English words beginning with <j> pronounced [Z]?

[Dennis Preston]

LH,

I believe the recommended Shakespearian version was /Jekwiz/ not /Jakwiz/.

dInIs

>---------------------- Information from the mail header
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>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>Subject:      Re: English words beginning with <j> pronounced [Z]?
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>At 4:20 AM +0000 1/22/08, Tom Zurinskas wrote:
>>Borrowed French words like genre ~zhaanru, (where ~aa sounds like
>>"ah" and ~u like "uh".)  Also Jacques, ~zhaaks.
>
>Seems like if someone is going to bother with the /Z/ for "Jacques",
>they'll go the whole hog:  /Zak/, not /Zaks/.  (For Shakespeare, I
>believe it was anglicized to something like /Jakwiz/.) And the riddle
>posed by Nadia Gabriel below originally specified an initial <j>, not
><g>, FWIW.
>
>LH
>
>>
>>Tom Zurinskas, USA - CT20, TN3, NJ33, FL5+
>>See truespel.com - and the 4 truespel books plus "Occasional Poems"
>>at authorhouse.com.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>>   Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2008 14:42:43 -0500
>>>   From: laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
>>>   Subject: Re: English words beginning with  pronounced [Z]?
>>>   To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>>>
>>>   ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>>-----------------------
>>>   Sender: American Dialect Society
>>>   Poster: Laurence Horn
>>>   Subject: Re: English words beginning with  pronounced [Z]?
>>>
>>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>>   At 1:56 PM -0500 1/21/08, Charles Doyle wrote:
>>>>A while back, didn't we discuss a word pronounced [ZUZ], a noun
>>>>referring to a quick shake given to something? I have no idea how
>>>>the word might be spelled!
>>>>
>>>>--Charlie
>>>
>>>   Most posters who seemed to know (or at least seemed to be confident)
>>>   had it as "zhuzh", and cited Queer Eye for the Straight Guy as the
>>>   vector. (Steve Kleinedler may have nominated it for one of the WOTY
>>>   categories a couple of years ago.)
>>>
>>>   LH
>>>
>>>>_____________________________________________________________
>>>>
>>>>---- Original message ----
>>>>>Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2008 13:19:07 -0500
>>>>>From: Dennis Preston >
>>>>>In LIN 101 we teach students that /Z/ (the second sound in 'azure'
>>>>>the last sound in 'garage') is a silly sound (like ng) which can
>>>>>occur internally and finally but never initially. In final position
>>>>>it is giving way to /dZ/, and here in good-talking and linguistically
>>>>>secure Michigan, people surveyed were not sensitive to the final /dZ/
>>>>>pronunciation as nonstandard.
>>>>>
>>>>>dInIs
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>>>>>-----------------------
>>>>>>Sender: American Dialect Society
>>>>>>Poster: Nadia Gabriel
>>>>>>Subject: English words beginning with  pronounced [Z]?
>>>>>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Dear all,
>>>>>>
>>>>>>A question out of a friend's curious brain - he is French,
>>>>>>currently taking
>>>>>>lessons to improve his English:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Do you know of words, common word or proper names, in the
>>>>>>English language
>>>>>>that begin with the letter  but that are pronounced without the [d]
>>>>>>sound, just the [Z] sound?
>>>>>>Or, to put it another way, words where the initial  is pronounced as in
>>>>>>French?
>>>>>>
>>>>>>I can't think of any!
>>>>>>An advanced search in the OED Online ("Entries containing Z
>>>>>>in Pronunciations") retrieves only one word: jinricksha, jinrikisha,
>>>>>>*n.*,
>>>>>>from Japanese.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>I'd be grateful for any comments!
>>>>>>   (I must add I didn't read all the article under the entry for
>>>>>>the letter J,
>>>>>>which also appeared in the results of my search - Wonderful OED)
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Thank you,
>>>>>>
>>>>>>   Nadia Gabriel
>>>>>>   Librarian & Translator
>>>>>>
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>  >>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>--
>>>>>Dennis R. Preston
>>>>>University Distinguished Professor
>>>>>Department of English
>>>>>Morrill Hall 15-C
>>>>>Michigan State University
>>>>>East Lansing, MI 48864 USA
>>>>>
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>>>>
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>>>>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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--
Dennis R. Preston
University Distinguished Professor
Department of English
Morrill Hall 15-C
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48864 USA

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