Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlearn

Discussion of natural languages, or language in general.
Sumelic
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 385
Joined: Sat Mar 28, 2015 7:05 pm

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Sumelic »

I just noticed something funny. Pronouncing "acknowlegement" to myself, I realized that by default, I pretty much pronounce the first syllable with /g/. It might not be exactly identical with /g/, but the start of how I pronounce "acknowledgement" definitely feels a lot closer to the start of how I pronounce "ignore" than the start of how I pronounce "acne". Obviously, the consonant would be expected to be lenited a bit due to being in the coda of an unstressed syllable, but it doesn't feel like an unaspirated voiceless /k/, it feels like a /g/. I can't find any dictionaries that mention /g/ as a possibility--does this sound at all familiar to anyone here?

User avatar
linguoboy
Sanno
Sanno
Posts: 3681
Joined: Tue Sep 17, 2002 9:00 am
Location: Rogers Park/Evanston

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by linguoboy »

I spotted someone wearing a Titleist cap yesterday and it reminded me that when I first saw this I thought it was derived from a German-American surname pronounced /ˈtit.laist/.

User avatar
Zaarin
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 1136
Joined: Sun Aug 15, 2010 5:00 pm

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Zaarin »

linguoboy wrote:I spotted someone wearing a Titleist cap yesterday and it reminded me that when I first saw this I thought it was derived from a German-American surname pronounced /ˈtit.laist/.
I thought German had s > ʃ before a plosive. Have I been mispronouncing Ulisses Spiele?
"But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?”

User avatar
linguoboy
Sanno
Sanno
Posts: 3681
Joined: Tue Sep 17, 2002 9:00 am
Location: Rogers Park/Evanston

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by linguoboy »

Zaarin wrote:
linguoboy wrote:I spotted someone wearing a Titleist cap yesterday and it reminded me that when I first saw this I thought it was derived from a German-American surname pronounced /ˈtit.laist/.
I thought German had s > ʃ before a plosive. Have I been mispronouncing Ulisses Spiele?
In Standard German, only in morpheme-initial position. Using [ʃ] in other positions is a dialectal feature characteristic of Southwest Germany and Switzerland (i.e. the Alemannic-speaking area)[*].

So it is [ʃ]piel (and Glocken[ʃ]piel), but Leberwurst and Zeitgeist contain [s].

[*]Even within Alemannic, palatalisation fails to occur across morpheme boundaries. So isch "is" contrasts with isst "eats", whereas these are homophones in StG.

Vijay
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 2244
Joined: Sat Feb 06, 2016 3:25 pm
Location: Austin, TX, USA

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Vijay »

Zaarin wrote:
linguoboy wrote:I spotted someone wearing a Titleist cap yesterday and it reminded me that when I first saw this I thought it was derived from a German-American surname pronounced /ˈtit.laist/.
I thought German had s > ʃ before a plosive. Have I been mispronouncing Ulisses Spiele?
No. The <S> in Spiele is indeed [ʃ].

hwhatting
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 2315
Joined: Fri Sep 13, 2002 2:49 am
Location: Bonn, Germany

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by hwhatting »

linguoboy wrote:Even within Alemannic, palatalisation fails to occur across morpheme boundaries. So isch "is" contrasts with isst "eats", whereas these are homophones in StG.
I don't know much about Alemannic, but AFAIK the reason is not the morpheme boundary, but the historical origin of what fell together in /VsC/ in Standard German - where /s/ goes back to Germanic /s/, it shows up as /S/ before stops in the South-Western German dialects, while where it goes back to Germanic /t/ like in the conjugation of essen (cf. Engl. eat), it shows up as /s/. For /s/ from old /t/, a position before stop would be possible only before a (historical) morpheme boundary, due to the phonology of Germanic, but the rule shouldn't hold for historical /s/. Easy to check - what would be the Alemannic forms of Standard German liest "reads" or reist "travels"?

User avatar
Zaarin
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 1136
Joined: Sun Aug 15, 2010 5:00 pm

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Zaarin »

Ah, that makes sense.
"But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?”

