"Cooper" redux

[Alice Faber]

Wilson Gray said:
>On Oct 12, 2004, at 2:15 PM, Arnold M. Zwicky wrote:

>>  Poster:       "Arnold M. Zwicky" <zwicky at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU>
>>
>>  On Oct 10, 2004, at 8:55 PM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>>
>>>  ...This third son's name is Cooper Manning. I've read in sports mags
>>>  and heard on TV sports programs that Cooper insists that his name is
>>>  absolutely *not* to be pronounced [kup at r]. Rather, it's to be
>>>  pronounced [kUp@], wherein "U" represents the sound of the "oo" of
>>>  "book." Apparently, the pronunciation [kup at r] sounds as ridiculous to
>>>  white Mississippians as it sounds to black Texans.

<snippage of Arnold's post>

>>  at least some people with [Up] in "Cooper" use it for everybody with
>>  that name, regardless of the name-bearer's own usage.
>>
>>  arnold (zwicky at csli.stanford.edu)
>>
>
>What I find interesting is the over=the-top reaction of [kUp@] speakers
>to the [kup at r] pronunciation. if you say [kup at r] to black Texans, their
>reaction is to laugh in your face. An otherwise-unknown white
>Mississipian becomes famous for his insistence that he *not* be
>referred to as [kup at r]. Both of these reactions seem extreme. Does it
>bother me that my name is routinely hypercorrected to [hwils at n] when
>I'm in Texas, even by people who've known me practically from birth? Of
>course not. Would the fact that, in some areas of Mississippi, your
>name will fall together with "honor" cause you to take umbrage? I doubt
>that it would. so what's up with these good folk who come from home?

Two reactions. First, my last name is Faber, with one R [febr]. It
drives me batty to be called Farber, with 2 Rs [farbr]. It's one of
two grudges that I still hold against my first grade teacher. (The
other is that she made me pretend to sound out words even though I
could already read perfectly well, because reading fluently was
"showing off".)

Second, I heard Peyton Manning interviewed on Mike and Mike in the
Morning this morning. His vowel in his brother's first name was not
[U]; it was far fronter than that, approaching a slightly rounded [I]
or barred-i (there are limits to what I can do with ASCII phonetics!).

--
 =============================================================================
Alice Faber                                             faber at haskins.yale.edu
Haskins Laboratories                                  tel: (203) 865-6163 x258
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