[Ads-l] Antedating of "Apartheid"

Baker, John JBAKER at STRADLEY.COM
Sun Jul 19 00:13:50 UTC 2020


Although the “apart hide” pronunciation seems to be more or less standard in American English, there are a number of online sources, many of them seemingly quite knowledgeable, that agree that it should be pronounced “apart hate.”


John Baker


From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> On Behalf Of Wilson Gray
Sent: Saturday, July 18, 2020 5:02 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: Antedating of "Apartheid"

External Email - Think Before You Click


Some time more or less in the same era, LIFE published an article on
apartheid. The article, among other things, explained that _apartheid_ is
an Afrikaans word and that its pronunciation is approximately "apart-hate."

Apparently, nobody else in the English-speaking world read this article.
I've heard this word pronounced as bizarrely as "appe(r)tite" even by UK
speakers.


On Fri, Jun 26, 2020 at 1:02 PM Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu<mailto:fred.shapiro at yale.edu>> wrote:

> apartheid (OED 1947 Oct.)
>
> 1947 _Rand Daily Mail_ 23 Jan. 9/3 (Readex) The Opposition had no native
> policy. He [S. J. Tighy] had asked the Leader of the Opposition for a
> definition of the word "apartheid." It could not be found in any dictionary.
>
> Fred Shapiro
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org<http://www.americandialect.org>
>


--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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

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


More information about the Ads-l mailing list