How to pronounce tricky food names
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Date: 2020-06-02
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Comments and reviews: 9
Troy
McDonalds is commonly referred to here in Australia as Maccas - so much so that Australian McDonalds stores and their Australian web site use that as well.
I have one for you, I've noticed that people in the United States of America pronounce herb as erb, dropping the H entirely. When asked, the common response is that it's a french word and thus they attempt to use french pronunciation, which apparently also drops the H.
But here in Australia, and I believe at least in some regions of the United Kingdom, it's pronounced with the H, kind of like Her-b. I know I have always pronounced it with the H, as does everyone around me in Australia. It may be a french loanword, but we are speaking English, and more specifically here we are using our Australian English language dialect rules, shaped by their own unique evolution and influences - from a later version of English from the late 1700s until about the 1960s directly from the UK, but also coloured by waves of immigration from what is now Germany with German speakers (producing the Barossa German dialect of German predominantly spoken in the Barossa Valley region of South Australia) and influencing the dialect of English spoken in the South Australian capital city of Adelaide to this day, which has a distinct sound which is noticeably closer to the pronunciation of words in German.
I believe (and I could be wrong, as I'm no expert, at least in Australia, this German influence has had an impact upon how we pronounce some words - such as herb, where we tend to use more of the German language pronunciation rules, where letters are more likely to not be silent - at least from my limited Deutsch sprache.
Which is correct, with or without the H? Well, as much as it sounds odd to me to hear it without the H, I understand that it sounds equally as odd to people to hear the H if they're not used to it - so in a way, both are correct in their own regions. It is my understanding that this is how languages evolve - old English diverged in this way from the other North Sea Germanic languages, one of which went on to become modern German, with a number of changes occuring in both languages over time as they drifted apart, to the point that the two only share a few mutually intelligble words.
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McDonalds is commonly referred to here in Australia as Maccas - so much so that Australian McDonalds stores and their Australian web site use that as well.
I have one for you, I've noticed that people in the United States of America pronounce herb as erb, dropping the H entirely. When asked, the common response is that it's a french word and thus they attempt to use french pronunciation, which apparently also drops the H.
But here in Australia, and I believe at least in some regions of the United Kingdom, it's pronounced with the H, kind of like Her-b. I know I have always pronounced it with the H, as does everyone around me in Australia. It may be a french loanword, but we are speaking English, and more specifically here we are using our Australian English language dialect rules, shaped by their own unique evolution and influences - from a later version of English from the late 1700s until about the 1960s directly from the UK, but also coloured by waves of immigration from what is now Germany with German speakers (producing the Barossa German dialect of German predominantly spoken in the Barossa Valley region of South Australia) and influencing the dialect of English spoken in the South Australian capital city of Adelaide to this day, which has a distinct sound which is noticeably closer to the pronunciation of words in German.
I believe (and I could be wrong, as I'm no expert, at least in Australia, this German influence has had an impact upon how we pronounce some words - such as herb, where we tend to use more of the German language pronunciation rules, where letters are more likely to not be silent - at least from my limited Deutsch sprache.
Which is correct, with or without the H? Well, as much as it sounds odd to me to hear it without the H, I understand that it sounds equally as odd to people to hear the H if they're not used to it - so in a way, both are correct in their own regions. It is my understanding that this is how languages evolve - old English diverged in this way from the other North Sea Germanic languages, one of which went on to become modern German, with a number of changes occuring in both languages over time as they drifted apart, to the point that the two only share a few mutually intelligble words.
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FBGzy01GEh
It turns out that even people's names need to be a bit flexible and it may sometimes be a good idea to trade off authenticity for intelligibility! The phenomenon you mention (sounds being inaccessible to an adult that didn't grow up using them) can have some interesting consequences applied to people's names. People try to solve these problems in interesting ways.
For example, you might be an immigrant, and might code-switch depending on who you're talking to, to avoid demanding that people in your adopted country pronounce your name the way YOU do (which they can't even approximate well, no matter how they try. Or you might be a first-generation immigrant not raised to speak the mother tongue, and you CAN'T even pronounce your last name the way it's 'meant' to be spoken or the way your relatives from the old country do. Or you might go by your middle name to avoid the problem of people messing up your first name.
