I agree that trying to pronounce a bike or component name, bottle of wine, or a glass of German beer as correct as possible without throwing a phony "accent" on it is always a good measure. Once upon a time I worked in a wine shop and someone came in wanting a bottle of Clos du Bois pronouncing it (close-do-boys), which was quite hysterical. Bruce "Ow-dino in Italy, Aw-dino in the US" Audino
On 9/25/08, Michael Schmidt <mdschmidt56@verizon.net> wrote:
> So youse really want to properly pronounce Alex Singer? Here it is!
> E-X-P-E-N-S-I-V-E and when Ernest hangs it up and passes on, add V-E-R-Y in
> front of it.
>
>
> Mike Schmidt
> Stirling, NJ
> USA
>
>
>
>
> On 9/25/08 4:35 PM, "Mitch Harris" <mitch.harris@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Thu, Sep 25, 2008 at 2:10 PM, Jan Heine <heine94@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>> At 1:51 PM -0600 9/25/08, Mitch Harris wrote:
>>>
>>>> On the other hand Singer is such a familiar word in English, both as
>>>> an ordinary noun and as a proper name, that its path toward
>>>> anglicization is smoothed and few people will object to hearing
>>>> "singer" for an A.Singer bike when it is said by a native English
>>>> speaker on soil where English is widely spoken.
>>>
>>> Absolutely. In fact, in the U.S., I refer to Alex Singer as if he had
>>> been a
>>> London, rather than Paris, builder. But in France, I use the French
>>> pronunciation.
>>>
>>
>> Looking again at what I wrote I don't want to give the impression that
>> using Frech pronounciation for A.Singer would be wrong in any way.
>> Just to different purposes as Jan says. So in the states you could
>> pronounce it to someone as "sanjear" as a part of explaining that it's
>> a French bike, and I imagine that both pronouciations could be
>> comfortable for someone in the US. Unlike a French word like Gitane,
>> where even in the states you'd help someone to not say "Git--tayne",
>> but "Jit-tayne" would be a minimal acceptable level of anglicization.
>>
>> Mike trumps this all with the Hungarian "zinger" but it sounds like
>> A.Singer himself Francified his name's pronounciation as many do who
>> move to France (?).
>>
>> Sometimes the anglicized version is correct, even when mistaken, as in
>> the Boston Celtics. Down the road where they do "keltic" studies,
>> they still take catch the "Seltics" game.
>>
>> Mitch Harris, where "harris" is the anglicized version (since 1066) of
>> a version of the French pronounciation of Henry. And where Mitchell
>> is the Francified (since 1066) version Micel, an anglo-saxon name.
>> Little Rock Canyon, Utah, USA
>> _______________________________________________
>
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> _______________________________________________
>
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Bruce Audino
New York City, NY
USA