George Bush Hooked on Phonics at U.N. (that's YOO-en)
Dennis Baron
debaron at UIUC.EDU
Thu Sep 27 19:41:31 UTC 2007
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the Web of Language:
George Bush Hooked on Phonics at U.N. (that's YOO-en)
George W. Bush had no trouble naming names when he berated dictators
in Burma, Iran and Cuba during his speech on Sept. 25 before the U.N.
General Assembly, but when it came time to praise countries like
Kyrgyzstan and Mauritania for making “strides toward liberty,” the
president needed help with his pronunciation.
In a copy of the president’s speech that the White House released by
mistake, and which appeared briefly on the United Nations web page,
Mr. Bush’s speechwriters provided the president with phonetic
transcriptions of the hard words KEYRgeez-stan and moor-EH-tain-ee-a,
along with cues to help him denounce Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe (moo-
GAHbee), and the Harare (hah-RAR-ray) government.
It’s not unusual for public speakers to mark up their text with cues
to aid their delivery. But our politicians are so convinced that the
linguistic transformation of Eliza Doolittle from inarticulate flower
girl to “rain-in-Spain-falls-mainly-on-the-plain” socialite in “My
Fair Lady” will help them in their own efforts to morph from prairie
oysters (TERD blahsumz) into master orators, that they line the
waiting rooms of the descendants of poor professor Higgins (EN-ree IG-
inz), seeking dialect transplants that their health insurance still
considers experimental.
Nor is it surprising that the president got help with his U.N.
speech. Bush has a history of mangling his English. He trips over
difficult names like Abu Ghraib, says OPEC at an APEC meeting, and
coins new catch phrases like “I’m the decider.” ....
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DB
Dennis Baron
Professor of English and Linguistics
Department of English
University of Illinois
608 S. Wright St.
Urbana, IL 61801
office: 217-244-0568
fax: 217-333-4321
www.uiuc.edu/goto/debaron
read the Web of Language:
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