really tough model name pronunciations --how bad does it get?

PatlaborUnit1 wrote:

Phil I must be the one who has never heard of her.............   David

Don't feel like the Lone Ranger, David!  

Phil

I must be the one who has never heard of her.............

David

How about people's names?

Almost everyone in the English speaking world knows who Kylie Minogue is.

But way back in the 80's when she was just a (but still nationally known) rising Aussie TV starlet, I recall hearing a radio voiceover guy proudly announcing the appearance of "Kylie Minnow-goo" at a local shopping mall. 

Rick Martin wrote:

Though I'm an ole Fla Cracker now I was born in Chicago, Ilinois. Ya know "Chi-town" and I still cringe when the state is pronounced  Illinoise rather than leavin the s silent. Sorry the only other mangle I can offer is Kissimmee, FL. Tourists usually mispronounce it Kiss-a-me and I don't unless the tourist is a super model.   Rick Martin

I was born and raised in Florida just north of Tampa.  Here are a few more Seminole and Calusa names for you to ponder:

Pithlachascotee, Chassahowitzka, Choctawhatchee, the now-infamous Kissimee, Okefenokee, Homosassa

There are so many more, too.

My first wifes family in Maine loved to point at places on the map and get me to say them. So I wrote Bexar county Texas, game over. Now I`m here in Austria having a good time with v and w. Not to mention Der, Die, and Das. I can´t seem to get the concept of the across.                  

A few years ago my wife (who is from the N-E of England) and I were visiting friends in Southampton.  They were showing us the local sights, and we drove near one of the bigger local tourist spots, a place called Beaulieu Castle.  I grew up in Montreal, and was educated in English and French, so I thought it was really neat to see a French name in the heart of southern England.  I said something like, "hey look, Beaulieu Castle", pronouncing the way it is supposed to be pronounced, the French way, Bo-lee-uh.  By the reaction I got, you'd think I had pulled down my pants and dropped anchor in the teapot!  I was told in no uncertain terms that it was not Bo-lee-uh or whatever fool thing I said, it was Bew-lee Castle.  I've travelled a fair bit through England, and I've always found it odd that the people who invented the language certainly have some funny ideas on using it.

My name I respond to it in about 6 different ways, as long as its close!

Waikong 

archangel571 wrote:

J-Hulk wrote:  Bgrigg wrote:  J-Hulk wrote: You guys think all those local place names are tough? Try this one: 西都原 It's a little historical area near my wife's hometown of 宮崎市. OK, who's got it? Anybody? Either of 'em?   Hey, isn't it 崎 before 市 except after 宮? Saito (Say-toe) Field and Miyazaki (meye-oh-za-key) City? Congrats! You got Miyazaki (Mee-yah-zah-kee) City (beautiful place, by the way!), but not quite there on the other one! Saito (Sah-ee-toh) is right, but the last kanji is a tricky local reading... can it be saitobaru?  i only know saitoshi so i might as well confess that i cheated...

shapooky wrote:

you want mangling ? how about when people pronounce the great state of idaho as IOWA ?

Or ask us Iowans if we grow taters? 

J-Hulk wrote:

Bgrigg wrote:  J-Hulk wrote: You guys think all those local place names are tough? Try this one: 西都原 It's a little historical area near my wife's hometown of 宮崎市. OK, who's got it? Anybody? Either of 'em?   Hey, isn't it 崎 before 市 except after 宮? Saito (Say-toe) Field and Miyazaki (meye-oh-za-key) City? Congrats! You got Miyazaki (Mee-yah-zah-kee) City (beautiful place, by the way!), but not quite there on the other one! Saito (Sah-ee-toh) is right, but the last kanji is a tricky local reading...

can it be saitobaru?  i only know saitoshi so i might as well confess that i cheated...

I was Louisiana Born n' raised till I moved to California when I was 24. My wife (from Ca.) gets flustered every time we go back home and I challenge her to pronounce the names of places, rivers, etc. There are alot of French and Native American names where I used to live. My family will be talking to her and she sits there with that blank stare and says "I'm very sorry but I didn't understand a word you said". She was afraid my folks would be upset but they would jus laugh and laugh. My mama said we was gonna hafta teach her how to speak coonass.