User avatar
finlay
Sumerul
Sumerul
Posts: 3600
Joined: Mon Dec 22, 2003 12:35 pm
Location: Tokyo

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by finlay »

I was surprised that Gestapo doesn't have /ʃ/

Vijay
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 2244
Joined: Sat Feb 06, 2016 3:25 pm
Location: Austin, TX, USA

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Vijay »

It can, apparently.

User avatar
linguoboy
Sanno
Sanno
Posts: 3681
Joined: Tue Sep 17, 2002 9:00 am
Location: Rogers Park/Evanston

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by linguoboy »

hwhatting wrote:Easy to check - what would be the Alemannic forms of Standard German liest "reads" or reist "travels"?
Not so easy, as it turns out. After an hour of fruitless searching online to confirm the conjugation of these verbs (since I don't know trust my own spotty knowledge of Alemannic) I finally gave up and asked a native-speaker of Swabian. He had this to say:
I däd "läst" mit ma langa "ä" saga, abber s gibt sicher au Leit, wo no en Omlaut hen: "i lies, du liesch, där/die/des liest, mir/ihr/die läset".
Vijay wrote:
finlay wrote:I was surprised that Gestapo doesn't have /ʃ/
It can, apparently.
Laut Duden: [ɡeˈstaːpo], auch: [ɡəˈʃtaːpo].

hwhatting
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 2315
Joined: Fri Sep 13, 2002 2:49 am
Location: Bonn, Germany

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by hwhatting »

linguoboy wrote:
hwhatting wrote:Easy to check - what would be the Alemannic forms of Standard German liest "reads" or reist "travels"?
Not so easy, as it turns out. After an hour of fruitless searching online to confirm the conjugation of these verbs (since I don't know trust my own spotty knowledge of Alemannic) I finally gave up and asked a native-speaker of Swabian. He had this to say:
I däd "läst" mit ma langa "ä" saga, abber s gibt sicher au Leit, wo no en Omlaut hen: "i lies, du liesch, där/die/des liest, mir/ihr/die läset".
Ok, looks like the morpheme boundary rule works, at least synchronically for transparent morpheme boundaries (after all, the /S/ in isch "ist" must go back to an older form *iSt, where there also is a morpheme boundary between historical /s/ and the stop.

User avatar
linguoboy
Sanno
Sanno
Posts: 3681
Joined: Tue Sep 17, 2002 9:00 am
Location: Rogers Park/Evanston

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by linguoboy »

hwhatting wrote:Ok, looks like the morpheme boundary rule works, at least synchronically for transparent morpheme boundaries (after all, the /S/ in isch "ist" must go back to an older form *iSt, where there also is a morpheme boundary between historical /s/ and the stop.
Similarly, Samschdig, historically sambaz + tac, where the Sams- is a cranberry morpheme. But Geburtstag has [s].

User avatar
jal
Sumerul
Sumerul
Posts: 2633
Joined: Tue Feb 06, 2007 12:03 am
Location: Netherlands
Contact:

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by jal »

I just learned that "caveat" isn't pronounced [kəˈviːt].


JAL

User avatar
Ser
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 1542
Joined: Sat Jul 19, 2008 1:55 am
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia / Colombie Britannique, Canada

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Ser »

It wasn't until about four years ago that I finally learned "category" is not pronounced */kəˈtɛgəɹi/ but /ˈkætəgɔɹi/.

User avatar
Zaarin
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 1136
Joined: Sun Aug 15, 2010 5:00 pm

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Zaarin »

jal wrote:I just learned that "caveat" isn't pronounced [kəˈviːt].


JAL
Reminds me that as a kid I pronounced albeit [ɑɫˈbaɪ̯t̚].
"But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?”

User avatar
Soap
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 1228
Joined: Sun Feb 16, 2003 2:57 pm
Location: Scattered disc
Contact:

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Soap »

Zaarin wrote:
jal wrote:I just learned that "caveat" isn't pronounced [kəˈviːt].


