Pronunciation watch

[Sir Velo]

Sean Bean?

Ah, but you're mixing your Irish with your anglo saxon!

[jean]

As was he (or his parents!)

[french frank]

Ah, but you're mixing your Irish with your anglo saxon!

Anglo-Saxon?

While I'm here, is there any evidence (this may have arisen recently) to justify the pronunciation Ann. Sir. Mett. for E. Ansermet, b. Vevey, d. Geneva?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

As was he (or his parents!)

Mine, too. (Well - grandparents, actually.)

[vinteuil]

While I'm here, is there any evidence (this may have arisen recently) to justify the pronunciation Ann. Sir. Mett. for E. Ansermet, b. Vevey, d. Geneva?

... this did indeed arise recently.

I thought I caught Ansermet pronounced with a hard t the other day . Amazingly there's ' how to pronounce Swiss German correctly website ' which has a very polished En - Sir - May on it. Sir doesn't quite do justice to the vowel sound but you get the drift . Still however you pronounce it good to hear him conducting .

.

.

... but surely Ernest Alexandre Ansermet, born in Vevey, teaching in Lausanne, was a francophone ("Suisse Romande") and not Swiss German?

I know that the final -t can be pronounced in French proper names (notoriously Moët, which is mo-ett and not mo-way) - but I wd never think to pronounce a final -t in Ansermet.

I hadn't realised, until looking up on wiki, a darker unattractive side to the man -

" In Ansermet's book, Les fondements de la musique dans la conscience humaine (1961), he sought to prove, using Husserlian phenomenology and partly his own mathematical studies, that Schoenberg's idiom was false and irrational. He labeled it a "Jewish idea" and went on to say that "the Jew is a me who speaks as though he were an I," that the Jew "suffers from thoughts doubly misformed", thus making him "suitable for the handling of money", and sums up with the statement that "historic creation of Western music" would have developed just as well "without the Jew". Ansermet's reputation suffered after the war because of his collaboration with the Nazis and he was boycotted in the new state of Israel."

That he could have written such stuff ... in 1961! - beggars belief.

.

[jean]

Auguste Pinochet?

[vinteuil]

Auguste Pinochet?

... ah, that's a much more complicated kettle de poissons. I recall a lengthy string of replies on this subject - was it on these Boards or on the predecessors? - on the political significance (?) of pronouncing or not the final T. I shall see if I can excavate...

But for starters -

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2006/12/augusto_pinoqu.html

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[french frank]

... this did indeed arise recently.
.

Yes, I remembered your mentioning that he was, not surprisingly, from Suisse Romande (though I didn't know that Ansermet actually founded the S-R Orchestra). But as I was listening and definitely heard it thus pronounced, I wished to make assurance doubly sure that such a pronunciation was at least unlikely in the extreme.

[Not Auguste Pinochet but Augusto, I think. We are in the uncertain realm of Martha Argerich &c. here.

[Richard Tarleton]

[Not Auguste Pinochet but Augusto, I think.

Indeed, see here - so as likely as not no final T even in Chile.

So you might expect an approximation to an authentic German Vineshtine.
Or a slightly less German Winestine.
Or failing that, an anglicised Weensteen.
But the authorised pronunciation seems to be Winesteen.
Which is odd, since there's the same vowel in both syllables.

I thought that was on its way to being a limerick, jean......

But, as per your second line, I see the US Senator Dianne Feinstein pronounces her name thus

[french frank]

Indeed, see here - so as likely as not no final T even in Chile.

And mee-CHELL batch-el-ETT At least the French emphases are retained.

In Bristol, the usual pronunciation for John and Sebastian Cabot was CABB-oh (pretentious, nous?). Under the influence of incomers we have been taught to pronounce it more correctly as CABButt, the gentlemen being in origin not French but Italian, so Caboto (or, more properly Venetian Chabotto - thanks Wiki).

[kernelbogey]

The man's name is spelt Weinstein.

So you might expect an approximation to an authentic German Vineshtine.

Or a slightly less German Winestine.

Or failing that, an anglicised Weensteen.

But the authorised pronunciation seems to be Winesteen.

Which is odd, since there's the same vowel in both syllables.

I am fairly certain that the preferred US pronunciation of names ending in -stein is steen. I agree that there's an inconsistency. (And I'm not sure how in the US they pronounce Alfred Einstein - I've never come across a -steen pronunciation.)

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I am fairly certain that the preferred US pronunciation of names ending in -stein is steen. I agree that there's an inconsistency.

Yes - Elmer was "Bernsteen", Lennie was "Bernstine". (IIRC, Joan Payser in her sensationalist biography intimated that "_stine" was "posher" and that Lennie adjusted the pronunciation from the more "common" version. So that's probably not correct!)

(And I'm not sure how in the US they pronounce Alfred Einstein - I've never come across a -steen pronunciation.)

Perhaps, because Einstine's name was so well-known in the United States before he moved there, the German pronunciation was easily maintained?

[vinteuil]

Perhaps, because Einstine's name was so well-known in the United States before he moved there, the German pronunciation was easily maintained?

... probs they knew the limerique -

There's a famous family called Stein
There's Gert, there's Ep, and there's Ein.
Gert's prose is all bunk
Ep's sculptures are junk
And no-one can understand Ein





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[french frank]

(And I'm not sure how in the US they pronounce Alfred Einstein - I've never come across a -steen pronunciation.)

Perhaps, because Einstine's name was so well-known in the United States before he moved there, the German pronunciation was easily maintained?

Fred or Bert?

[ahinton]

(Leo) Ornstein seems to have been or become a "steen" but at what stage in his life this might have happened I have no idea; whether relocating to USA played any part in this I also do not know but, having done so at the age or around 12, he had plenty more time to find out how people pronounced his surname - a further 96 years, in fact...

Anyway, whatever the pronunciation, ein Stein is a stone whereas Ein Audi is a car...