Bill Maher, Fareed Zakaria and The Politics of Pronunciation
By Guest Contributor Joseph, originally posted at VS. THE POMEGRANATE
I have a love/hate relationship with Bill Maher because I think he represents both the best and worst aspects of the newest generation of political comedians. During the bleakest hours of the Bush administration Maher was often a welcome voice crying in the wilderness about any number of conservative excesses. But just as often Maher goes for the easy joke at the expense of politics. His attitudes toward women are legendarily bad (although, to be fair he is generally more respectful of his female guests than, say, Charlie Rose, who never met a woman he didn’t interrupt mid-sentence). In general Maher is pretty shitty on Arabs and Muslims too, regularly parroting the same centuries-old Orientalist/Islamophobic scenarios as any Fox talking head. His anti-religion schtick in particular is (as with Hitchens and Dawkins) dependent on an almost pathological Islamophobia about which he refuses to be dissuaded. So, you know, I watch Real Time with the side-eye at the ready.
It is always interesting to see how Maher’s guests deal with Real Time’s trap-door dynamic: One second you may be making your way through a serious conversation about the economy and the next the floor gives way and you have landed on a pile of dick jokes designed to allow Maher to remind himself (and you) that he is really in charge here. It is, with very few exceptions, always especially painful for me to see actors try to keep up… it’s like watching a dog walk on two legs. A recent Real Time appearance by Kerry Washington, whose points about the Obama administration were almost entirely overshadowed by her crazy-eyes, is a sad example of this.
Fareed Zakaria, Richard Engel and Barney Frank (D-MA) shared the panel on Real Time’s May 1st episode and their facility in navigating the hybrid news/comedy format was fascinating to observe. Frank, who now more than ever represents the Clintonian old guard within the Democratic Party, crossed the line into grotesque self-parody. (Note to Barney: Your uncanny resemblance to Buddy Hackett notwithstanding, leave the jokes to Maher, okay? You are very, very creepy when you try to be funny). NBC News Chief Foreign Correspondent Engel, who it must be said has a beautiful head of hair going for him, looked a bit like Steve Trevor seconds before Wonder Woman comes crashing through a window: handsomely at sea in the face of the shifting comedic tides. While Zakaria seemed amused by the spectacle and gracefully adjusted to the often abrupt shifts in tone. However, even he felt compelled to make with the funny, when he suggested with a smirk that the efforts undertaken by politicians and media professionals to pronounce Afghanistan and Pakistan correctly–as in “Eff-GAHn-i-stan” and “PAHk-i-stan”–is an attempt to be “ethnically cool.” He compared this to liberal efforts to say “Nigeh-RAHG-wah” (ie. Nicaragua) in the 1980s. Of course Zakaria, who is Indian, gave himself a pass here by saying that these pronunciations came easily to him because he comes from that part of the world. The rest of the panel seemed uncomfortable with this observation as Engel, who was there hawking his upcoming book, War Journal: My Five Years in Iraq, defended his proper pronunciation by saying that he’d spent significant time in the region. Zakaria argued that Americans anglicize the names of European countries as a matter of course, making no special effort to say “FrAHnce” instead of France, for example. The implication being that the special emphasis on pronunciation highlights foreignness, rather than the reverse.
Frank, who by this time was imagining a rim-shot after every bon-mot, piped up that certain of his constituents were very comfortable saying “Yisroel” as a matter of course, which gave Maher the opportunity to shift the conversation away from this awkward comedic non-starter and on to Israel. Rather than follow him in that shift (in which Frank defended Israel to a comic degree and Zakaria and even Maher (!) called him on it) I’d like to linger on this uncomfortable exchange about pronunciation. (For your reference the video at the top of this post contains this brief exchange starting at around 6:55).
As a progressive I am always on board to deconstruct liberal guilt for its hidden racism and ethnocentrism, but I am not convinced that Zakaria is right about this. I am also old enough to remember the earnest Spanish pronunciation employed by liberal activists working around Central American issues.
But, so what?
Is it really fair to torment liberals over their…admittedly sometimes clumsy… attempts at cultural respect? Or perhaps more to the point, is it really productive? Since the first Bush administration, mispronunciation has been willfully employed to assert rhetorical superiority over Arab and Muslim subjects. Am I the only one who remembers that George H.W. Bush—-in a move that made more than one gay friend of mine arch an eyebrow– renamed Saddam Hussein “Sodom”? And is it possible to hear the default American mispronunciations “EYE-rack” and “EYE-ran” without hearing George W. Bush’s folksy/wounded/proud voice in your head? Is it really so ridiculous to ask that if we are sending young American men and women to fight and die in a foreign country that we learn to say its name correctly? Is “EAR-ock” really such a devastating compromise for American tongues and ears? Or even, when anglicized as Zakaria suggests, “EAR-ack”? I don’t think so.
