Pop-up suggesting download of repair tool

[Ian Jackson]

This post gets my vote for best linguistic lesson ever in
alt.windows7.general !

Including any of mine.

There seem to be quite a few refugees from alt.english.usage and
alt.usage.english!

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

There seem to be quite a few refugees from alt.english.usage and
alt.usage.english!

Are you suggesting that we're off-topic here?

Perhaps I could go back to one or both of those and start a thread on
Windows 8 or something...

 

[choro]

[...] > Latin alphabet which it then continues to mess up and not
'several
phonetic systems' as you claim.

I taught the history of English, starting with Anglo-Saxon. Trust me, I
know whereof I speak. English spelling is pretty consistently phonetic
by origin, with the usual quota of exceptions. If you know something of
the source language, you will have much less trouble spelling than if
you don't. You'll also have much less trouble figuring out what the word
means, but that's another issue.

True, true. I've read your response and was impressed. OK I give you
that alphabets *are* phonetic (to start with anyway) though obviously
some are more phonetic than others. My mother tongue is a language that
is fully 100 % rpt 100 % phonetic which is the reason why I felt like
posting my previous response. I have nothing against English spelling
though describing it as phonetic is stretching it a bit. But of course
if you are aware of the fact that words beginning with KN for example
the K sound is suppressed for whatever reason owing to the peculiarities
of the word's etymological origin, then things become clearer.

When I said fully 100 % phonetic I meant it 100 % in approximation of
the sounds of the language for as you already point out below there are
various sounds of the letter a in different words a good example being
bath, and father and bat. This is true of any language as far as I know.
And obviously not all these variations can have their own alphabet
letters. Witness the pronunciation aids in some of the older
dictionaries which are an absolute maze. I remember giving those
pronunciation guides a cursory look and deciding that I was better off
not wasting my time on them.

My spelling of English is pretty good and I'll let you in on my secret.
When learning words in my early teens I learned both its proper
pronunciation and its phonetic pronunciation in my mother tongue in
which certain English words became real tongue twisters. But this tactic
paid off as I was 'probably' the best speller in class which included
the son of our English teacher who was himself English. And incidentally
he was one of the best ever teachers who taught me.

Anyway, despite all it was quite interesting reading your response.

 

[choro]

Not in the Latin I learned, where "vita" is 'veet-a'. "I" is generally
'ee' in languages which are directly of Latin in origin (certainly
Italian and Spanish), and this is one thing that speakers of those
languages seem to find impossible to 'correct' when they are speaking
English (no matter how fluent they may be).

Maybe I should have said Kit as in Kitty Cat or as in bitty rather than
as in Kit meaning Gear. But it is certainly not a long ee as in Meet or
Meat or Feet. More like Fit as in having a fit!

Oh these subtle differences...

Dare I say that you were taught Latin by an English teacher!!!

The English are notorious for distorting the pronunciation of foreign
words and names. You would always get the gold medal if mispronouncing
foreign words were part of the olympics. ;-)--
choro
*****

 

[Robin Bignall]

Are you suggesting that we're off-topic here?

Perhaps I could go back to one or both of those and start a thread on
Windows 8 or something...

They'd prefer 'something'.

 

[Wolf K]

There seem to be quite a few refugees from alt.english.usage and
alt.usage.english!

Sir, you've blown my cover!

;-)

 

[Char Jackson]

Granted, considering how badly spelling is taught in English speaking
schools, it's amazing English speakers spell as well as they do. Eg,
crap about "long a" and "short a", when the two sounds labelled thus are
not long/short versions of each other. The long a is heard in "father",
the short one in "cat". Anyone who thinks otherwise has been thoroughly
corrupted by bad teaching.

I'm one of the thoroughly corrupted. For me, the 'long a' is heard twice in
payday, and the 'short a' is heard multiple times in "wham bam thank you
ma'am". The a in father is a whole different animal, neither long nor short.

 

[Tim Slattery]

I'm one of the thoroughly corrupted. For me, the 'long a' is heard twice in
payday, and the 'short a' is heard multiple times in "wham bam thank you
ma'am". The a in father is a whole different animal, neither long nor short.

The "a" sound in "father" in a broad "a" - at least that's how I would
categorize it, and it's very different from a long "a". The "a"s in
"payday", as you say, are long "a"s. I also agree with your definition
of short "a".

 

[charlie]

I guess most of French, and many English words as well, will have to
change their pronunciations.

Or maybe we could just admit that we are no longer speaking Latin, once
Mass is over.

Church Latin, or public school Latin?

