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

[Tom Zurinskas]

"Moo goo gie pan" is a poor choice for that name.  "Gai" would need be "guy" because the words are English based.  The letter string "ai" almost never represents the "eye" sound in English.  I would think that VOA-spell is by default the American government standard phonetic transcription system for English.  It's also the one most used by American newspapers and media.

Tom Zurinskas, USA - CT20, TN3, NJ33, FL5+
See truespel.com - and the 4 truespel books plus "Occasional Poems" at authorhouse.com.



> Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2008 21:13:03 -0500
> From: bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.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: Benjamin Zimmer
> Subject: Re: English words beginning with  pronounced [Z]?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Jan 22, 2008 5:54 PM, Tom Zurinskas  wrote:
>>
>>
>>> The five most common transcription systems are given here:
>>> http://www.blahedo.org/ascii-ipa.html
>>
>> Thanks for this site.
>> Which of the five does the US Government use? I know the VOA uses none of these. I call their
>> type of phonetic spelling VOAspel. No one has given me another name for it.
>
> Those are just IPA-to-ASCII transcription systems. VOA uses a phonetic
> respelling that has nothing to do with IPA.
>
> If you're looking for a name, Larry Urdang likes to call this type of
> phonetic respelling the Moo Goo Gai Pan System.
>
>
> --Ben Zimmer
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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