, Ar-can-zass.


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Did you know that during the Cold War, people were worried about nukular weapons? And we once bought a house with help from our realitor. [sigh]


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