So I wonder: what is gained by mocking well-intentioned liberals when they make an effort?
By positioning himself as a native informant Zakaria whipped out his authenticity card and slapped it down on the table. I like Zakaria for lots of reasons–many of which can be observed in the video above– but that is as much of a bullshit move as willfully mispronouncing “foreign” names as a way of asserting cultural authority. In fact, of these strategies the one that bothers me least is an earnest attempt to connect.
Thoughts?
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
Tami wrote:
Awesome piece, Joseph. And I agree. Unlike Zakaria, I find my nerves jangled by American mispronunciations of other countries (Eye-rack…ugh.). That even many local news journalists don’t bother to get the pronunciations down seems an example of priviledge: “Why should I bother to get your ‘funny’ name, right?”
Of course, many will take Zakaria’s pronouncement as law. You know when POC speak we are speaking for all POC.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 8:17 am ¶
Miyak29 wrote:
I strongly disagree with many of your statements you made about Bill Maher and the other atheists. For instance.
“In general Maher is pretty shitty on Arabs and Muslims too”
He bashes Christians A LOT more. In fact I haven’t really seen him go after Muslims, except radical islam and I take offense to your comment if your implying that the radical form of islam, ie the ‘terrorism kind’ that he bashes is representative of the norm.
“Regularly parroting the same centuries-old Orientalist/Islamophobic scenarios as any Fox talking head.”
Since when? Again he makes fun of right wing america more than anything. Why aren’t you outraged about that as well?
“His anti-religion schtick in particular is (as with Hitchens and Dawkins) dependent on an almost pathological Islamophobia about which he refuses to be dissuaded.”
Um no, it’s not schtick. They are rationalists, they believe in evidence and reason vs blind faith, and that’s what they use in the arguments against faith. If you watched any of their arguments, especially Hitchens, he brings up jewish circumcision practices and Catholic church bans on condoms as well as creationism and other policies. Radical islam is just one example they all use for an example of religion going maverick. If this was the 1200’s they would use the Inquisition or whatever the christians were doing.
I’m sorry, but this is shoddy research for your article on your part…IMO, and I found it hard to take the rest of it seriously.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 9:18 am ¶
N wrote:
I think it is respectful to make an attempt to pronounce Proper names “properly”. With France, there is a long tradition of using a certain pronunciation, so I wouldn’t expect that to change. But with names that are new to most Americans, why not use the/a proper pronunciation when introducing them to the vernacular.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 9:51 am ¶
N wrote:
What is gained? Its IMO an attempt to assert ownership and keep whitey in his place.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 9:56 am ¶
gatamala wrote:
I suppose that accounts for the kuh-TAR/KUH-ter shift…
I saw that episode & had a professor use the Nicaragua line on me (a year speaking Spanish will do that to you). Even SNL had a skit where they pronounced Spanish and then Irish names as well.
It’s a tight rope. I can see where Zakaria is coming from. But then again, who doesn’t want their name pronounced properly? I thought anglicizing names was not.good.
(Not only did Zakaria whip out the authenticity card, he lumped himself in the brown box too…but I guess that’s part and parcel of being the Brown Spokesman)
Posted 19 May 2009 at 10:00 am ¶
atlasien wrote:
I left a more detailed comment on your original post, but I think it’s impossible to pronounce names like “Iraq” correctly in English. The Anglicized pronunciation isn’t set in stone… it shifts all over. If you try for an authentic Arabic pronunciation you’re either going to fail, or else it will sound like you’re not speaking English. The best you can hope for is some sort of “medium” pronunciation that offends the least people possible.
There’s no such problem with names like “Egypt” which is an exonym: it has no relation at all to what the people in Egypt actually call Egypt.
On the other hand, I do think certain Anglicized pronunciations sound much stupider than others. But is “EYE-rack” intrinsically stupider because of the way it sounds… or is it stupider because Bush said it that unique way so often that it’s become associated with his stupidity?
I definitely agree that pronunciation isn’t neutral.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 10:25 am ¶
Sobia wrote:
@Miyak29:
I feel the same way about Maher as Joseph does. Maher does get into Islamophobic territory. He does more than just criticize the “radical” element. He creates the “bad Muslim/good Muslim” dichotomy. One’s a bad Muslim if they are religious, good if they’re secular.
