Letter From America: Pernunciation
It's not just what you say, it's how you say it. Ronnie Bray has a good chuckle while writing on the subject of pronuncitation. Sorry...Ronnie's a Yorkshireman...that should be pernunciation.
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As a Yorkshireman living in exile in a country that claims to speak some English, it is a constant surprise to discover how many ways there are to pronounce the same word. One example is the noble Saint Bernard dog, which Englishmen pronounce as Saint BERN’ard, but Americans as Saint Bern’ARD.
The personal name Colin is pronounced as COLL’in in English, but as COAL’in American. Good old English TomAhtoes become TomAYtoes on the far side of the pond, while the word for recreational time enunciated as Leszha in the Mother Country, mysteriously becomes Leeszhure west of the New York seaboard.
That Master of the English Language, Winston Churchill, was once in an exchange with US General Eisenhower as to the correct way to articulate the word ‘schedule’ after Ike used it in a meeting, pronouncing it SHEDyool.
Churchill, who had an obsession with proper English was not amused and asked, "General why do you pronounce ‘SKEDyool' as 'SHEDyool'? Why can't you pronounce it correctly, the way we English do? Where did you learn this pronunciation?" Eisenhower's answer was: "At 'shool'."
But of all the exchanges I that have come to my attention, none rises above the supreme example of the self-sacrificing Yorkshireman who was asked to adjudicate between two travellers who hailed from southern counties on the old LMS Railway.
The three of them shared a third class non-smoking carriage in a train that was chugging its way from Huddersfield to Leeds when the pair of friends became embroiled in a rather acrimonious argument as to which way was the correct way to pronounce ‘Neither.’ One of them opted for NEE-ther, and the other one plumped for NYE-ther. The Yorkshireman pretended not to hear them and assumed an air of strained indifference as he considered the plight of Yorkshire Cricket since the days of Sutcliffe and Hirst.
However, such was the heat generated by the discussion that eventually the two Southerners appealed to him to be the referee. He was, they thought, obviously an educated fellow because his socks matched, he wore a collar and tie, had on a bowler not a flat cap, and there was no sign of a whippet.
"Sir," one of them began. "Would you settle a dispute between us as to how to voice ‘n-e-i-t-h-e-r?’ I say it is NEE-ther …."
"And I say it is NYE-ther," interrupted his friend. "Which one of us is right?"
The Tyke, although resentful at being interrupted from his train of thought, but not displeased to have been requested to act as arbiter of a subject dear to his heart, drew himself up, quashed his selfish instincts and slowly closed his copy of Wisden’s Almanac, fixed the disputants with a steely gaze that neither of them have ever been able to erase from their memories, and then, when he had their undivided attention, spoke slowly and deliberately.
"Ther int one o’ thee reight. Its noo’an NEE-ther nor NYE-ther, it’s NOR-ther! Tha wents ter larn ter speik t’king’s Hinglish!"
The pair felt sorely chastened and remained in stunned silence for the rest of the journey, while the Yorkshireman resumed his research into when and how Yorkshire Cricket had getten itsen aht o’t reight rooad.
Copyright © 2007 – Ronnie Bray
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http://www.meridianmagazine.com/voices/011024summer.html
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