There's a lot of room for nuance here. Part of the answer is respecting people's preferences, as you suggest, but I don't think that can be all of it. Even if, as you say, It's their name, and I think they get to decide with authority how it's pronounced, the reality is that some decisions about how it's pronounced will result in a guaranteed mispronunciation even by someone trying their hardest, in good faith, to get things right. In such circumstances not all decisions about how a name should be pronounced, or what to accept from others, are equally good from either an authenticity or an intelligibility standpoint. (Sorry, no examples, though the best would be my real name (not featured! If I asked people to pronounce it as a native of COUNTRY_OF_ORIGIN would, that would be silly and achieve poor results)
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It turns out that even people's names need to be a bit flexible and it may sometimes be a good idea to trade off authenticity for intelligibility! The phenomenon you mention (sounds being inaccessible to an adult that didn't grow up using them) can have some interesting consequences applied to people's names. People try to solve these problems in interesting ways.
For example, you might be an immigrant, and might code-switch depending on who you're talking to, to avoid demanding that people in your adopted country pronounce your name the way YOU do (which they can't even approximate well, no matter how they try. Or you might be a first-generation immigrant not raised to speak the mother tongue, and you CAN'T even pronounce your last name the way it's 'meant' to be spoken or the way your relatives from the old country do. Or you might go by your middle name to avoid the problem of people messing up your first name.
There's a lot of room for nuance here. Part of the answer is respecting people's preferences, as you suggest, but I don't think that can be all of it. Even if, as you say, It's their name, and I think they get to decide with authority how it's pronounced, the reality is that some decisions about how it's pronounced will result in a guaranteed mispronunciation even by someone trying their hardest, in good faith, to get things right. In such circumstances not all decisions about how a name should be pronounced, or what to accept from others, are equally good from either an authenticity or an intelligibility standpoint. (Sorry, no examples, though the best would be my real name (not featured! If I asked people to pronounce it as a native of COUNTRY_OF_ORIGIN would, that would be silly and achieve poor results)
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Mishko
This isn't meant as a correction, just an extra thing that might be interesting:
Most American English do actually have a 'tapped' R, it's just not represented by the letter R. When the t- and d-sounds (in linguistics referred to as coronal stops ) of words like letter and ladder occur between two vowels, where the first vowel is unstressed, they get flapped. In other words, they sound like the flapped R of languages such as Spanish and Italian. This is the reason why the R in a name like Fieri (like in Guy Fieri's name) is pronounced Fieddy: the d is in a position in which it's pronounced as a flapped R-sound, meant to emulate the Italian pronunciation.
Now, an extra interesting thing here is something called phonology, which is the psychology of linguistic sounds (i. e. sounds used in a language, like t or k or b. Different people interpret the same mouth-movements as different sounds or categories of sounds. In American English, flaps such as the t in butter are heard as if they're d-sounds, despite being different from the d in a word like door or bed. The exact same mouth-movements caused to produce that sound would be interpreted as an R-sound by other languages (such as Italian or Spanish.
If you want a practical application for why I'm telling you these things: if you want to pronounce a rolled or flapped r in a language, try to separate the d-sound in door from the d-sound in ladder, so that you actively recognize that they're different sounds. Once you do that, just use that sound in those languages for their r sound. This works especially well in languages that don't distinguish r from rr (Spanish and Italian are unfortunately languages that do.
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This isn't meant as a correction, just an extra thing that might be interesting:
Most American English do actually have a 'tapped' R, it's just not represented by the letter R. When the t- and d-sounds (in linguistics referred to as coronal stops ) of words like letter and ladder occur between two vowels, where the first vowel is unstressed, they get flapped. In other words, they sound like the flapped R of languages such as Spanish and Italian. This is the reason why the R in a name like Fieri (like in Guy Fieri's name) is pronounced Fieddy: the d is in a position in which it's pronounced as a flapped R-sound, meant to emulate the Italian pronunciation.