Maher criticizes Islam, which is perfectly fine. But he will often ridicule anyone who tries to present another interpretation of it – hence refusing to be dissuaded. His hate of religion, which is his right, gets into arrogance territory.
“I take offense to your comment if your implying that the radical form of islam, ie the ‘terrorism kind’ that he bashes is representative of the norm.”
I think its obvious to most readers of Racialicious that Joseph would not assume the ‘terrorism kind’ (of Islam) is representative of the norm. Putting Islam and Muslims into these “terrorism kind” and “norm” is problematic in and of itself. Things are rarely that simple.
Anyhow, the “terrorism kind” of Islam does not exist. The terrorism we see today is not a religious problem, but rather a political one.
@ Joseph:
Great piece! I find Zakaria’s attempts to be funny cringe worthy because very often he’s talking about very not funny things. There are times I like him and other times not so much. I agree that his word may be taken more seriously because he is an inside informant.
Personally, I think that if we can we should try our best to pronounce words accurately. Admittedly, it will often be difficult for us to get the accent right, but at the very least our pronunciation should sound similar. For instance, pronouncing Afghanistan “Eff-GAHn-i-stan” as you pointed, out would be very close to the original, but would require the ability to pronounce the more guttural (is that the right term?) ‘gh’ to get it right.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 10:26 am ¶
Brandon wrote:
While I do think that cultural ignorance is at play here, I’m unwilling to dismiss the power of general ignorance. I just discovered this morning that I (and everyone I know) have been mispronouncing “oxymoron”. And every single time I hear the word “peruse” it is used in the exact opposite way or how it should be used. (Curious? Look it up.) And why do so many people say that they “could care less”?
Never, never discount the influence of ignorance.
And so, I think that we arrive at a place where if we use the correct pronunciation, people think we are either idiots or elitists. I’m OK with one of those labels…
Or, we get openly mocked. Or, worst case scenario, people start mocking the proper pronunciation… it’s never pretty when white people “adopt” an accent when talking about all things foreign. I have definitely heard people doing exaggerated and obnoxious “correct” pronunciations in a way that is mocking and hardly respectful.
Interesting issue, though…
Posted 19 May 2009 at 10:29 am ¶
Alston wrote:
I think that we should all take a cue from Alex Trebek, who seems to be able to pronounce ANYTHING properly. I hear the right pronunciation, and I feel a little smarter and less ignorant of the world.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 11:13 am ¶
Fiqah wrote:
Joseph, FANTASTIC (and funny as hell) write-up. I’m working on one myself about Mos Def vs. Chris Hitchens. I hope it’s like, half as good.
Cosigning with everybody about the mispronunciations. One of my favorite Middle Eastern Studies profs, fluent in (Syrian) Arabic, Spanish and English, would routinely correct her students mid-sentence: “You rack what? And you ran where? I’m not interested in a recount of your daily activities.” Some folks found her approach excessive, but I loved it. (But then again I’ve got one of those wacky “q-but-no-u-and-say-the-i-like-ih” names, so maybe I’m just sensitive.)
Posted 19 May 2009 at 11:16 am ¶
Deena wrote:
Miyak – I disagree. There was a recently Real Time (panel was Naomi Wolf, Matt Taibi, Reza Aslan, Seth MacFarlane) where Bill seemed to hold up radical Islam as the natural state of Islam, equate Arabs and Muslims, and demonize Islam as much, if not more so, than his take on Christianity or Judaism.
Bill Maher is going to be skeptical of all religions, and I get that. I leave it as one of those agree-to-disagree situations. However, there are areas where he is schticky. He’s a comedian! He has patter about his atheism in the same way he has patter about Bush, marijuana, and anything else in his routine. The rest of the points in Joseph’s article are valid, even if you disagree.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 11:29 am ¶
Rita wrote:
Actually, I’ve always thought that the long A verses the short A in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and France, etc., are not so much a matter of mispronunciation but of American English vowels versus British English vowels. Other examples include “example,” “grass,” “can’t,” etc.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 11:37 am ¶
Joseph wrote:
@Miyak29
1) I know that Maher bashes Christians too. So what? The United States is not regularly arresting and torturing Christians at random (unless, you know, they are also Arabs/South Asians…). But this post was not intended as an exhaustive deconstruction of Maher’s entire act but rather a focus on one aspect of it: his pretty gross distortions of Arab culture in general and Islam in particular.
