Language desk
< January 28	<< Dec \| January \| Feb >>	January 30 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

January 29

What are the pronunciations?

~~English pronunciation of Bouchard? [1], [2] Does she pronounce her surname Bouchard /ˈbuːʃɑːrd/ or /ˈbʊʃɑːrd/?~~ √ Solved

~~And French pronunciation of Genie? Is there anyone who knows if it's [ʒəni]? There are two French record: [3], [4]~~ √ Solved

English pronunciation of Anisimova? [5] Is it /əˌnɪsɪˈmoʊvə/?

English pronunciation of Ajla Tomljanovic? [6], [7] Is it /ˈaɪlə təmˈjɑːnəvɪtʃ/?

English pronunciation of Marina Erakovic? [8], [9] Is it /məˈrɪnə ɪˈrækəvɪtʃ/?

Appreciations! LoveVanPersie (talk) 11:01, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

In French, she is always called Eugénie Bouchard (never Genie) with the regular French pronunciation of both names (i.e. the final d in Bouchard is silent). It's in English that her name presents a challenge. --Xuxl (talk) 14:31, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I'm a bit rusty with the IPA, but in English, at least in Canadian English, it would be /buˈʃɑɹd/, wouldn't it? Stressed on the second syllable, not really a long [ɑ] (at least not like it would be in French), and [ɹ] instead of [r]? (Trying to transcribe how I pronounce it, and how I hear it pronounced by sports news reporters...) Adam Bishop (talk) 15:44, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Xuxl: Thanks. But Genie is a diminutive of Eugénie. Isn't it Genie?

In French, diminutives are not used as much as in English. Génie is not one that's common (it's the French form of "genius", so it sounds really strange as a first name). I could see a commentator using the English pronunciation of "Genie" (something like Djee-ny), but it would be a deliberate affectation to underline the fact that French is not her first language, not something done in the normal course of a broadcast. For example, Amélie Mauresmo was always called "Amélie", not "Amé" or "Amy" or "Mélie" or an other contrived diminutive. --Xuxl (talk) 20:07, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Xuxl: I see. All gratitude! LoveVanPersie (talk) 20:19, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

She is almost always called "Genie" in English (/ˈdʒini/ or perhaps sometimes /ˈʒini/). Adam Bishop (talk) 01:10, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Adam Bishop: Get it. Thank you! Do you know another three names' pronunciations in the clips? LoveVanPersie (talk) 16:12, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Adam Bishop: Remember that transcriptions enclosed within IPAc-en are diaphonemic, so the vowel length symbol has nothing to do with phonetic vowel length (which is quite variable in English). It's a pure abstraction. Mr KEBAB (talk) 04:24, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, Anisimova is /əˌnɪsɪˈmoʊvə/ in English,

Ajla Tomljanovic is /ˈaɪlə təmˈljɑːnəvɪtʃ/ (don't forget the second L), and

Marina Erakovic is /məˈrɪnə ɪˈrækəvɪtʃ/. —Stephen (talk) 03:40, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I doubt it, as regards Anisimova. It's true that sports reporters tend to move the stress back to the penult in such names, but that doesn't make it correct. Anisimova is the feminine of Anisimov, and unless Anisimov is stressed on the last syllable (which seems unlikely), Anisimova should probably be stressed on the "sim". Similarly, Sharapova is stressed on the "ra", not on the "pov". --Trovatore (talk) 04:21, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Trovatore:, /əˌnɪsɪˈmoʊvə/ is how she pronounces it herself. In Russian, the stress is on the second syllable /ɐˈnʲisʲiməvə/, but Miss Anisimova stresses the penultimate in English. —Stephen (talk) 09:57, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Already covered; see below. --Trovatore (talk) 09:59, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Trovatore: True, but opinions of other people are always welcome. I'm not infallible. Mr KEBAB (talk) 10:12, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, but Stephen hadn't noticed that I had already acknowledged the point.

I wonder whether the reason she and her family accept the stress on the penult is that it would be pretty difficult to get Anglophones to say three unstressed syllables in a row (Kournikova would have the same problem). (Though she must have had to explain a few times why her father is presumably named Anisimov rather than Anisimova.)

But it really shouldn't be hard at all for Anglophones to get the stress right in "Sharapova", and I don't really understand why the Share-a-POVE-a barbarism is so persistent. --Trovatore (talk) 10:24, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Trovatore: Oh, that's what you mean.

Yeah... /æˈniːsɪməvə/ or /æˈnɪsɪməvə/ and /ˈkʊərnɪkəvə/ sound pretty un-English to me. It's probably the last schwa that's guilty of that.