Now, an extra interesting thing here is something called phonology, which is the psychology of linguistic sounds (i. e. sounds used in a language, like t or k or b. Different people interpret the same mouth-movements as different sounds or categories of sounds. In American English, flaps such as the t in butter are heard as if they're d-sounds, despite being different from the d in a word like door or bed. The exact same mouth-movements caused to produce that sound would be interpreted as an R-sound by other languages (such as Italian or Spanish.
If you want a practical application for why I'm telling you these things: if you want to pronounce a rolled or flapped r in a language, try to separate the d-sound in door from the d-sound in ladder, so that you actively recognize that they're different sounds. Once you do that, just use that sound in those languages for their r sound. This works especially well in languages that don't distinguish r from rr (Spanish and Italian are unfortunately languages that do.
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TheShadowblast123
What would happen if someone is studied in another language and thusly has extended sound inventory to choose from? I'll give example cases:
1. I know spanish and I know how italian pronounciation rules work, so when I know the origin of bruschetta, my brain says it in spanish with a spelling change brusqueta [sounds the same]
2. If I read about a dish with a spanish name, automatically I code switch on that word. yeah I went to get some tacos al pastor and they were pretty good
3. If I didn't know the name [or was given a correction] of a dish and someone of the culture of the dish was telling me the name, I'd try to copy them exactly till they were satisfied.
now with the current law of ragusea
1. I'd say bruhs-cheh-tuh until you say the name
2. saying tacos al pastor in english pronounciation doesn't just feel wrong, but I'd have to slow down just to be able to do it
3. I'd give'em back the californian english pronounciation, which to me feels insensitive, ignorant, and incorrect
Note: I am having regular conversations in spanish with people that don't know english and some people say I sound native like (which is nonsense) for context.
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What would happen if someone is studied in another language and thusly has extended sound inventory to choose from? I'll give example cases:
1. I know spanish and I know how italian pronounciation rules work, so when I know the origin of bruschetta, my brain says it in spanish with a spelling change brusqueta [sounds the same]
2. If I read about a dish with a spanish name, automatically I code switch on that word. yeah I went to get some tacos al pastor and they were pretty good
3. If I didn't know the name [or was given a correction] of a dish and someone of the culture of the dish was telling me the name, I'd try to copy them exactly till they were satisfied.
now with the current law of ragusea
1. I'd say bruhs-cheh-tuh until you say the name
2. saying tacos al pastor in english pronounciation doesn't just feel wrong, but I'd have to slow down just to be able to do it
3. I'd give'em back the californian english pronounciation, which to me feels insensitive, ignorant, and incorrect
Note: I am having regular conversations in spanish with people that don't know english and some people say I sound native like (which is nonsense) for context.
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taiiat
it's called GiF, not JIF. because the inventor corrected the naming of it 30 years too late.
okay, enough jokes(though true jokes.
you. have a point on Gyro. but i think i'm still going to go with. wait how do you phonetically spell this ah hell. 'Yero'. but that's because 'Jyro' has been given such a negative viewpoint for so long that i find it hard to bring myself to use it. it's like i'm trained to not like that pronunciation by default, right or not.
and yeah, Language is ever evolving. it's not a fixed thing. communication is about finding ways to, well, communicate ideas consistently in some sort of agreed fashion. and. those agreements are going to change over time, it's inevitable. that's okay, that's how we got all of these Languages and Dialects in the first place as it is.
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it's called GiF, not JIF. because the inventor corrected the naming of it 30 years too late.
okay, enough jokes(though true jokes.
you. have a point on Gyro. but i think i'm still going to go with. wait how do you phonetically spell this ah hell. 'Yero'. but that's because 'Jyro' has been given such a negative viewpoint for so long that i find it hard to bring myself to use it. it's like i'm trained to not like that pronunciation by default, right or not.
and yeah, Language is ever evolving. it's not a fixed thing. communication is about finding ways to, well, communicate ideas consistently in some sort of agreed fashion. and. those agreements are going to change over time, it's inevitable. that's okay, that's how we got all of these Languages and Dialects in the first place as it is.