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

There seem to be quite a few refugees from alt.english.usage and
alt.usage.english!

They get everywhere; fortunately they seem to be the nicer people.
(Though I haven't visited AUE or AEU for some decades; maybe they are
all nice now [I found it far too high traffic, and rather tended to get
heated!, when I did drop in - can't remember which, AUE I think). The
longest thread - by a considerable margin, in fact I'd say factor - I
have read in soc.genealogy.britain was one that was actually
cross-posted to one of the englishes. It did actually start (IIRR on the
subject of a piece of household fitting, like fireplace or something,
which was vaguely on-topic) in SGB, but someone cross-posted it (not me
for once), and it rambled marvellously. (And enjoyably.)
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he is supposed to
be
doing at the moment. -Robert Benchley, humorist, drama critic, and actor
(1889-1945)

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <[email protected]>, choro <[email protected]>
writes:
[]

some are more phonetic than others. My mother tongue is a language that
is fully 100 % rpt 100 % phonetic which is the reason why I felt like

[]
Which is that? I've always thought German is pretty phonetic, apart from
the odd placename (such as Bochum) and foreign words, but I'd be
hesitant about saying 100%. Similarly French, though I know that less
well, and Spanish Italian and Portuguese (a lot less well). Oh, and
Dutch, Danish, even Welsh ... in fact, most of the languages I've had
any dealing with I'd say are mostly phonetic, once you learn the rules
and to spot foreign names.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he is supposed to be
doing at the moment. -Robert Benchley, humorist, drama critic, and actor
(1889-1945)

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Hmm. But shouldn't the t be doubled then? (NB I'm rightpondian too, and
vite-amin sounds wrong to me too.) I also give you siren, filofax, the
drug ritalin (actually I've heard that both ways), vital, ... (-:

The 'i' in Vitamin is from the Latin Vita meaning life and in Latin the
letter 'i' is always pronounced as in 'kit' --
choro
*****

As others have said, vita is pronounced veeta in Latin (or so we
believe; their recording industry didn't manage long-lasting records).
But not always the same anyway in Latin: similis would have two kitty
sounds, vita more an ee.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he is supposed to
be
doing at the moment. -Robert Benchley, humorist, drama critic, and actor
(1889-1945)

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

That's how they pronounce it over there. As you've seen in the other
posts, they have good reasons for that.

(Indeed, that is our normal pron. of that word, though I'm less sure we
can justify it!)

But they don't always. last night I was watching a British show called
"Dalziel and Pasco". They are police officers. But the first name
seems to be pronounced "Dee-Ell", as if you were just pronouncing the
two letters DL. What happened to the other letters?

Actually the first is _slightly_ longer, and there's a _hint_ of a y in
there - sort of Dyell (with 'dy' as in Normandy ...).

The best known example (this side of the pond, anyway) is
Worcestershire, which is pronounced "Worstershire". Then there's the
surname Cholmondley, which is pronounced "Chumley". Reading Martha
Grime's books, one of the characters has a butler name Ruthven. Only
it's pronounced "Riven". What?

English is just something that has to be learned, and placenames and
surnames in particular! I usually give the Northumbrian placenames of
Alnmouth (at the mouth of the river Aln, and pronounced exactly as
written), Alnwick which is nearby (pron. Annik), and Ulgham (uff'm).

If you really want a headache, try the Gaelic ones, especially the Irish
Gaelic: Dun Laoghaire is pron. Dun (or Don) leery, for example, and the
Gaelic spelling of the forename Rory (pronounced Rory) is something I
can never remember exactly, but is something like Ruairigh. And that's
among normal English speakers: once you involve the Irish accent,
especially the Northern one, you've got a further kettle of fish!
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he is supposed to
be
doing at the moment. -Robert Benchley, humorist, drama critic, and actor
(1889-1945)

 

[choro]

some are more phonetic than others. My mother tongue is a language
that is fully 100 % rpt 100 % phonetic which is the reason why I felt
like

[]
Which is that? I've always thought German is pretty phonetic, apart from
the odd placename (such as Bochum) and foreign words, but I'd be
hesitant about saying 100%. Similarly French, though I know that less
well, and Spanish Italian and Portuguese (a lot less well). Oh, and
Dutch, Danish, even Welsh ... in fact, most of the languages I've had
any dealing with I'd say are mostly phonetic, once you learn the rules
and to spot foreign names.[/QUOTE]

You say "once you learn the rules"!!! But as far as I am concerned the
letters of a 100 % phonetic alphabet each have their own sounds that DO
NOT VARY come rain or shine.

