"New Orleans," pronunciation thereof

[Mark Mandel]

On Wed, Jul 1, 2009 at 9:34 PM, Jonathan Lighter<wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
> All my life I said "New Or-LEENs" (note the "r"). Then I met people from
> there who ridiculed me because they said "NAWlins" only. Â They were my age,
> so that pronunciation must have been standard in the 1950s if not before.

"new or-LEENZ" is also my pronunciation. The "r" will be there by
default for rhotic speakers like me (NYC area) and absent for
non-rhotics (including N.O.), so that difference is automatic here.

But I've also seen a pronunciation described as "N'yawlinz" (iirc),
with a /y/. Anyone know more about that?

m a m

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org