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Will
Hey Adam. Linguist here, great vid but no use of language can be wrong so long as it is intelligible (for instance the inventor of gif pronounces it jif but gif is understandable. Also its better especially in recent societies like america to more focus on the social bounds that the language plays rather than the 'original' pronunciation. Language is used to show what groups people are a member of. So more Italian people would pronounce bruscetta differently to less italian people to signal italianness. Btw this isnt how I think language should be used I've been strictly trained to see language in a descriptive not prescribtivist way. Which almost made me mad at adam advising people on how to use language but then I thought he used language to do that so I can't criticise.
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Hey Adam. Linguist here, great vid but no use of language can be wrong so long as it is intelligible (for instance the inventor of gif pronounces it jif but gif is understandable. Also its better especially in recent societies like america to more focus on the social bounds that the language plays rather than the 'original' pronunciation. Language is used to show what groups people are a member of. So more Italian people would pronounce bruscetta differently to less italian people to signal italianness. Btw this isnt how I think language should be used I've been strictly trained to see language in a descriptive not prescribtivist way. Which almost made me mad at adam advising people on how to use language but then I thought he used language to do that so I can't criticise.
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Alex
As far as international cuisine. I like trying authentic foods of the nation I visit and I like trying to show respect by learning proper pronunciation, but I have no illusion. I m American, I know it by American names and my language skills are pretty dreadful. if they can t understand what I m trying to order, then I try to find something different and hope they are offended. And if someone views me as arrogant or pompous (however you described it, well. it s just something they need to get over. I m not going to go to college for another 4 years just so I can please their opinion on how I pronounce something. I like too many cultures to do that. I try a small amount but that s all their going to get. lol
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As far as international cuisine. I like trying authentic foods of the nation I visit and I like trying to show respect by learning proper pronunciation, but I have no illusion. I m American, I know it by American names and my language skills are pretty dreadful. if they can t understand what I m trying to order, then I try to find something different and hope they are offended. And if someone views me as arrogant or pompous (however you described it, well. it s just something they need to get over. I m not going to go to college for another 4 years just so I can please their opinion on how I pronounce something. I like too many cultures to do that. I try a small amount but that s all their going to get. lol
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Christopher
ooooh this hits close to home. This stuff bothers me allot. I have been to Worcester. I have visited the lea and perrin's brewery. I know for as fact that the correct pronunciation is wooster sauce. But if I say that i sound like a jack ass.
The Gyro one baffles me. I travel A LOT. all seven continents. The only place they even use the word gyro to describe that dish is north america. Until about 13 years ago I had never heard the 'y' version. 22 years of downtown NYC taught me to never consider anything else. I can only conclude that it comes from an overeager attempt at being culturally sensitive. Which is weird because the authentic way of saying it is doner kebab.
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ooooh this hits close to home. This stuff bothers me allot. I have been to Worcester. I have visited the lea and perrin's brewery. I know for as fact that the correct pronunciation is wooster sauce. But if I say that i sound like a jack ass.
The Gyro one baffles me. I travel A LOT. all seven continents. The only place they even use the word gyro to describe that dish is north america. Until about 13 years ago I had never heard the 'y' version. 22 years of downtown NYC taught me to never consider anything else. I can only conclude that it comes from an overeager attempt at being culturally sensitive. Which is weird because the authentic way of saying it is doner kebab.
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Finn
I'll admit I've never really thought about this with food names, but I've thought about it a fair amount with name names. I'm told that in Ireland, my last name, Flaherty, would be pronounced the way it's spelled, but in Massachusetts, it's recognizable as being pronounced Flarity. It definitely falls under the category of being a word someone owns, given that it's my name, but it's other people's name too, and they pronounce it differently. I pronounce it the same as the group of similarly-named people I belong to (my family, as do most massholes, but I wonder if I moved to Ireland if the way I pronounced it would become wrong. ?
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I'll admit I've never really thought about this with food names, but I've thought about it a fair amount with name names. I'm told that in Ireland, my last name, Flaherty, would be pronounced the way it's spelled, but in Massachusetts, it's recognizable as being pronounced Flarity. It definitely falls under the category of being a word someone owns, given that it's my name, but it's other people's name too, and they pronounce it differently. I pronounce it the same as the group of similarly-named people I belong to (my family, as do most massholes, but I wonder if I moved to Ireland if the way I pronounced it would become wrong. ?
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