SST

Bgrigg wrote:

J-Hulk wrote: You guys think all those local place names are tough? Try this one: 西都原 It's a little historical area near my wife's hometown of 宮崎市. OK, who's got it? Anybody? Either of 'em?   Hey, isn't it 崎 before 市 except after 宮? Saito (Say-toe) Field and Miyazaki (meye-oh-za-key) City?

J-Hulk wrote:

You guys think all those local place names are tough? Try this one: 西都原 It's a little historical area near my wife's hometown of 宮崎市. OK, who's got it? Anybody? Either of 'em?

Hey, isn't it 崎 before 市 except after 宮?

Saito (Say-toe) Field and Miyazaki (meye-oh-za-key) City?

I have an aunt who lives in Lompoc California. She would use to get mad at us kids if we called it Lom-pock and not so gently tell us it was called Lom-poke. Everytime I watch the movie XXX  I cringe when he calls it Lom-pock. I can still hear her screaming.

Speaking of triplex, how about them Sukhois towards the end? I think thats the first time a Su-22M has appeared in a Western film isn't it?

"I went to school in Nacogdoches Tx. We all just refered to it as Nac, even after a few cervase's we still could not say it."

 My daughter is a SFA graduate and she and her buddies pronounced it NAC-Uh-No-Where!

For the unenlightened:  SFA is Stephen F. Austin University in Nacogdoches.  They have a fine forestry department--my daughter majored in lumberjacks!

Here in Arizona, there is a town about 100 miles north of Phoenix called Prescott. It's not pronounced "Pres-scott," it's "PRES-kit." (You almost don't say the O at all.) My friend Steve in California very briefly was considering buying a house as an investment there and once wanted me to pick up some real estate brochures about Prescott. I told him in a letter that I mailed along with the stuff that if he talks to a real estate agent there, "make sure you pronounce it PRES-kit, otherwise the agent will figure, 'Gee, this dummy from out of state who can't pronounce it right ought to be worth an extra 20,000 bucks!'"

Another pronunciation stumbling block for non-Arizonans is the big cactus plants in the desert called "saguaro." (These are the kinds of cactus that you see on Road Runner cartoons.) The correct pronunciation is "suh-WAR-row," pronouncing the G like a W. Of course, many visitors to Arizona call them "sagwaros" or even "cigaros." When I run into these people visiting the nursery I work at, I gently tell them that it's pronounced "suh-WAR-row" and jokingly tell them to make sure they use the correct pronunciation, otherwise they might as well have a flashing sign on their forehead blinking, "TOURIST! TOURIST! TOURIST!"   

After almost twenty years, some of the old hands in our club still get a laugh outta one of our previous president's dismal attempt to pronounce the word 'Sioux' during an awards banquet... I still hear it in my nightmares... soo-axe... sooooooo-axe...

Fade to Black... 

KINGTHAD wrote:

Hey Randi, I went to school in Nacogdoches Tx. We all just refered to it as Nac, even after a few cervase's we still could not say it. Natchitoches & Nacogdoches were brothers named by their indian chief father. Thad

Thanks for the information, Thad. I did not know that.

Another great thing about this site. You learn more than just modeling. 

Hey Randi,

I went to school in Nacogdoches Tx. We all just refered to it as Nac, even after a few cervase's we still could not say it.

Natchitoches & Nacogdoches were brothers named by their indian chief father.

Thad 

Living in western Conneticut many of the towns are called by there original Indian names and it makes for some dificult pronuciating. Saugatuck Norwalk Winapauck it must drive tourist crazy. If they are not called Indian names then they are named after English towns New Fairfield New London New York. Not very original.

                                                                    Soulcrusher

'Round these parts, people pronounce the town of Dante as "Daint", St. Clair is said as "Sinkler" and we don't care how you said it back home.  Weird thing is, I don't hear these regional pronunciations anymore, but when I go someplace else everybody talks funny.

Yeah, I'm from Avenal (Not Avi-NAHL) so Im very familiar with To-Lahr!

 ....or Gloster from Glocester... 

David

I was born and raised in Tulare (too-larry, NOT too-lair as many are proned to say) so I know what you mean about having to learn pronunciations.  We have a few in Oklahoma that can be tricky.

You might try Worcester, Massachusetts.  How do the get Wooster out of that?