"gyro" pronunciation

Victoria Neufeldt vneufeldt at M-W.COM
Wed Mar 22 14:38:31 UTC 2000


"Gyro" is also quite commonly pronounced like the first element of words
like "gyrostabilizer", at least in western Massachusetts.  For anyone who
uses only that pronunciation, it certainly would be a far phonetic reach to
"hero"!

Victoria

Merriam-Webster, Inc. P.O. Box 281
Springfield, MA 01102
Tel: 413-734-3134  ext 124
Fax: 413-827-7262


> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU]On Behalf
> Of Laurence Horn
> Sent: Tuesday, March 21, 2000 6:37 PM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: Poor Boys
>
>
> To repeat and, I hope, clarify my claims:
> (1) our NYC hero sandwiches predated gyro sandwiches in that location by
> decades.
[SNIP]
> (3) I see no problem in principle deriving "hero" from "gyro" on phonetic
> grounds alone, the latter being pronounced with an initial [y] or
> voiceless
> palatal fricative, but the chronological and referential evidence renders
> any such derivation extremely implausible.
>
> larry
>
> Anne Lambert writes:
> >I doubt very much if "hero" can be derived from "gyro." We don't
> have that
> >kind of phonetic process in English.
> >Muffuletta is as described--chopped green olives, pimentos, etc.
> >I know very little about the hero you describe, or really about
> any hero.  I
> >always assumed it was just a variant term for the submarine.
> Maybe I'm wrong
> >and it's a different sandwich.
> >
>[SNIP]



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