Pronunciation Pricks (2 Viewers)

[Wilbert]

Ah here. Pot, meet Mr Kettle.

In fairness like, as soon as I open my mouth, someone says "Oh, you've got a lovely BRRRROOOOOGUE".
And, I'm thinking, brog is a shoe. But, you know, I'll let that one slide.

Well, no, 'bróg' is a shoe and 'brogue' is a strong dialectical accent (and a shoe). So they're not wrong when they use the word.

 

[flashback]

Well, no, 'bróg' is a shoe and 'brogue' is a strong dialectical accent (and a shoe). So they're not wrong when they use the word.

Listen Wilbert. I dont need your facts getting in the way of my disdain, contempt and feelings of superiority over simpleton Americans.

Ah no. I didn't know that. Fair enough.

Its funny once in a while. It can be a bit trying at times. I suppose I dont really mind it that much, it is creepy though when a forty something year old woman who's granny was from "Dunnigul" hear it and deduce that you also hate darkies, nig nogs and The Jews.
And talk about the ruination of Ireland with all the immigrants.


Realistically though, unless the conversation turns to computers, Genetics or bikes, if people aren't going to talk to me about my accent I've no idea what I can chat to them about.

The weather possibly.

 

[Scientician 0.8]

That I love. My problem is the pretentious mispronunciation, the forced way people say shit just to sound like they know stuff. Maybe it makes me a little sad that the forcedness makes it sound like they don't value the way they speak themselves.

The gazillions of dialects and accents is great. We're not just losing minority languages at a rapid rate, we're losing regional accents. Part of that is from marrying people from further away, and from travelling more, and it's not like they can be kept in the way a language can be maintained, but it's fantastic to hear really localised accents.

There was an amazing progamme on a year ago or so where they looked into old accents, and how much *more* distinctive they used to be before people were as mobile as they became after WWII started.

They'd found this German archive that had been compiled during WWI, where they recorded the speech patterns of thousands of prisoners of war, and then they tracked down their families and played the recordings for them -- it was amazing. Most of the families were moved to tears, especially where one or more of the surviving members remembered the person speaking.

Absolutely crazy cool ways of saying stuff. Like parts of southern England where 'father' was pronounced 'fay-thur'. Incredible stuff, and pronunciations you just never knew existed. I'd say the social anthropologists who went around county Clare in the 1930s captured some equally interesting ones -- I keep meaning to look into whether those are still available.

I think partly because I love diversity of accents that it makes me feel awkward to hear people trying to speak unnaturally.

One word that is always enjoyable to the ear is the chim-bleee. Chimney sounds boring in comparison.

That was a really interesting programme but it seems the accents/dialects the men were using were exagerated. The purpose of the recordings was to document different dialects etc so alot of the men over emphasised the differences, affected more a brogue/burr etc than they would normally have, especially in a situation where they were all mixed with soldiers from other parts of Britain, Ireland and the rest of the empire.

 

[Scientician 0.8]

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to flashback again.

 

[jane]

Its funny once in a while. It can be a bit trying at times. I suppose I dont really mind it that much, it is creepy though when a forty something year old woman who's granny was from "Dunnigul" hear it and deduce that you also hate darkies, nig nogs and The Jews.
And talk about the ruination of Ireland with all the immigrants.


Realistically though, unless the conversation turns to computers, Genetics or bikes, if people aren't going to talk to me about my accent I've no idea what I can chat to them about.

The weather possibly.

Or the immigrants ruining Ireland? Or the various meritorious qualities of darkies and Jews?

It must wreck your head. At least you're in a city where people are relatively used to hearing Irish accents. Imagine if you were in some small town in middle America? It would go something like this.

Flashback goes into a shop. It's a small shop, for small things. He puts a small number of small things into his basket and takes a few small stepts to the till, where a large man, a big man, a man in overalls who will not be ignored is short one shirt.

Flashback: Hi, could I have a paper bag please?

Bubba: You ain' from aroun' here, are ya? Cause 'round here, we say, 'Kin ah GIT'.

Flashback: Okay, can I get a paper bag please?

Bubba: Where you from, BOY? Iiiinglin?