2) I am not “outraged”… Why do you think I am outraged? (Open question: Has anyone else noticed that often when big ole Ay-rab me states his opinion someone–inevitably–asks me to “calm down” or characterizes me as “angry” or “outraged”? Listen up people: I am perfectly calm, okay? So relax, The Arab is not pulling at his chain. Sometimes I just have an opinion different from yours. Such is life. If you are reading my posts with your finger hovering over the speed dial to call the CIA in case I go off, then maybe you should look at that. I’m just saying…).
3) Of course it is schtick. Maher is a comedian. My entire point is that he often sacrifices politics in order to get a laugh–a trait he shares in common with every other comedian on the planet. Comedy is amoral (which is not necessarily a bad thing) but it is a compelling reason not to expect that comedians will take the point on progressive politics. Even so-called “political comedians”.
Sure, Hitchens and Dawkins both describe themselves as rationalists, which is the philosophy that undergirds their Atheism. But I am not arguing for or against that philosophy in this post. So if I have offended you as an atheist, that was not my intention. Rather, I am pointing out that Orientalism and Islamophobia are also rampant within their arguments. Just as, for example, there are sometimes racist themes articulated by otherwise progressive ideologues… like white feminists for example. ::cough:: Geraldine Ferraro::cough::
3) “Shoddy research”? In other words, if I were smarter and more prepared I would agree… with you? Hm. If you were one of my students I would ask you rethink that argument before trying it on me again.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 12:16 pm ¶
cb3n wrote:
I dunno, I can kind of see both sides of this. I think Joseph’s point about anglicizing and slash or mispronouncing names intentionally as a way of exercising power and framing the people and places in question as irreconcilably foreign is well made. But, I also think Zakaria’s point here is a good one too.
As Engel sort of demonstrates here in his response to Zakaria’s idea, massaging an American accent to pronounce country and personal names authentically is also a way to claim knowledge over the culture or part of the world in question. Engel’s argument that he’s spent time in the regions in question and so therefore knows how to pronounce the names correctly (and really, he seems to imply that he can’t help it now) reminds me a lot of college kids coming back from a term abroad with an attitude that they now possess some kind of secret knowledge of and belonging to the country they spent time in. Despite the apparent views of some I’ve encountered, teaching English in China for a year doesn’t make a white kid from California ‘practically Chinese’. There’s this whole institution in liberal America about asserting authority through supposed expertise about non Americans gained by travel that has always kind of bugged me and that I’m reminded of when Zakaria mentions pronunciation and Engel tries to defend himself. So, I think there’s definitely more to this argument. I guess I’m just not so sure that liberal America’s attempts to get the pronunciations right is as innocent as it seems.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 1:00 pm ¶
Luis wrote:
I think the point he was making was that “well-meaning liberals,” to use your words, use their “proper” pronunciation as a way of asserting a moral high-ground over the conservatives who anglicize names. He’s saying the whole exercise has no intrinsic value beyond that assertion.
Some countries are impossible to pronounce correctly, like Japan or China, because we don’t even use their real names (Nippon and Zhōngguó, respectively). So why keep up the farce for any other reason than to feel better about yourself and prove your superiority to others?
Posted 19 May 2009 at 1:04 pm ¶
jmn wrote:
I have to admit that I anglicize my last name as I pronounce it “Win” to most Americans. But that’s because when they try to pronounce “Nguyễn,” it comes out mangled like “Nah Guy Yen” or “New Jen” or something funky … :p
Posted 19 May 2009 at 1:09 pm ¶
Titanis walleri wrote:
“His anti-religion schtick in particular is (as with Hitchens and Dawkins) dependent on an almost pathological Islamophobia about which he refuses to be dissuaded.”
Wait… what? I can’t remember Dawkins being any harder on Islam than he is on Christianity…
Posted 19 May 2009 at 1:14 pm ¶
Chris Diaz wrote:
What? The U.S. is very culturally competent. Just because I’ve had people ask me “Do you speak ‘Mexican’?”, doesn’t mean we’re Amerocentric.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 1:21 pm ¶
Evan Carden wrote:
The video isn’t working for me. Is it working for anyone else?
I haven’t been able to watch the clip, so I can’t really comment, except more generally to say that I’ve tried watching Maher and I always end up giving it up after about ten minutes because Maher appears to feel that any time the camera is focussed on anyone but him is wasted. Why bother having smart people on your show if you’re just going to talk for the entire time?
@Brandon
I can’t speak to your experience, but the variation I’d expect in oxymoron would be due to accent rather than ignorance. If I’m wrong, then might I suggest that the problem is that pronounciation shifts (there is after all a reason we don’t all speak with British accents).
Peruse:
“1 a: to examine or consider with attention and in detail : study b: to look over or through in a casual or cursory manner
2: read ; especially : to read over in an attentive or leisurely manner” (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/peruse)
I’ve only ever heard it used for 1B (ie I perused the book before I bought it). How are the people you’re talking about using it?
As for “could care less”, it’s an idiom. Why does “kick the bucket” mean die? To be “beside oneself” isn’t to be be literally in two places at once because English (and I believe most other languages) doesn’t work that way, it evolved and is evolving, and therefore doesn’t always follow strict rules.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 1:31 pm ¶
Fiqah wrote:
@Joseph:
I’m glad you and Sobia addressed this. No one needs to explain it to you or most of the posters here, but some people might not be aware that calling someone “outraged” does NOT further the dialogue. “Angry” = silencing tool. It enables your opponent to posit themselves as cool, logical, rational and – ultimately – above criticism. Men use it with women, straight people use it with LGBTIQ people, and White people use it with PoC. If one wishes to engage in a productive discussion it is almost always in one’s best interest to avoid these labels.
Something unsettling I’ve noticed about being called “outraged”/ “angry”/ whatever the hell: it can be a self-fulfilling label. It’s like, “I wasn’t angry before you called me angry, but now, I’m mad as hell!” (Aaaannd then your opponent’s point is “proven” because people who use this particular silencing method also tend to have difficulty grasping causality…)
Posted 19 May 2009 at 2:17 pm ¶
al oof wrote:
i’ve actually always wondered why english anglicizes everything. you know, spain and germany don’t call themselves that. and the pronunciation issue seems related. i mean, everyone laughs when peggy hill says ‘me hi co’, right? maybe it would make more sense to change the spelling of place names to match english pronunciations, so they match up. because is the name of a place how it is spoken or how it is spelled?
that all said, i’d like to call each country whatever the people in the country want me to call it, so i guess i have some research to do.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 2:27 pm ¶
Paz wrote:
Has anyone noticed that Obama pronounces Pakistan correctly, but then pronounces Afghanistan with an anglicized accent? Maybe so he doesn’t come off as too Muslim. /sarcasm
I think it is a sign of respect when you make the effort to pronounce something correctly. I notice that we tend to cherry pick, though. Los Angeles, for example, will probably forever be anglicized, but La Jolla, CA is pronounced correctly. (lah HOI-yah)
Posted 19 May 2009 at 2:47 pm ¶
pm wrote:
When a British journalist here expressed annoyance with the ’stupid’ way American government spokespeople and journalists pronounced ‘Iraq’ he was widely accused of anti-American snobbery.
I don’t know whether this stuff matters or not, to be honest. The French, for example, happily go on calling Beijing ‘Peking’ and no-one seems to care. But because English has become an international language it seems to be the price that has to be paid for the convenience of everyone else speaking your language is you have to try be sensitive to foreign place names (e.g. Bombay vs Mumbai) and pronunciation. It seems a fair quid-quo-pro to me.
@Evan Carden
‘Could care less’ (which is exclusively a US-English form, over here its ‘couldn’t care less’) isn’t quite the same as those other idioms, because its literal meaning is exactly the opposite of its idiomatic one, rather than being apparently unrelated or metaphorical.
My interpretation is that its not “I couldn’t care less’ with the ‘not’ missing, but is ‘(as if) I could care less’ with the first two words elided. The latter seems a more reasonable elision than the first.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 2:53 pm ¶
Lee-eye-la wrote:
I don’t know where I stand with this issue; both sides have valid arguments and when you factor in the fact that many countries (if not most) have different names in different languages it just gets more convoluted.
Some pronunciations, however, have always bugged me because they seem to be going out of their way to be wrong, whether to exert control as Joseph said or just out of stubborn ignorance. Like saying “EYE-rack and EYE-ran” – that’s like saying “Ay-merica.” The proper way of pronouncing the “I” is nowhere near difficult to say in English and isn’t even a foreign phoneme. Even the short “i” as in “Italy” is more permissible to me than “EYE”, and I must admit that this Iranian sometimes says “ih (as in italy) – raahn” as opposed to “eee-raahn.”
But as Rita said, the difference between American English vowels and British English vowels is a whole other factor. We’re never going to be pronouncing every word the same, “correct” way, even within the English language.
