[Sca-cooks] pronunciations

[Philip & Susan Troy]

Also sprach Marilyn Traber:
>If there is, I default to the american extant form [phlip and i had a short
>word about this the other night.]
>
>frex - anise.
>some people pronounce it a-NIECE, accent on the last syllable.
>
>there is a perfectly good american pronunciation. A-niss, with a soft 'i'
>like in the worn 'miss' and the accent on the first syllable.

This is also, as far as I know, the default English pronunciation,
one, I might add, for a food product indigenous to much of Europe,
which cannot be claimed [sensibly] by any particular culture.

>If I am speaking french, I will use the french pronunciation. If I am
>speaking 'murican, I will use the american pronunciation. I don't need
>'false erudition' to prove how smart I am.
>
>chow, baby
>margali
>[and yes I know it is spelled ciao.]

Depends on whether you're talking about edible dogs or not... but
yes, you _do_ need the false (or misplaced) erudition in order to
prove your requisite American self-loathing. Anything else would
be... [splutter]... politically you-know-what. I can't even say it.
You know... ixnay on the oliticallypae incorrectae?

Or even worse! Dare I say... out of fashion??? Maybe Americans need a
new name, something they can hide behind in order to avoid being
perceived as inherently evil. Remember when peace-loving and
law-abiding Iranians and Iranian-Americans all went back to being
Persian for a while, to avoid being confused with Those Other Guys?
Maybe a nice little lapel button that simply says, "Not Evil" is
indicated...

With regard to the wine/grape name, I have to assume the name was
first portrayed using the Roman alphabet, in the way that it was, for
a reason, and that that reason had at least something to do with a
reasonably phonetic pronunciation. I run across this constantly as my
lady wife reads phrases in pinyin, Roman-alphabet Cantonese (say, the
phrase Say, Eng, Luck, for the numbers four, five, and six) and
automatically converts them into a Toysanese pronunciation (Chlee,
Mmm, Lok), without conscious thought. She claims the phonetic
pronunciations of those words as spelled with the Roman alphabet are
incorrect, and I have to remind her that Toysan is not mainstream
Cantonese any more than Robbie Burrrrrns is standard English, and
that there appear to be Cantonese variants that pronounce these
numbers exactly as they are spelled above. So while I couldn't (or
rather, wouldn't bother) correct someone who pronounced the grape as
si-ray, I think making a case for its exclusivity would be very
difficult indeed. Probably the best and most honest argument would
be, "Yes, but the people who pay attention to current trends
pronounce it 'si-ray', so if you don't, you're not kewl."

Adamantius (who also never uses "ou" in words that can be spelled
with an "o", and who laughs raucously at SCAdians who wear
"armour"...)
--
"No one who cannot rejoice in the discovery of his own mistakes
deserves to be called a scholar."
	-DONALD FOSTER