Flashback: Ireland.

Bubba: What in the darn hell is an Arlan? Turns toward the back room. HEY, DARLENE! GIT YER ASS OUT HERE AND GETTALOADA THIS GAAAA!

The earth begins to shake. Bottles of cheap vodka clang behind Bubba's mesh baseball hat. In the doorway appears the biggest, baddest questionably female grease machine Flashback ever did see. A one-woman fattery.

Bubba: Go on, boy, say something fer ma waaafe. Darlene, you gotta here this little fella talk. He sound like the Queena Inglin. Where you say yer from boy?

Flashback: [gulps] I'm from Ireland.

Darlene: ARLIN? WHAT IN THE SAM HELL IS ARLIN? She turns around and shouts into the back room. HEY, CLETUS, GET YER ASS OUT HERE AND GETTALOADA THIS GAAA SAY HE FROM SOME PLACE CALL ARLIN.

The earth begins to shake....

You get my drift. That would be every day. Until one of them ate you all up.

 

[jane]

That was a really interesting programme but it seems the accents/dialects the men were using were exagerated. The purpose of the recordings was to document different dialects etc so alot of the men over emphasised the differences, affected more a brogue/burr etc than they would normally have, especially in a situation where they were all mixed with soldiers from other parts of Britain, Ireland and the rest of the empire.

Oh, yeah, but if someone is trying to document your accent, you're always going to exaggerate. And they also had them doing readings and recitations, for which you'd automatically be much more conscious of how you were pronouncing things.

It was well cool, though. I loved the way people were so moved by hearing a recording of a long-dead family member. An audio artefact is a fairly new thing if you think about it, and it just seemed to have such a powerful effect.

 

[Anarcho Munk]

This is most def true.

Janer has a 60" TV.


;>

 

[Scientician 0.8]

"Can I get" has taken over recently, it used to be "Can I have" or "may I have" or "Giz", now it's "Can I get a ciabata with chicken goujons and a latte?"

 

[Unicron]

Or the immigrants ruining Ireland? Or the various meritorious qualities of darkies and Jews?

It must wreck your head. At least you're in a city where people are relatively used to hearing Irish accents. Imagine if you were in some small town in middle America? It would go something like this.

Flashback goes into a shop. It's a small shop, for small things. He puts a small number of small things into his basket and takes a few small stepts to the till, where a large man, a big man, a man in overalls who will not be ignored is short one shirt.

Flashback: Hi, could I have a paper bag please?

Bubba: You ain' from aroun' here, are ya? Cause 'round here, we say, 'Kin ah GIT'.

Flashback: Okay, can I get a paper bag please?

Bubba: Where you from, BOY? Iiiinglin?

Flashback: Ireland.

Bubba: What in the darn hell is an Arlan? Turns toward the back room. HEY, DARLENE! GIT YER ASS OUT HERE AND GETTALOADA THIS GAAAA!

The earth begins to shake. Bottles of cheap vodka clang behind Bubba's mesh baseball hat. In the doorway appears the biggest, baddest questionably female grease machine Flashback ever did see. A one-woman fattery.

Bubba: Go on, boy, say something fer ma waaafe. Darlene, you gotta here this little fella talk. He sound like the Queena Inglin. Where you say yer from boy?

Flashback: [gulps] I'm from Ireland.

Darlene: ARLIN? WHAT IN THE SAM HELL IS ARLIN? She turns around and shouts into the back room. HEY, CLETUS, GET YER ASS OUT HERE AND GETTALOADA THIS GAAA SAY HE FROM SOME PLACE CALL ARLIN.

The earth begins to shake....

You get my drift. That would be every day. Until one of them ate you all up.

When I was in Texas a few years ago people would ask me where I'm from and when I said Ireland they thought I was saying Arlington.

 

[jane]

When I was in Texas a few years ago people would ask me where I'm from and when I said Ireland they thought I was saying Arlington.

Christ. Yeah, I got that in Maryland. Now my mother lives in Arlington, VA, so that could get confusing.

