词汇大师(Wordmaster)--Pronunciation, Part 2

Broadcast: December 15, 2004

AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on Wordmaster: more of our conversation with Jim Tedder¹, the creator of VOA's online Pronunciation Guide.

RS: It used to be that when announcers at VOA needed to know how to say the name of someone in the news, they would have to look it up in a file of index cards.

AA: Then, about five years ago, Jim Tedder got the idea for a system to make this information available -- complete with audio -- to any user of the Internet.

RS: Today Jim is still responsible for keeping the Pronunciation Guide stocked with the latest names in the news. But it's not always easy.

JIM TEDDER: "This is kind of a funny example. When I go to the Urdu Service at VOA and ask for pronunciations about words from Pakistan, it usually starts an argument. If I ask for a single pronunciation, I'll get 10 different variations because I'm talking to someone from northern Pakistan or eastern Pakistan or western, or one tribe or another. So you have to sometimes just make a -- take a consensus³ and say 'OK, I'm aware of the fact that it's said 10 different ways. For consistency's sake, I'm going to enter it this way."

AA: "Well, now, which brings us to a question from a listener of VOA News Now named Harry⁴ Wang in Shanghai who says -- and am I pronouncing that correctly, Shanghai?"

JIM TEDDER: "That's one way to say it, sure. [laughter]"

AA: "How should I say it?"

RS: "What's the standard VOA way?"

JIM TEDDER: "A little more 'shong' rather than 'shang,' but 'shang-hai' is fine."

AA: "Well, he has noticed that some of our announcers on News Now apparently⁵ have switched between saying the word 'either,' e-i-t-h-e-r, they're pronouncing it either 'ee-ther' or 'eye-ther,' and he wants to know which is more correct or considered more acceptable by most Americans. And [he] goes on to say, 'Should it be the rule set by your station or just simply a personal preference?'"

JIM TEDDER: "Well, this goes back to what we talked about earlier. It's a request that I think all human beings have, a desire, that somewhere there is an absolute that says 'this is right and this is wrong.' The truth is, having studied this for many years, no such standard exists.

"When Mister Wang wrote to us -- and I appreciate him getting in touch, it's a very good question and I understand how it could be confusing for an international listener. If you go as I did -- upon reading his letter, immediately I went to the Merriam-Webster dictionary.

"In this case, the largest one we have, the most complete, is the Third International Unabridged -- a huge, thick, heavy-to-carry-around book. And it gave, as I suspected, 'ee-ther comma eye-ther.' In other words, they're saying with a common word like this, it is said by some educated people as ee-ther; other educated people say eye-ther. They make no distinction that one is a better way to say it than the other."

RS: "I think here, as a former foreign language teacher, I would prefer my students just to be consistent. I really wouldn't care which one they used. I just would prefer that they would be consistent the way they pronounce words."

AA: "It's like the word 'often' [aw-fen] -- or 'awf-ten,' right? -- where you've got half the people say it one way and I remember seeing someone point out that, for the ones who say it one way, the others think they're illiterate⁶ and uneducated, and the same way vice² versa. So which do you say? Do you say 'aw-fen' or 'awf-ten'?"

JIM TEDDER: "I say 'aw-fen' and leave the t out, and the only reason I do is because that's what I was taught when I was in school. It's a habit that I have kept over the years. And I agree with you. When I was in school my teachers, my English teachers, would say 'don't say awf-ten; that's what uneducated, ignorant people say.' And I grew up believing that.

"But, indeed, if you look at what the lexicographers say, they say 'no, we're not saying one is better than the other. We're saying both are said by intelligent, informed, interested people.'

"So what happens for a foreign listener -- and it makes it more difficult in our language -- is, they have to be aware that one can say that word as aw-fen or awf-ten, and we hope that there's not confusion there, but I'm sure there is to some degree."

RS: VOA's Jim Tedder was on the phone with us from his home, since he works evenings and we don't get to see him much.

AA: Besides being one of the voices of Special English, Jim Tedder is the keeper of VOA's online Pronunciation Guide. That's where you'll find phonetic⁷ spellings and audio files to go with about five thousand names in the news. It's all free, and you can find it at voanews.com.

RS: And if you go to voanews.com/wordmaster, you'll find our weekly segments going back to 1998. If you ever have a question, just as Harry Wang in SHONG-hai did -- write to............With Avi Arditti, I'm Rosanne Skirble.

 

1 tedder   

n.（干草）翻晒者，翻晒机

参考例句：

• Jim Tedder has more. 吉姆？特德将给我们做更多的介绍。 来自互联网
• Jim Tedder tells us more. 吉姆？泰德给我们带来更详细的报道。 来自互联网

2 vice   

n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的

参考例句：

• He guarded himself against vice.他避免染上坏习惯。
• They are sunk in the depth of vice.他们堕入了罪恶的深渊。

3 consensus   

n.(意见等的)一致，一致同意，共识

参考例句：

• Can we reach a consensus on this issue?我们能在这个问题上取得一致意见吗？
• What is the consensus of opinion at the afternoon meeting?下午会议上一致的意见是什么？

4 harry   

vt.掠夺，蹂躏，使苦恼

参考例句：

• Today,people feel more hurried and harried.今天，人们感到更加忙碌和苦恼。
• Obama harried business by Healthcare Reform plan.奥巴马用医改掠夺了商界。

5 apparently   

adv.显然地；表面上，似乎

参考例句：

• An apparently blind alley leads suddenly into an open space.山穷水尽，豁然开朗。
• He was apparently much surprised at the news.他对那个消息显然感到十分惊异。

6 illiterate   

adj.文盲的；无知的；n.文盲

参考例句：

• There are still many illiterate people in our country.在我国还有许多文盲。
• I was an illiterate in the old society,but now I can read.我这个旧社会的文盲，今天也认字了。

7 phonetic   

adj.语言的，语言上的，表示语音的

参考例句：

• Our department has engaged a foreign teacher as phonetic adviser.我们系已经聘请了一位外籍老师作为语音顾问。
• English phonetic teaching is an important teaching step in elementary stages.语音教学是英语基础阶段重要的教学环节。