Re: [CH] Regional Pronunciations
The Old Bear (oldbear@arctos.com)
Sun, 15 Feb 1998 12:16:28 -0500
In Chileheads Digest, v.4 no.315, Jim Lane wrote:
>Date: Sat, 14 Feb 1998 13:28:04 PST
>From: jmlane@ibm.net
>Subject: Re: [CH] Regional Pronunciations
>
>. . . There IS a pronunciation which is CORRECT for both English
>and Spanish. . .
Having made (more or less successfully) a flippantly amusing post
about my very real Bostonian battle with pronouncing the letter
"R," a beg your patience in some more serious observations:
As native speaker of American English (or British English, or
Australian English, or whatever), each of us encounters non-native
speakers on a regular basis. Depending upon their familiarity
and comfort with our language, their speech will be colored by
both accent and pronunciation.
Most of us will cut a non-native speaker of English quite a bit
of slack and, indeed, we will even be honored that this person
is making the effort to speak to us in our own language.
However, Americans tend to be much more self-conscious about their
own attempts at pronouncing 'foreign' words -- either being
embarrased by their own ignorance, or wearing their ignorance as a
badge of perverted pride (as in "I'm an American and I don't need
to use those fancy foreign words.")
Of course, some of us interpret "mispronunciation" as a mark of
stupidity -- which is suprising, because a person who mispronounces
a word while indicating knowledge of its meaning even in a
mispronounced form, is displaying a willingness to use the word
to convey some subtlety of thought that a more familiar word might
not accommodate.
Kay's comments about there being no single "correct" pronunciation
makes the most sense when one considers that we humans are quite
capable of dealing with a range of pronunciations without
loss of meaning. Although there may be a preferred or "standard"
pronunciation, in day-to-day speech one hears -- and understands --
a wide range of regional pronunciations, accented pronunciations,
and less-than-faithfully adopted foreign pronunciations.
I doubt that puting a "ñ" in the pronunciation of "habanero" will
make much difference in the type of chile which the grocer hands to
you. And, I'd bet, that pronouncing the "j" and ignoring the "ñ"
in jalapeño will still get you what you want at most Mexican
restautants. And, hopefully, context will bail you out when you
pronounce "pollo" as "polo" when telling your Mexican host what
you'd like for dinner.
Cheers,
The Old Bear
While it is nice to be able to use flawlessly the "standard"
pronunciation, it is better to mispronouce than not to communicate
at all.