[Ads-l] G. MacKay and Co.

[Jonathan Lighter]

My understanding and (limited) experience is that  Irish English has
long tended to merge "oy" with "eye."

E.g.(crudely) "boil" > "bile," "noise" >"nize,"  "hoist" > "heist";
"child" > "choild," "cry" > "croy."

JL

On Wed, Jun 1, 2016 at 12:07 PM, Baker, John <JBAKER at stradley.com> wrote:
> Do we have any evidence for a "muhkye" pronunciation of "McCoy"?   This certainly seems the most plausible explanation for the transition from "MacKay" to "McCoy," if they were indeed pronounced similarly.
>
>
> John Baker
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of Jonathan Lighter
> Sent: Wednesday, June 1, 2016 11:53 AM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: G. MacKay and Co.
>
> My guess is that "McCoy" was the more common surname in the US, and
> that it was usu. also  pronounced "muhkye" (more or less) by its Scots
> and Irish bearers.  That would be pretty normal for first-generation
> immigrants (I think).
>
> "The real "Mc /koi/" would thus be a "spelling pronunciation." .
>
>
> JL
>
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 1, 2016 at 7:05 AM, Dave Wilton <dave at wilton.net> wrote:
>> Datum: I knew a Scottish woman with that name, and she used the /eye/ pronunciation.
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of James A. Landau
>> Sent: Wednesday, June 01, 2016 1:39 AM
>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>> Subject: Re: [ADS-L] G. MacKay and Co.
>>
>> Somebody (I lost the reference) said that "MacKay" is pronounced /M@ KEYE/
>>
>> Some time ago we had a discussion of how /oi/ can get transformed into /eye/, as in Camptown Races "Gwyne to run all night gwyne to run all day".  Perhaps we have the reverse phenomenon here, with /keye/ getting transformed into /koi/.
>>
>> Incidentally, people from some areas in Eastern Europe when reading Hebrew transform certain vowels into /oi/.
>>
>> - James A. Landau
>>
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>
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