/ˌʃærəˈpoʊvə/ is just as easy for Anglophones. It's probably not wanting to reduce the ⟨o⟩ to /ə/ that's responsible for that pronunciation, and /ʃəˈræpoʊvə/ would be a bit weird, wouldn't it? So the end result is /ˌʃærəˈpoʊvə/. Mr KEBAB (talk) 10:55, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

/ʃəˈræpoʊvə/ would be weird because of the /æ/, which seems extremely British. I don't see anything weird about /ʃəˈrɑːpoʊvə/, which is pretty much how I say it (modulo quibbles on the schwas); that seems perfectly accessible to GA speakers. --Trovatore (talk) 11:00, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Trovatore: Right. I forgot that unrounded open vowels from other languages are regularly anglicized as /ɑː/ by Americans.

In that case, do /æˈniːsɪ(ˌ)moʊvə ~ æˈnɪsɪ(ˌ)moʊvə/ and /ˈkʊərnɪ(ˌ)koʊvə/ sound acceptable to you? Just being curious. Mr KEBAB (talk) 10:07, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Stephen G. Brown: I'm pretty sure that she pronounces it /təmˈjɑːnəvɪtʃ/, not /təmˈljɑːnəvɪtʃ/. I doubt that /lj/ is a valid syllable onset when it appears before /ɑː/. Also, English isn't her native language and you can hear that she has a mixed Croatian-American-Australian accent. I don't know whether we can trust her pronunciation, as /təm/ is a weird way of anglicizing pre-stressed ⟨tom⟩, and incorrect reduction of unstressed vowels to a schwa (e.g. tattoo as */təˈtuː/) is a pretty common error among non-native speakers. /tɒmˈjɑːnəvɪtʃ/ or /tɒmˈlɑːnəvɪtʃ/ would sound a lot more appropriate. Or maybe she pronounces it /təˈmjɑːnəvɪtʃ/? But /mj/ is also a weird onset.

If it's truly /təmˈljɑːnəvɪtʃ/, it's even weirder. I seriously doubt that it's a valid anglicization. We should find out whether there's an established pronunciation of her surname that is used by tennis commentators.

Also, I'm the one who originally transcribed Marina Erakovic as /məˈrɪnə ɪˈrækəvɪtʃ/, and I'm sure that it's correct. It was only a few days ago that it was incorrectly changed to /məˈrɪnə ɪˈrɑːkəvɪtʃ/. Mr KEBAB (talk) 04:24, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Trovatore: That's how Anisimova herself pronounces it. She's a native speaker of English, so there's no reason not to trust her. Mr KEBAB (talk) 04:24, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Ah. That's fine, then. Sharapova seems to have made her peace with the reporters' pronunciation, but I don't get the impression she really likes it. --Trovatore (talk) 04:27, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I can't speak for English, but the original (Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian) pronunciation would be /ˈajla tomˈʎanoʋitɕ/ and /maˈrina eˈrakoʋitɕ/ with the /tɕ/ sound about the same as ch in choose. 93.139.90.39 (talk) 03:52, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

But that's what he asked for: English pronunciations. The original Serbo-Croatian pronunciations are already in the articles. Mr KEBAB (talk) 04:24, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for going offtopic, but what's the point of an "English" pronunciation? I certainly pronounce my name the same in both English and Croatian conversation - the closer you can get to it the more it is appreciated. I have a few sportspeople friends who are very annoyed by the mangled "English" pronunciations they get abroad from commentators; it's certainly not something they'd want you to imitate when talking to them. 93.139.90.39 (talk) 05:50, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

93.139.90.39 -- sometimes even when people can actually pronounce a name from another language correctly in that language, they don't necessarily have the dexterity to slip the foreign pronunciation naturally into the middle of an English sentence (or they dislike making the effort to do so). And for some sounds, such as that in Yeni Ngbakoto's name, or French [ʁ] or Arabic [ʕ] (ع), or Southern African clicks, the vast majority of English speakers are simply incapable of pronouncing it as it is pronounced in the original language. In such cases, it's often convenient to establish a fixed Englishized pronunciation, so people don't each stumble over it separately and end up pronouncing it lots of different ways... AnonMoos (talk) 08:59, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

There are no clicks, ʁ or ʕ in Croatian - for the most part you'll find the phonemes have English counterparts. Pronouncing e.g. /r/ as [ɹ] or /o/ as [oʊ] is something I absolutely understand, but knowingly deciding to pronounce /e/ as [i] when there is actually a vowel /i/ in the original language and there are a number of closer sounds in English, such as [ɛ] or [æ], does come off as disrespectful to me. 93.136.79.20 (talk) 05:25, 1 February 2018 (UTC) (90.139)[reply]

There's a lot to explain here, and I'm not the best person to do that. Please read English phonology, Great Vowel Shift, phonology and phonotactics. If the articles aren't good enough, try googling the terms. All I can say is that the reason the first sound of Erakovic is /ɪ/ is exactly the same as the reason the third sound of it is /ə/. See vowel reduction in English.

I'd be careful with using phonetic brackets. Transcriptions enclosed within IPAc-en (the template used to transcribe English into IPA) aren't phonetic nor even phonemic but diaphonemic, i.e. extremely abstract, even more abstract than phonemic transcriptions. The fact that we write /məˈrɪnə ɪˈrækəvɪtʃ/ doesn't mean that it's [məˈrɪnə ɪˈrækəvɪtʃ] in phonetic transcription, especially given the fact that English /r/ is very rarely trilled. A typical RP pronunciation of that name would be [məˈɹɪnəɹ‿ɪˈɹakəvɪtʃ], in GA it'd be [məˈɻɪnə (ʔ)əˈɻækəvɪtʃ], in General New Zealand [mɘˈɹɘnɘɹ‿ɘˈɹɛkɘvɘtʃ]. See also linking and intrusive R.

Also, ⟨e⟩ never stands for the diaphoneme /æ/ in English. This is orthography 101. Mr KEBAB (talk) 09:14, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe not that useful since it's not IPA but it looks like Marina Erakovic was given as mah-REE-nuh eh-RAK-o-vich in the 2015 WTA Media Guide. No link since I could only find the 2017 and 2018 media guides and the place I found this list which I think is from 2015 is likely an external link copyvio. Nil Einne (talk) 08:46, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Nil Einne: That's /mɑːˈriːnə ɛˈrækoʊvɪtʃ/ in our diaphonemic system (which is explained on Help:IPA/English). I'm afraid that it's not correct, as the first syllable of Marina and the third syllable of Erakovic are incorrectly analyzed as having strong vowels /ɑː/ and /oʊ/ which Erakovic clearly pronounces as a schwa /ə/. The first vowel of the surname is cleary a schwa /ə/ too, but New Zealand English has the weak vowel merger. Since our transcriptions are diaphonemic, we must write it /ɪ/ as that's the sound that'd be used by RP speakers pronouncing her name (unstressed word-initial ⟨e⟩ is /ɪ/ in RP, at least if we can only choose between /ɪ/ and /ə/. The latter would suggest that the surname spelled Arakovic). Speakers of New Zealand, Australian, Irish and Norfolk English should know that they're to interpret that transcription as /məˈrɪnə əˈrækəvɪtʃ/ (to be precise, it's /məˈrənə əˈrækəvətʃ/ (or, if we want to be pedantic and follow the set of symbols used on New Zealand English phonology, /mɘˈɹɘnɘ ɘˈɹɛkɘvɘtʃ/) in New Zealand, as they don't differentiate between /ə/ and /ɪ/, which both have a schwa-like quality around [ɘ] or [ə].) The second vowel of Marina seems to be wrong too, as Erakovic pronounces it /ɪ/, not /iː/. Her accent is somewhat unusual in that she seems to pronounce /ɪ/ in a non-Kiwi way, preserving the [ɪ] quality of it that's so common in other accents. Maybe she had some exposure to the Maori accent, in which [ɪ] for the stressed /ə/ (our /ɪ/) is quite common. I don't know. Mr KEBAB (talk) 09:50, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

A likely explanation would be that [ɪ] is a misidentification/mispronunciation of /e/ (which is much closer to it than /ɛ/; the latter doesn't exist in Croatian outside of dialectal use), which is part of the original pronunciation of Eraković. 93.136.79.20 (talk) 05:25, 1 February 2018 (UTC) (90.139)[reply]

Croatian /e/ isn't close-mid but between close-mid and open-mid. It's not terribly close to English /ɪ/. Mr KEBAB (talk) 09:14, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thank all guys for answering the questions!

Since Ajla Tomljanović isn't an Anglophone, I find some records by commentators. Are [10] and [11] /tɒmˈjɑːnəvɪtʃ/? And [12] seems /tɒmˈjænəvɪtʃ/?

@93.139.90.39: Do you know the tone of Ajla? It doesn't exist in Hrvatski jezični portal. Is it Ájla, Àjla, Ȃjla or Ȁjla? LoveVanPersie (talk) 16:54, 30 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@LoveVanPersie: Not quite. They're /tɒmˈljænəvɪtʃ/, /tɒmˈjænəvɪtʃ/ and /tɒmˈlænəvɪtʃ/. /tɒmˈljænəvɪtʃ/ still looks somewhat weird to me, a more Anglophone-friendly version would be /ˌtɒmliˈænəvɪtʃ/ (to a certain extent, the weak vowel /i/ and the approximant /j/ are in a complementary distribution). Unless there's proof that any of those three pronunciations aren't widely used, I'd list all three in the following order: /tɒmˈjænəvɪtʃ, -ˈlæn-, -ˈljæn-/, with the version with /lj/ being the least preferred one.

You forgot the versions with a long unstressed vowel. There are 8 possible pronunciations: Àjla, Ájla, Ȁjla, Ȃjla, Àjlā, Ájlā, Ȁjlā and Ȃjlā. I have no idea which one is correct. Mr KEBAB (talk) 10:07, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Native speaker of Serbo-Croatian here — the name is not common even in her native Bosnia, so it's hard to establish the tone with certainty. It certainly does not have a long post-tonic vowel. My educated guess would be either Ȁjla /âjla/ (~Azra) or Ájla /ǎːjla/ (~Ajša). No such user (talk) 11:11, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@No such user: Good to know. Do you think that we should add those transcriptions to Ajla Tomljanović? Mr KEBAB (talk) 16:45, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Mr KEBAB: Upon reading the article, I'm of an opinion that her parents, a Croatian father and a Bosniak mother of cosmopolitan backgrounds, gave names to their daughters that are easily pronounceable and broadly resemble both traditions, but aren't identifiably traditional (her sister's Hannah (name) is well-known, but not common in the Balkans except for Jewish girls, but Ajla is really a hapax legomenon). That further indicates the "unmarked" pronunciation of Ȁjla (~/'ajla/), but that's still my OR. No such user (talk) 21:42, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@No such user: That's an impressive response! It sounds sufficiently well-thought to let us use [âjla] in the article. The transcription of the surname is also unsourced (though I know that it's from HJP, it's the only source LoveVanPersie uses for Serbo-Croatian), so that's not a big problem. Mr KEBAB (talk) 21:50, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I would second that Ajla has both short vowels, although being from Zagreb my guess of pitch is as good as anybody's 93.136.79.20 (talk) 05:25, 1 February 2018 (UTC) (90.139)[reply]

Thanks for all your detailed answers!

@No such user and 93.139.90.39: What about these given names Ani, Haris (record in Forvo) and Tena, surnames: Džumhur (record by Damir Džumhur), Kovinić, Krstajić (record in Forvo), Lajović (record by Dušan Lajović himself), Đere (record in Forvo), Mrdeža, Njirić (record in Forvo), Pulišić (record in Forvo), Seleš (record in Forvo), Tinjić, and both given names and surnames:Antonio Veić (Antonio, Veić in Forvo), Edin Džeko (record in Forvo), Sead Kolašinac (record in Forvo), Vesna Dolonc (record in Forvo). Thanks a million!

And the pronunciaton of Nȍvāk sounds wrong (the tone of o)? LoveVanPersie (talk) 16:34, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@LoveVanPersie: It is "wrong" indeed – see Mr KEBAB's answer below. I'd guess that the speaker is from Belgrade, whose typical features include merging of short rising and short falling (that pronunciation sounds slightly rising to me too) and shortening of post-tonic length. While I'm not against addressing your "shopping list" (though I'm a bit busy IRL lately), I'd suggest switching to your or my talk page. No such user (talk) 13:55, 2 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@No such user: Appreciate you! LoveVanPersie (talk) 18:22, 2 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Mr KEBAB: Is it /pəˈɡuːlə/? LoveVanPersie (talk) 16:48, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@LoveVanPersie: I'd be wary of posting such shopping lists of pronunciations. People get paid to do such research, you know. If you're that interested in Serbo-Croatian you should try learning it.

It's not wrong, it's different. In speech, tones don't always agree with what you can find in dictionaries. In Croatia and Serbia, there's generally no tonal contrast among short vowels, and unstressed long vowels are mostly short. In Bosnia, there is tonal contrast among short vowels, but short unstressed vowels are often reduced (mid-centralized) or even elided. In some accents (e.g. in popular Zagreb speech) the tones have completely disappeared. See Serbo-Croatian phonology.

I thought I made it clear that I don't want to be pinged with requests for IPA. I watch this reference desk. You can post your requests here, and I'll respond from time to time. Or not. Who knows. The point is I joined the discussion this time because it involved the IPA for Marina Erakovic, which I transcribed myself a couple of weeks ago.

It is /pəˈɡuːlə/. Mr KEBAB (talk) 17:54, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@LoveVanPersie: Maybe I phrased it in a weird way. What I meant was that posting such a long list may make people not want to help you, not that you're breaking any rules by doing that. As far as I know, you aren't. Mr KEBAB (talk) 20:15, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I know. Thanks for your reminder. LoveVanPersie (talk) 20:23, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]