Italian comes pretty close but even Italian has got a few rules that
bars it from being considered fully 100 % phonetic.

If it were fully 100 % phonetic the 2 c's in CONCITA would be pronounced
the same but they ain't! But the rules are simple and straightforward
and very easily grasped.

 

[choro]

Hmm. But shouldn't the t be doubled then? (NB I'm rightpondian too, and
vite-amin sounds wrong to me too.) I also give you siren, filofax, the
drug ritalin (actually I've heard that both ways), vital, ... (-:

Yes, but can't you see that the pronunciation all the i's in these words
are corrupted in the British and American English presumably by people
with inadequate grasp of the language or at least of the etymology of
these words.

As others have said, vita is pronounced veeta in Latin (or so we
believe; their recording industry didn't manage long-lasting records).
But not always the same anyway in Latin: similis would have two kitty
sounds, vita more an ee.

The very subtle differences in the pronunciation of the same letter or
letters in different words can be disregarded unless we want an alphabet
of a few hundred characters. This would be something like the excuse
being more serious than the offense like when the pupil at a boarding
school tried to explain to his teacher why he was late to school. He
said that Mrs Teacher had come to the doorstep and told him that she was
shivering with cold and could he warm her up a bit!!!

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

some are more phonetic than others. My mother tongue is a language
that is fully 100 % rpt 100 % phonetic which is the reason why I felt
like

[]
Which is that? I've always thought German is pretty phonetic, apart from

[]
You say "once you learn the rules"!!! But as far as I am concerned the
letters of a 100 % phonetic alphabet each have their own sounds that DO
NOT VARY come rain or shine.

Italian comes pretty close but even Italian has got a few rules that
bars it from being considered fully 100 % phonetic.

If it were fully 100 % phonetic the 2 c's in CONCITA would be
pronounced the same but they ain't! But the rules are simple and
straightforward and very easily grasped.[/QUOTE]

As I said, once you learn the rules. Nearly all are more phonetic than
English though! Especially if you accept letter combinations as symbols,
rather than individual letters as symbols; very few languages have a
true one-to-one mapping.

So your mother tongue is ...

 

[choro]

In message <[email protected]>, choro <[email protected]>
writes:
[]
some are more phonetic than others. My mother tongue is a language
that is fully 100 % rpt 100 % phonetic which is the reason why I felt
like
[]
Which is that? I've always thought German is pretty phonetic, apart from

[]
You say "once you learn the rules"!!! But as far as I am concerned the
letters of a 100 % phonetic alphabet each have their own sounds that
DO NOT VARY come rain or shine.

Italian comes pretty close but even Italian has got a few rules that
bars it from being considered fully 100 % phonetic.

If it were fully 100 % phonetic the 2 c's in CONCITA would be
pronounced the same but they ain't! But the rules are simple and
straightforward and very easily grasped.

As I said, once you learn the rules. Nearly all are more phonetic than
English though! Especially if you accept letter combinations as symbols,
rather than individual letters as symbols; very few languages have a
true one-to-one mapping.

So your mother tongue is ...

I am a bit of a mixed breed but Turkish was my mother tongue though I
was brought up bilingual. Learned English at school in my teen years.

As a matter of interest, long years ago when I was involved with news,
one of the Portugese reporter/translator girls who knew that Turkish was
completely phonetic gathered a few others around her and got me to try
reading a book in Esperanto which I did. And judging from the
expressions on their faces, I did it quite well.

It was quite easy for me. Though I must say in all honesty that my
knowledge of Italian musical terms also helped in giving the words the
right inflection. But they were not to know that I knew how to pronounce
Italian musical expressions as well as any Italian.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

You say "once you learn the rules"!!! But as far as I am concerned the
letters of a 100 % phonetic alphabet each have their own sounds that DO
NOT VARY come rain or shine.

Than a word would have to be respelled for every instance where a sound
changes due to grammatical or word-formation affixes.

Think of natal-natural-nation as the first example from English that
popped into my mind.

Much easier to understand the few simple (for some values of "few" and
"simple") rules involved

You might also check out the Celtic languages, where some of them change
the spelling to reflect mutation and others don't.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Yes, but can't you see that the pronunciation all the i's in these words
are corrupted in the British and American English presumably by people
with inadequate grasp of the language or at least of the etymology of
these words.

A word comes to my mind after reading that: presumptuous.

 

[Char Jackson]

The "a" sound in "father" in a broad "a" - at least that's how I would
categorize it, and it's very different from a long "a". The "a"s in
"payday", as you say, are long "a"s. I also agree with your definition
of short "a".

Thanks, Tim. Corruption loves company.