Anglicization

[Salikoko Mufwene]

  On 10/8/2010 10:44 AM, Paul Frank wrote:
> This (in my opinion silly) habit of pronouncing foreign names the
> foreign or pseudo-foreign way when speaking English only works with
> languages with which English speakers are familiar or vaguely
> familiar.
SSM: I am shocked by the parenthetical. How else can one pronounce 
foreign names, by anglicizing them?

Sali.
>   In the next few days we are all going to hear all sorts of
> attempts to pronounce the name of Liu Xiaobo (several of whose
> articles I'm a little proud to say I had the honor of translating for
> Human Rights in China when Liu Xiaobo was known to virtually no one
> outside or inside China). Chinese names are too foreign to be
> pronounced the Chinese way in English.
>
> Paul
>
> On Fri, Oct 8, 2010 at 3:19 PM, Joel S. Berson<Berson at att.net>  wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> At 10/8/2010 08:44 AM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>>
>>> The wisdom I received long ago, though I've never personally and absolutely
>>> verified it, is that the pronunciation of foreign names and words in English
>>> was almost always anglicized by the intelligentsia (and presumably most
>>> everyone else) up until the 20th Century.
>> One can see that in the attempts at phonetic spelling in the 18th
>> century. Â E.g., "Lewis" for "[King] Louis".
>>
>> For another kind of anglicization, one sees "Hyacinth" Paoli for "Giacinto".
>>
>> Joel
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

-- 
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Salikoko S. Mufwene                    s-mufwene at uchicago.edu
The Frank J. McLoraine Distinguished Service Professor of Linguistics and the College
Professor, Committee on Evolutionary Biology
Professor, Committee on Conceptual&  Historical Studies of Science
University of Chicago                  773-702-8531; FAX 773-834-0924
Department of Linguistics
1010 East 59th Street
Chicago, IL 60637, USA
http://humanities.uchicago.edu/faculty/mufwene
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org