[HPforGrownups] Pronunciation (OT)

[Neil Ward]

No: HPFGUIDX 6711

Amanda said:

> Which brings me to a related question I've been meaning to ask. In my
experience
> (limited to other people's observations, who've been to England more) the
> English almost pride themselves on pronouncing foreign words in English.
> Examples--garage, Nazi. In American English these have a warped but
faithful
> echo of the French and German pronunciation, but in British English the
"g" and
> the "z" are the standard ones of English pronunciation.

That is true of many words imported to British English, but it is often more
out of ignorance or linguistic evolution than national pride.  'Garage'
would often be pronounced 'garridge', but Nazi would, I think, be said as
'nartsee' by most people (not 'nazzy', as I think you're suggesting).

> Sooooo, why, Caius, do you think the British would pronounce Voldemort
with a
> French accent? I've always thought it would rhyme with "short," not
"more." Does
> anyone have any evidence for the pronunciation that I'm missing?
(audiotapes
> don't count; they are an interpretation, not the original.) And am I right
about
> the British? [I've been told they mispronounced Nazi deliberately, as an
insult,
> so perhaps it doesn't hold true for all foreign words..?]

Personally, I would say Voldemort without the 't' if I thought he was a
Frenchman, but as I know it is an anagram of Englishman Tom Riddle's full
name, I say it as Voldemort with the 't'.

You are right about *some* British people, but everyone is different.  Those
people (particularly the older generation) who have not studied languages
might say foreign words as if they were English ones without thinking, as
they have no other reference point; on the other hand, those who have
studied languages at advanced level would find it hard not to use the
correct pronunciation.  Some people are just too stubborn to change though:
a friend of my father's loves taking holidays in Lille and he still refers
to it, unashamedly, as 'Lily', and there may well be an element of
deliberate mispronunciation due to xenophobia in some cases.

Note: I'm assuming you were talking about British people, not English people
only as you implied in your first paragraph.  The two terms aren't
interchangeable (ask a Scot if they hail from England and you'll find out!).

Neil

_____________________________________

Flying-Ford-Anglia

"Ron, full of turkey and cake and with nothing
mysterious to bother him, fell asleep almost
as soon as he'd drawn the curtains of his
four-poster."

[Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone]