How do you pronounce Mopane?

[sturob]

I doubt that the vowel in "pa" is as long in Ndebele as most English speakers enunciate the vowel in "PAW". In the circumstances it may be more "correct" to spell it "moponee" but, then, Roman script English and phonetics are not bedfellows.

I wrote a big long diatribe about why "paw" is actually appropriate, but nevermind, since it's argumentative. OK, maybe I should have said "pah."

But mopanee is no more accurate than mopani, UNLESS we take into account that in the Romanized script of Ndebele, Shona, and Swahili, the word would be spelled "mopani." Double-E is too ambiguous in English, which is why it has been abandoned in most official romanizations. Cf, Chinese surname Lee, which in modern Pinyin has become "Li."

À propos your comment on "paw," it's interesting to note the incorrectness of the spelling of the Korean surname "Park," which is actually pronounced more like "Pahk." Most native speakers of English (meaning actual-first-language natives, not those who learn it because it's an official language in their country) pronounce postvocalic R, making this surname "Parrrrrrk," something impronounceable to a monolingual Korean. And which can't be written with their syllabary.

Stuart

[talasiga]

.....
But mopanee is no more accurate than mopani, UNLESS we take into account that in the Romanized script of Ndebele, Shona, and Swahili, the word would be spelled "mopani." Double-E is too ambiguous in English, which is why it has been abandoned in most official romanizations.

And exactly how is "double E" ambiguous in English?
In the majority of English words "double E" denotes
an elongated enunciation of the short vowel "i" as in "sit".
Look at these examples:-

beef
beech
been
beep beep
beet
cheek
cheese
cheetah
deed
deem
deep
fee
feeble
feed
feel (etc)
feet

Need I complete the list?

The only exceptions so far are beer, cheer and deer but these are subject to various enunciations of the "double E" depending on whether
1. the speaker does not enunciate the "r" as a consonant (as most English speakers don't), in which case the whole set "eer" function as a diphthong.
2. the speaker does enunciate the "r" as a consonant (voiced alveolar or post dental with weak roll or tap - as in North England parts and Scotland etc) and in which case the "double E" is enunciated as per my point.

So what exactly is your point about the "ambiguity" of "ee" in English?
Or are you just arguing for the sake of arguing?
Hmmm?

[Jumbuk]

"Mo' pain" is what you get when you hit yourself on the head (again) with your Mopane flute.

I felt stupid when my wife's harp maker asked me what timber my flute was made of. He had spent time in Africa and very quickly gave me the correct pronunciation. Now I think of it, it was mo-pah-nee, not mo-paw-nee - make of that what you will!

[Flutered]

I'd be embarrassed to ask how to pronounce Bodhran or feadog. I don't even know what that is. Is feadog the song you tune your ukulele to?

Hi SB, try this link for meanings and pronounciations: http://comhaltas.ie/glossary/
A 'Feadóg' is a whistle of course! and a 'Feadóg Mhór' a big whistle or flute! Don't ask what a low whistle is as gaelige, they're only a recent blowin!! though I'm sure there's some makey uppy word for them. I've also seen the term 'Fliúit' used for a flute but that seems to be a recent makey uppy too, though I could be very wrong here as there are regional dialects in Ireland and it's quite possible the word for a flute varies between Munster, Connaught and Donegal.

[sturob]

And exactly how is "double E" ambiguous in English?
In the majority of English words "double E" denotes
an elongated enunciation of the short vowel "i" as in "sit".

You need not, but, I suppose I'll have to rephrase.

As English has become more international, in fact, the lingua franca, it was decided by those who made such decisions that the letter E was ambiguous because only in English does it phonetically sound as it does in beet or cheese. Nearly all, if not all, other Romanized languages use it to indicate variants of the non-diphthongued sound approximated by the vowel in "bay."

Therefore, as English has become more international, it became apparent that E and EE are a little ambiguous when writing words of foreign origin. EE is a common ending in French; cf. 'née,' which doesn't rhyme with knee. When educated English speakers not shackled by monolingualism see a word like "Königsallee," they tend to realize that the EE probably isn't pronounced like it is in beet.

And if you'd like NUMBERS of native speakers, North American English dominates over British pronunciation. So "been" doesn't rhyme with "bean." It is incorrect for you to comment that "most" English speakers don't enunciate the R in beer, cheer, and deer as a consonant, since numerically WE outnumber YOU. People who have learned a variant of British English as a second language don't count when we're talking about how to pronounce the language, much as my pronunciation of French, German, or Spanish wouldn't count.

Would you like for me to cite scholarly evidence, most of which comes from Britain, which indicates the thinking among linguists that North American English, in its Canadian and American variants, is more conservative than British English? That the pronunciation of our dialects has changed less in the past 300-400 years than has the pronunciation of British English? So if you want to ask who's right . . . even when you look at grammar, our language has retained verb tenses lost in the UK.

Probably if you'd like to continue this we should go to the poststructural pub, but I (a) am actually qualified for the discussion if an advanced degree in linguistics qualifies me, and (b) I think you're just trying to be argumentative anyway.

Stuart

[pipersgrip]

well, you two are from different countries. so your accents are different in the way you pronounce it.

[Casey Burns]

Another tack in this is to consider the scientific name for Mopane:

Colosphernum mopane

Thus perhaps we should be using the Latin pronunciation!

[sturob]

You're right, Casey.

And man, I'm fussy today! Maybe I need a nap, or a binkie.

Stuart

[sbhikes]

Well, I didn't mean to start up such a fuss, but I do like the word "make uppy." I'm going to add that to my vocabulary.

[Ro3b]

The phrase "English has become the lingua franca" made me chortle.

[Denny]

hard to argue with that, innit?

[sturob]

The phrase "English has become the lingua franca" made me chortle.

I'm glad you got it!

Stuart

Ro3b's laughing because 'lingua franca,' which translates figuratively as 'common tongue,' is Latin for 'French language' and arises from the time in history when French was the language of diplomacy.

[AaronMalcomb]

Another tack in this is to consider the scientific name for Mopane:

Colosphernum mopane

Thus perhaps we should be using the Latin pronunciation!

Luckily there wouldn't be much difference between Ecclesiastical and Classical pronunciations since there are no G's, V's or C's flanked by E or I.

[Casey Burns]

I use neither of those being a devout atheist and practicing paleontologist.

I prefer the Scientific pronunciation. See
http://www.saltspring.com/capewest/pron.htm as an example
or search Google for "scientific pronunciation Latin"

[Cathy Wilde]

Another tack in this is to consider the scientific name for Mopane:

Colosphernum mopane

Thus perhaps we should be using the Latin pronunciation!

Which, my oh-so-long-ago four years of Latin would lead me to believe, would be "mo-pah-nay" (, y'all), eh?