[Ads-l] ISIL [rhymes with whistle]

[Laurence Horn]

> On Dec 6, 2015, at 8:50 PM, W Brewer <brewerwa at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> I would guess that <ISIL> [rhymes with whistle], instead of [EYE-sull], is
> an elegantese rendition parallel to <Iraq> [eye-rack] ~ [ear-rack], <Iran>
> [eye-ran] ~ [ear-ran]. And the myriad other  ai ~ I  alternations.

Or "Eye-talian".  But aren't all of the versions with the English Vowel Shifted version (/ai/ instead of /i/ or a weakened [I] or schwa) closer to the original, and in most cases to the earlier Anglicized versions as well?  I'm not sure I'd call "it-TAL-yun" elegant-ese, as opposed to the one where we send it through the vowel shift and it comes out "eye-TAL-yun" at the other end.  

LH
> 
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