-stein names: -stine, or -steen?

[Wilson Gray]

As is so often the case with language, very little is true of all
possible cases. I have Jewish friiends with the surnames, "Stine"[sic]
and "Kapstein," pronounced "Kapstine."
On 1/10/06, Mark Spahn <mspahn at localnet.com> wrote:
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Mark Spahn <mspahn at LOCALNET.COM>
> Subject:      -stein names: -stine, or -steen?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> An new episode of 'Law and Order' tonight included
> a medical examiner technician who argued that she
> could handle a handgun because of her training with
> the U.S. Air Force in Ramstein, Germany.
>
> Unfortunately, she pronounced "Ramstein" with neither
> its German pronunciation "Rahm-shtine" nor its Anglicized=20
> pronunciation "Ram-stine", but with the pronunciation "Ram-steen".
>
> There are two prominent persons in Western New York
> named Weinstein.  One, a politician, pronounces his name
> "Wine-steen".  The other, a former TV newsreader, pronounces
> his name "Wine-stine".  The proper pronunciation of a German-
> derived word ending in -stein is "-stine" (in German, "-shtine").
> It has been explained to me (correct me if this understanding is wrong)
> that both the Yiddish and the German word for "stone" was
> originally "stin", but that in German there was a vowel shift
> to the "stine" pronunciation, while the Yiddish pronunciation
> remained "steen".  That is why a name like Bernstein is
> pronounced sometimes German-style as "Bern-stine"
> and sometimes Yiddish-style as "Bern-steen".
>
> In any case, "Ram-steen" is an unambiguously wrong pronunciation
> for the purely German word "Ramstein".  The TV cop show
> 'Law and Order' is set and filmed in New York City, which=20
> has a high Jewish population.  My guess is that the actress who was=20
> called upon to pronounce the word "Ramstein" pronouced it
> following the pattern of Jewish surnames spelled "-stein" but=20
> pronounced "-steen".
>
> -- Mark Spahn  (West Seneca, NY)
>