distinguished alum

[Laurence Horn]

At 11:14 AM -0500 5/1/09, Barbara Need wrote:
>I have used alum for both singular and plural for years. I attended
>Swarthmore, a co-ed institution, and have found it much simpler than
>arguing about the Latin vs. English pronunciations of alumni/alumnae.
>

and it makes a nice example of a minimal pair differentiated (almost
entirely) by stress:  /@'l at m/~/ae'l at m/ vs. /'ael at m/.  Not that
graduates are likely to be confused with sulfates.

LH

>On 1 May 2009, at 11:07 AM, Arnold Zwicky wrote:
>
>>"alumnus" and related forms have been troublesome for speakers and
>>writers of english for some time, because they're unassimilated bits
>>of latin.  "alumni" is very often used as a singular, as a way of
>>avoiding the choice between the sex-marked "alumnus" and
>>"alumna" ("alum" is another solution), although many have deprecated
>>this as a vulgar error.  it is sometimes used with reference to a
>>woman, as in "Are you an alumni of Green Mt. Camp for Girls?".
>>
>>so there are plenty of occurrences of "an alumni of".  but there are
>>also some (though many fewer) occurrences of "an alumnae of".  you can
>>see how this could come about: the pronunciation of -I and -AE in
>>latin plurals is vexing, and though many people insist on /ai/ and /
>>e/, respectively, an /ai/ pronunciation for both is not uncommon, and
>>then the question is how to spell it.  the association of the -AE
>>spelling with women remains strong, so almost all the 640 occurrences
>>(dupes removed) of "an alumnae of" that i googled up refer to women.
>>but there are a few referring to men:
>>
>>>I arrived to school late due to an art bid meeting this morning-but
>>they had a celebration for Sue with a "Congratulations Mom" cake and
>>punch. And one of our fabulous kitchen employees made up t-shirts with
>>Harold's picture on it stating "We're proud of West Babylon's Top
>>Chef", (He's an alumnae of our school district as well) that many
>>staff members are wearing today.<
>>   http://bloggingprojectrunway2.blogspot.com/2006_05_01_archive.html
>>
>>>My friend Andrew Kvammen (Andrew's Bad Stuff) is an alumnae of the
>>Young Musicians' Orchestra and he was invited to perform at a show at
>>Walt Disney Concert ...<
>>   http://mickieszoo.blogspot.com/2007_06_01_archive.html
>>
>>i got into this topic because i came across the following on Paul
>>Dickson's website:
>>
>>>Dickson, born in Yonkers, NY, graduated from Wesleyan University in
>>1961 and was honored as a Distinguished Alumnae of that institution in
>>2001.<
>>   http://pauldicksonbooks.com/
>>
>>(the word is spelled ALUMNI on the Wesleyan (of Conn.) website, by the
>>way.)
>>
>>this caught my eye because Dickson writes about language, among other
>>things.  on his website, he says that he "now concentrates on writing
>>about the American language, baseball, and 20th century history".
>>
>>arnold
>
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org