Zompist Bboard Again

I wasn't sure whether to ask this in one of the political threads or in one of the linguistic threads, so I'm starting a new thread for it.

In George Orwell's lengthy essay Looking Back on the Spanish War https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-or ... anish-war/, near the end, there's the following quote:

When one thinks of all the people who support or have supported Fascism, one stands amazed at their diversity. What a crew! Think of a programme which at any rate for a while could bring Hitler, Pétain, Montagu Norman, Pavelitch, William Randolph Hearst, Streicher, Buchman, Ezra Pound, Juan March, Cocteau, Thyssen, Father Coughlin, the Mufti of Jerusalem, Arnold Lunn, Antonescu, Spengler, Beverley Nichols, Lady Houston, and Marinetti all into the same boat!

Now, my question is, would any of you feel up to reading all of that quote aloud without mispronouncing anything?

Raphael wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2026 6:33 am

When one thinks of all the people who support or have supported Fascism, one stands amazed at their diversity. What a crew! Think of a programme which at any rate for a while could bring Hitler, Pétain, Montagu Norman, Pavelitch, William Randolph Hearst, Streicher, Buchman, Ezra Pound, Juan March, Cocteau, Thyssen, Father Coughlin, the Mufti of Jerusalem, Arnold Lunn, Antonescu, Spengler, Beverley Nichols, Lady Houston, and Marinetti all into the same boat!

Now, my question is, would any of you feel up to reading all of that quote aloud without mispronouncing anything?

Interesting. I don't think it's that difficult, but it has some gotchas... mostly in knowing the actual nationality of some of these now-obscure people. E.g. is Buchman an American or German? (American, so it's pronounced like Bookman.) March is pronounced [mark] in Catalan, but [martʃ] in Spanish.

Then there's the question of whether to pronounce the foreign names "correctly" at all. I very much doubt Orwell would, at least speaking to other English people. I think even most Americans would say [spɛŋ glr], not [ʃpɛn glə]. OTOH my friend Daniel-- linguoboy to y'all-- would use the German pronunciation, just as I'd find it impossible to pronounce Pétain without a nasalized vowel.

zompist wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2026 8:36 am Then there's the question of whether to pronounce the foreign names "correctly" at all. I very much doubt Orwell would, at least speaking to other English people. I think even most Americans would say [spɛŋ glr], not [ʃpɛn glə]. OTOH my friend Daniel-- linguoboy to y'all-- would use the German pronunciation, just as I'd find it impossible to pronounce Pétain without a nasalized vowel.

Most French people wouldn't care, either. But we're notoriously very bad at this. I think French Canadians do better.

Something occured to me, concerning German names. I'd pronounce Spengler as [ʃpɛn glœʁ], some people would say [spɛnglœʁ] (I know it's [ɐ], but French people won't understand that, unless they speak German well, which is unlikely). Likewise [ʃʁœdœʁ], [a.de.na.wœʁ]/[adeno.wœʁ]. But Hitler is [hit.lɛʁ]. (*)

So sometime in the interval, French people decided [œ] was a better approximation.

(Speaking of improbable pronunciations, my grandmother's neighbours were called Whitehead, pronounced, I kid you not, [viteat])

EDIT: (*) Likewise, Luther is [ly.tɛʁ], hence, of course [maʁ.tɛ̃ ly.tɛʁ kiŋg])

Ares Land wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2026 9:47 am (Speaking of improbable pronunciations, my grandmother's neighbours were called Whitehead, pronounced, I kid you not, [viteat])

Suddenly, Pratchett‘s ‘Mr Teatime, pronounced Teh-ah-tim-eh’ sounds a lot more plausible…

I thought "Spengler" was [ˈʃpɛŋlɐ] in StG.

Travis B. wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2026 12:35 pm I thought "Spengler" was [ˈʃpɛŋlɐ] in StG.

Hm, I don't really understand IPA that well, but depending on whether you talk more colloquially or more overly formally correct, it ends either with a more or less "ah"-like vowel, or with a more or less "eh"-like vowel followed by a more or less "r"-like consonant, but in any case not with a more or less "eh"-like vowel as the last phoneme of the name.

Raphael wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2026 12:42 pm

Travis B. wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2026 12:35 pm I thought "Spengler" was [ˈʃpɛŋlɐ] in StG.

Hm, I don't really understand IPA that well, but depending on whether you talk more colloquially or more overly formally correct, it ends either with a more or less "ah"-like vowel, or with a more or less "eh"-like vowel followed by a more or less "r"-like consonant, but in any case not with a more or less "eh"-like vowel as the last phoneme of the name.

How I always understood StG was that /ʁ/ was vocalized to either [ɐ̯] in a syllable coda or, as in this case, /əʁ/ as a whole is vocalized to [ɐ] when the /ʁ/ falls in a coda position, and that not doing this is a feature of Swiss Standard German, as StG goes, and many Alemannic varieties in particular, which often have something other than [ʁ] for their rhotic consonant.

Travis B. wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2026 12:49 pm How I always understood StG was that /ʁ/ was vocalized to either [ɐ̯] in a syllable coda or, as in this case, /əʁ/ as a whole is vocalized to [ɐ] when the /ʁ/ falls in a coda position, and that not doing this is a feature of Swiss Standard German, as StG goes, and many Alemannic varieties in particular, which often have something other than [ʁ] for their rhotic consonant.

As soon as I'm less busy, I'll look up what your post means. Sorry.

I should note that having [r], especially in the coda, is also a classic feature of Bühnendeutsch (for those here who don't know any German, that means "stage German", i.e. a rather artificial version of StG specifically for stage productions).

Travis B. wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2026 12:35 pm I thought "Spengler" was [ˈʃpɛŋlɐ] in StG.

Yes, that's correct. I don't know German that well, but that I'm reasonably certain of.

Travis B. wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2026 12:35 pm I thought "Spengler" was [ˈʃpɛŋlɐ] in StG.

And you are right, as I as a native speaker of German can ascertain. The name denotes, BTW, a profession, namely a plumber.

OK, I had a wrong idea of what ɐ means.