tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8419556441121513390.post4777675543010046050..comments2024-03-15T20:17:33.221-04:00Comments on Ace Linguist: Bay-zhing or bay-jing: Let's go to BeijingUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8419556441121513390.post-68365082595484197512019-06-03T09:17:49.662-04:002019-06-03T09:17:49.662-04:00Yes, "Bei[ʒ]ing" definitely does not get...Yes, "Bei[ʒ]ing" definitely does not get the same amount of defense from descriptivists or prescriptivists. It doesn't seem to be fashionable to defend it the way other stigmatized pronunciations are defended, perhaps because of the association with perceived class-climbing. It isn't "protecting the little guy" or defending an on-going sound change or a long-lost alternate pronunciation. It's the sort of language change that is easy to make fun of but finds few defenders, hence the analogy to "nucular." A true descriptivist approach will simply note that these are varieties that exist and that there is a negative attitude towards them among some circles. But most people, linguists included, do not adopt a true descriptivist approach to language outside of academic studies and have their own bugbears.<br /><br />That being said, this pronunciation is approximately 25 years old now, and the users of "Bei[ʒ]ing" today are likely unaware that it used to be called "Peking" or that there even exists the alternate pronunciation of "Bei[dʒ]ing." A quarter of a century after Joseph noted this pronunciation as pseudo-French, there are still articles being written about it! I wonder how long it will take before it is fully accepted as an alternate pronunciation, being that it shows no signs of slowing down and that its users are unaware that it is proscribed. Perhaps it will continue on like "between him and I" - disliked by prescriptivists and descriptivists, yet still common.Karenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01212964336916867257noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8419556441121513390.post-20803003642417872602019-05-22T04:14:46.032-04:002019-05-22T04:14:46.032-04:00I think what rubs people the wrong way about "...I think what rubs people the wrong way about "Bei[ʒ]ing" is that it sounds neither fully anglicized, nor fully original. There used to be a fully-anglicized name, "Peking": using it wouldn't be worse than "Moscow" for "Москва" (not to mention exonyms such as "Germany" or "Finland").<br /><br />At some point, people decided to switch to "Beijing", because it's the endonym. The original pronunciation uses [dʒ], so if it's important to pronounce it as the local people do, it 'should' be [dʒ]. On the other hand, if the word was fully anglicized, then it would use regular English pronunciation rules, so 'j' would be pronounced [dʒ]... which gives the same result. How come the word ended up with [ʒ] if it fits neither the original, nor regular English rules?<br /><br />Hypercorrection seems to bother both descriptivists and prescriptivists. Prescriptivists, because they insist on the 'correct' form. Descriptivists, because they think it's a proof of the ravages of prescriptivism. Isn't it funny?Ryusenshinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8419556441121513390.post-14385773514507986702019-05-08T09:05:10.899-04:002019-05-08T09:05:10.899-04:00There are certain language changes that seem to ar...There are certain language changes that seem to arise, as Geoff Nunberg put it, from ignorance of the standard form - 'nucular' seems to be in that category. But the people who adopted it later were not necessarily themselves ignorant; they simply picked it up from someone who used it and didn't really stop to think about the pronunciation/spelling discrepancy or whether it 'makes sense' re: 'I could care less.' There are, after all, so many strange spellings and pronunciations in English ('lieutenant' -> 'leftenant') that what's one more? There are also so many phrases that are unintuitive to understand ('X is all but Y' doesn't mean 'X is everything except Y', which is what I expected as a child) that you become inured to stuff like 'I could care less.' Now I do have my pet peeve about 'I could care less', but as you say, it is probably too late to expect that that form will recede!<br /><br />Yes, I have rarely encountered anyone who speaks Spanish, French, Russian, or Swedish who brags about using the original place names pronunciation. The phenomenon of 'fidelity to endonyms' seems to be more common in English-speaking spaces, perhaps as a counter to Anglo-centrism? I cannot help but wonder if it is also related to the legacy of English colonialism. It seems to be a more recent phenomenon. But that's idle speculation on my part - I'd be very interested in seeing if there are examples to the contrary.<br /><br />It would certainly be interesting to switch entirely to endonyms. Farewell Finland, hello Suomi!Karenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01212964336916867257noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8419556441121513390.post-33090133758017098132019-05-08T01:58:54.442-04:002019-05-08T01:58:54.442-04:00I think the last vestige of my own prescriptivism ...I think the last vestige of my own prescriptivism that I have a tough time letting go of is in these cases where words (or phrases) are changed due to being misheard or because they're simply tricky to pronounce. "Nucular" seems like such a case to me. It clearly violates the spelling logic of the word, but yes, noo-cue-lar rolls off the tongue a little easier than new-clee-ar so it feels like people just gave up and quit trying to say it the "right" way, spelling be damned. If there were a centuries-old evolution of the spelling and pronunciation I'd be more sympathetic, but we're talking about a word that didn't come into common use by the non-scientist general public until probably the 1960s ("atomic" being more common before then, I'd assume — correct me if I'm wrong). Anyway, I put "nucular" in the same category as "I could care less": nonsensical and incorrect, but it's probably to late to fret over it at this point.<br /><br />I'm with you 100% on the foreign pronunciations of words. Anglicized pronunciations are pretty standardized and I'm sure other languages do the same thing, so I have no problem with it. If a newscaster in Colombia wants to pronounce our second-largest city "Los An-hell-ess" that seems entirely appropriate to me. And when a radio person switches to a foreign accent to pronounce a name (when they are themselves not a native speaker of that language), I find it cringey. Same thing when a US student returns from a semester in Spain and insists on calling it "Barthelona".<br /><br />Regarding Moscow, none of our pronunciations make any more or less sense because the Russian name is "Moskva". As far as I'm concerned we just have a different name for the city in our language: we call Deutschland Germany, we call Nihon Japan, we call Moskva Moscow, and so forth. :-)Stutznoreply@blogger.com