"in phonetics"

[Wilson Gray]

Thanks, Bill!

In the old Army Security Agency, it was considered gauche to use the
official "phonetics" for ID purposes, when signing of at the end of a
shift. E.g. John Kershaw always signed off by saying, "This is
operator _Jackie Kennedy_." Since the Agency had its own chain of
command, separate from that of the rest of the military, it was
possible to get away with this kind of "grab-ass(ing)," jokingly given
the pswaydo-Continental pronunciation, [gra 'bas(IN)], instead of the
ordinary ['gr&b ,&s(IN)], as a sign of Agency pswaydo-sophistication
WRT to the hoi polloi of the military.

Someone on the ANS listserv, in a demonstration of overcorrect
pswaydo-learnedness, once made reference to "the polloi."

-Wilson

On Fri, Jul 10, 2009 at 6:13 AM, Bill Palmer<w_a_palmer at bellsouth.net> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Bill Palmer <w_a_palmer at BELLSOUTH.NET>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: "in phonetics"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Wilson,
>
> To the best of my knowledge "Alfa" still represents A in military
> "phonetics". Â Has remained the same since 1956, when it changed, supposedly
> to facilitate pronunciation by members of various NATO countries' armed
> forces. Â In the changeover from the old "Abel, Baker, Charlie..." form,
> three survived: Â Charlie, Mike, & Victor
>
> Bill Palmer
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Wilson Gray" <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Sent: Thursday, July 09, 2009 10:10 PM
> Subject: Re: "in phonetics"
>
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>> header -----------------------
>> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: "in phonetics"
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> I wonder why _A_ is such a problem? "Abel" in WWII, "alfa" during my
>> military service, now "adam." And there's "bravo" vs. "baker." But
>> "charlie" appears to be money.
>>
>> -Wilson
>>
>> On Wed, Jul 8, 2009 at 2:17 PM, Arnold Zwicky<zwicky at stanford.edu> wrote:
>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>>> header -----------------------
>>> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at STANFORD.EDU>
>>> Subject: Â  Â  Â "in phonetics"
>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> a little while ago, on an episode of NCIS, Special Agent Gibbs (played
>>> by Mark Harman), annoyed when people failed to understand some proper
>>> names, exhorted everyone to say the names "in phonetics" -- by which
>>> he meant that they should use what's known in some circles (especially
>>> military ones) as a "phonetic alphabet". Â the technical term for these
>>> is "spelling alphabet", but you can see why no one would want to say
>>> that you should use "spelling".
>>>
>>> a spelling alphabet is a kind of code for the letters of the alphabet,
>>> in which each letter is represented by a word beginning with that
>>> letter: Adam, Bravo, Charlie,...; Abel, Baker, Charlie,...
>>>
>>> the wikipedia entry gives a number of spelling alphabets, for english
>>> and a number of other languages:
>>> Â  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spelling_alphabet
>>>
>>> i didn't find "phonetic alphabet" (in this sense) under either
>>> "phonetic" or "alphabet" in the OED. Â or "spelling alphabet" under
>>> either "spelling" or "alphabet".
>>>
>>> arnold
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> -Wilson
>> â?"â?"â?"
>> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
>> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>> -----
>> -Mark Twain
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



--
-Wilson
–––
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Mark Twain

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org