JAL
Reminds me that as a kid I pronounced albeit [ɑɫˈbaɪ̯t̚].
Me too, since I had assumed it was a German loanword. I never used it out loud, though, only in academic writing. I dont think I ever heard it used aloud either until I was well into adulthood.

Im surprised caveat seemingly isnt used in other languages, since it's taken from a famous Latin phrase.
Sunàqʷa the Sea Lamprey says:
Image

User avatar
Raphael
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 335
Joined: Fri Sep 13, 2002 9:01 am
Location: Just outside Hamburg, Germany

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Raphael »

I used to think that "bow", as in "bow down", is pronounced something like "boh".

User avatar
linguoboy
Sanno
Sanno
Posts: 3681
Joined: Tue Sep 17, 2002 9:00 am
Location: Rogers Park/Evanston

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by linguoboy »

Raphael wrote:I used to think that "bow", as in "bow down", is pronounced something like "boh".
For ages, I thought that English people had /roːz/, not /rauz/. I still have to correct my mental pronunciation sometimes.

User avatar
alynnidalar
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 491
Joined: Fri Aug 15, 2014 9:35 pm
Location: Michigan, USA

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by alynnidalar »

wait what

They don't have /ro:z/?? :?

I... I need to lie down.
I generally forget to say, so if it's relevant and I don't mention it--I'm from Southern Michigan and speak Inland North American English. Yes, I have the Northern Cities Vowel Shift; no, I don't have the cot-caught merger; and it is called pop.

User avatar
Zaarin
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 1136
Joined: Sun Aug 15, 2010 5:00 pm

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Zaarin »

Soap wrote:
Zaarin wrote:
jal wrote:I just learned that "caveat" isn't pronounced [kəˈviːt].


JAL
Reminds me that as a kid I pronounced albeit [ɑɫˈbaɪ̯t̚].
Me too, since I had assumed it was a German loanword. I never used it out loud, though, only in academic writing. I dont think I ever heard it used aloud either until I was well into adulthood.

Im surprised caveat seemingly isnt used in other languages, since it's taken from a famous Latin phrase.
I do (and did) use albeit in speech, but I also use nota bene in speech, so... :p
"But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?”

User avatar
KathTheDragon
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 2139
Joined: Thu Apr 25, 2013 4:48 am
Location: Brittania

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by KathTheDragon »

linguoboy wrote:
Raphael wrote:I used to think that "bow", as in "bow down", is pronounced something like "boh".
For ages, I thought that English people had /roːz/, not /rauz/. I still have to correct my mental pronunciation sometimes.
For what word? "Row" as in "argument"?

User avatar
linguoboy
Sanno
Sanno
Posts: 3681
Joined: Tue Sep 17, 2002 9:00 am
Location: Rogers Park/Evanston

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by linguoboy »

KathTheDragon wrote:
linguoboy wrote:
Raphael wrote:I used to think that "bow", as in "bow down", is pronounced something like "boh".
For ages, I thought that English people had /roːz/, not /rauz/. I still have to correct my mental pronunciation sometimes.
For what word? "Row" as in "argument"?
Is there another kind of "row" you people can "have"?

I mean maybe you could "have a little row on the Thames". But I didn't think anyone wanted to sound that ridiculously posh any more.

User avatar
Pole, the
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 1606
Joined: Sat Feb 11, 2012 9:50 am

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by Pole, the »

A row of, non-specific, items?
The conlanger formerly known as “the conlanger formerly known as Pole, the”.

If we don't study the mistakes of the future we're doomed to repeat them for the first time.

User avatar
KathTheDragon
Smeric
Smeric
Posts: 2139
Joined: Thu Apr 25, 2013 4:48 am
Location: Brittania

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by KathTheDragon »

It wasn't at all clear to me whether you were using the phrase "have a row" or talking about having a word /rau/ instead of /rəʊ/

User avatar
linguoboy
Sanno
Sanno
Posts: 3681
Joined: Tue Sep 17, 2002 9:00 am
Location: Rogers Park/Evanston

Re: Incorrect pronunciations you have (or have had) to unlea

Post by linguoboy »

chitin (just heard a friend get this wrong recently)

Post Reply