taking poll on pronunciation

[John Dunn]

As it happens, I have of late been contemplating the rules by which English speakers assign stress to unfamiliar Russian names.  In the instance of Borodino, two rules would seem to be relevant.

The first is that final stress is generally avoided.  There are exceptions to this with some two-syllable names, particularly if they are transliterated according to French norms (as used to be the practice for passports and the like), but final stress does not appear to occur spontaneously with longer names.

The second rule is that English prefers to avoid sequences of more than two unstressed syllables.  With four-syllable names there are thus two options, and while it is my impression that the second syllable is the 'default' (if there is one), the actual assignment appears to depend on the shape of the word.  I am sure that a previous correspondent is correct in suggesting that BoroDIno is prompted by Italian patterns such as ValenTIno, just as the pattern CasaNOva is probably responsible for stress assignments of the SharaPOva type.  

John Dunn.

-----Original Message-----
From: Kevin Windle <kevin.windle at ANU.EDU.AU>
To: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
Date: Mon, 17 May 2010 13:27:33 +1000
Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] taking poll on pronunciation

In my experience as a Brit living in Australia, speakers in the UK and Australia will pronounce BorodINo with exactly the stress preferred in North America, i.e. primary stress on the third syllable and a weaker one on the first. Stressing the last syllable seems unnatural to most speakers of English. It may actually render the name unrecognizable to them, forcing those who do know Russian to shift the stress to the penult when speaking English. Much the same thing happens with Vladivostok. English-speakers will generally place the stress on the penult.

Kevin Windle,


John Dunn
Honorary Research Fellow, SMLC (Slavonic Studies)
University of Glasgow, Scotland

Address:
Via Carolina Coronedi Berti 6
40137 Bologna
Italy
Tel.: +39 051/1889 8661
e-mail: J.Dunn at slavonic.arts.gla.ac.uk
johnanthony.dunn at fastwebnet.it


John Dunn
Honorary Research Fellow, SMLC (Slavonic Studies)
University of Glasgow, Scotland

Address:
Via Carolina Coronedi Berti 6
40137 Bologna
Italy
Tel.: +39 051/1889 8661
e-mail: J.Dunn at slavonic.arts.gla.ac.uk
johnanthony.dunn at fastwebnet.it

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Use your web browser to search the archives, control your subscription
  options, and more.  Visit and bookmark the SEELANGS Web Interface at:
                    http://seelangs.home.comcast.net/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------