Geographical and cultural ignorance I can forgive because, fuck it, some people just don't know shit about the rest of the world. But feigned knowledge is just hilarious, and probably falls into the same category of annoyance as pretentious pronunciation.

Like that fucking frat boy chiropractor I went to telling me he stayed in an 8000-year old castle. Stupid me, I tried to explain that there were no castles anywhere 8000 years ago, but he was resolute in his assessment that it was 'really, really old'. The place he was describing sounded 19th century, but I just decided to let him have his stupid fantasy because talking to him meant hearing more responses in his Lucky Charms accent. I then deduced from his further recounting of conversations he'd had with Irish people that he'd been wound up completely and filled with hilarious lies, and I didn't want to undo someone else's fine handiwork.

So there's a guy in Maryland who believes that global warming was a hoax perpetrated by an embittered Al Gore, that Ireland's castles are all 8000 years old or more, built by a mysterious and long-extinct super-race of Celts, and that the Irish are the only people in the world who hate the French more than the English do.

Someone had a grand old time with this guy and while normally I don't like windups of nice, well-meaning people, this guy was a Grade A xenophobic, neo-con, woman-demeaning prick with his frat letters tattooed on his ankle, in case you were wondering where he'd cultivated some of his more staggering prickish flourishes.

 

[Wilbert]

Listen Wilbert. I dont need your facts getting in the way of my disdain, contempt and feelings of superiority over simpleton Americans.

Ah no. I didn't know that. Fair enough.

I feel bad for pointing it out now. It's not like I ever let reality/facts get in the way of a good moan myself!

 

[Vinnie]

I think it was the great Stephen Spielsberg who once said, "pronunciation is like solfadeine; get too obsessed about it and you'll end up in hospidal"

 

[Space]

Janer has a 60" TV.


;>

It doesn't get much more working class than that.

 

[Janer]

It doesn't get much more working class than that.

But Janer hasn't and wonders why you take the same bloke who is always taking the piss out of you at face value, most odd.

And now that you mention the working classes I could tell you that the vast majority now have flat panel tvs and do you know why?
Supply and demand, once there is a mass market there are massive price drops, 1st time I ever seen one of these tellys was in Brown Thomas and they went for 16g's!!!
Now they can be got for under a grand.......

 

[Space]

But Janer hasn't and wonders why you take the same bloke who is always taking the piss out of you at face value, most odd.

And now that you mention the working classes I could tell you that the vast majority now have flat panel tvs and do you know why?
Supply and demand, once there is a mass market there are massive price drops, 1st time I ever seen one of these tellys was in Brown Thomas and they went for 16g's!!!
Now they can be got for under a grand.......

Ah but that's where you'd be wrong, I gave up taking that lad at face value a good while ago, still I wasn't going to miss a chance to get a dig in at you.

Class identity from tv sizes, who'd have thunk it.

 

[Janer]

 

[Space]

 

[Janer]

 

[SONYMEGADRIVE]

Oh man, I think I'd resort to flash cards and pointing, anything not to talk.

Do people then try to mimic you and end up making you want to hurt them in the face?

I went to this chiropractor a few times when I was in Maryland a couple of years ago, some frat boy dickhead who made Bill O'Reilly seem like Noam Chomsky, and who thought my mixed-up accent (it definitely sounds like a hybrid, and may well be irritating to the ear) was the most amusing thing ever.

He THEN decided to tell me all about his trip to Ireland, and how he stayed in an 8000 year old castle and that while in Ireland, he learned to speak with an 'Irish accent', and he insisted on having EVERY conversation with me, INCLUDING ones about my chiropractic treatment in this fucking awful Lucky Charms accent.

I was polite at first, but then I had to ask him to stop doing it.

It just made me worry about the millions of people in the US who get that shit all the time, and worse, since they don't have the in-country advantage of being American as well. I reckon coming across some O'Reilly Licker would make a person worry that if you criticised them, they'd call INS on you.

s'funny, was just recounting this yesterday - the exact same thing happened to me in providence where this guy, when he learned i was irish, started talking
in some weird accent. didn't bother me in the slightest though! i thought it was gas.

 

[ravishinrikrude]

my ma's cookin pisghetti for me dinner lator