In conclusion, I have no idea.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 3:12 pm ¶
sarah wrote:
@miyak29 — “He bashes Christians A LOT more.”
Bill Maher has publicly advocated for the racial profiling of Arabs, South Asians, and Muslims. http://archives.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/11/28/cf.opinion.bill.maher/
AFAIK, he does not advocate similar measures for Christians who also commit terrorism. I think Joseph’s statements are fair.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 3:44 pm ¶
Zahra wrote:
Not that it’s terribly relevant, but “I could care less” is an American usage that evolved from “I couldn’t care less” by dropping the “n’t.” I recall a lot of handwringing among language pundits when the former overtook the latter, as its literal meaning is now the opposite of its idiomatic use.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 5:01 pm ¶
Falyne wrote:
I do have to say that one of the (many) things that really sold me (American, IR major) on Obama was how awesome it would be to have a President who a.) KNEW how to pronounce Pakistan, Iran, etc., correctly and b.) took the time to DO so. Especially in comparison to Bush and McCain, this seemed bloody awesome. Dunno why he doesn’t with Afghanistan; hadn’t really noticed that before.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 5:55 pm ¶
Joseph wrote:
@atlasien (#6)
“But is “EYE-rack” intrinsically stupider because of the way it sounds… or is it stupider because Bush said it that unique way so often that it’s become associated with his stupidity?”
Your points (both here and on the original comment thread) are well taken: it is extremely difficult to know where the line is when it comes to pronunciation… and interpretations are extremely fraught. I don’t think “eye-RACK” is intrinsically stupider than anything else. But I do believe that the Bush Administration’s pattern of mispronunciation re: Arab and Muslim names of people and countries was purposeful. Which is sort of the crux of this question for me.
@Fiqah (#10)
Flatterer. Somehow I don’t think you will have a problem. I saw that ep too and I look forward to reading your take on it. Also: You bring up an excellent point about sensitivity to pronunciation being tied to naming. I am working on a post about naming and names that is a sort of sequel to this and it addresses some of that. I hope you’ll read it and tell me what you think.
@Luis (#15)
“I think the point he was making was that “well-meaning liberals,” to use your words, use their “proper” pronunciation as a way of asserting a moral high-ground over the conservatives who anglicize names.”
I think you are right. That is what he means and I think he (and you) are not wrong about that. I am just thinking about whether–for me–it is a battle that is really worth fighting. I guess it shows how durable a Western sense of entitlement is: When willfully mispronouncing foreign names and self-consciously pronouncing them correctly BOTH end up being about a Western person at the center of everything in the end.
@Evan Carden (#19)
“Maher appears to feel that any time the camera is focused on anyone but him is wasted. Why bother having smart people on your show if you’re just going to talk for the entire time?”
Exactly. Cosign. I think Maher has been a valuable voice on some issues –the Iraq War for e.g.–but his prodigious narcissism makes his political usefulness very conditional… at least for me.
@Sarah (#25)
Thanks for that link: I hadn’t read that transcript before. Yikes.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 7:55 pm ¶
jvansteppes wrote:
While I understand the irritating and pretentious nature of anglos trying to sound ‘authentic’ when they pronounce Spanish names, I have a feeling that Zakaria’s disdain for anglo speakers trying to pronounce ‘Nicaragua’ properly might have something to do with his support for Ronald Reagan’s policy towards the country.
It’s interesting that he brings up the point about France; in Canada it is very common for anglophones to learn the proper pronunciation of French words without fluency in the language. This is often a manner of being respectful to the Quebecois.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 7:55 pm ¶
BSK wrote:
Why don’t we just call countries by what they want to be called? Which, I would assume, is what they call themselves?
Posted 19 May 2009 at 8:06 pm ¶
atlasien wrote:
@BSK: That’s a good idea in principle, but it’s just… totally impractical.
Take “The United States of America”. It’s long, unwieldy and difficult for non-English speakers. And the name “America” is deeply insulting to many Latin Americans who don’t like the fact that we appropriated the name of the entire continent for what’s really only one country inside that continent.
As a sidenote, I’ve noticed that in the last decade or so, a lot of country names have been moving closer to standardization by dropping their “the” in common usage. I used to hear “The Ukraine” and “The Congo” but nowadays it’s “Ukraine” and “Congo” although “The Netherlands” is still going strong.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 9:10 pm ¶
Arabi wrote:
@al oof
“i’d like to call each country whatever the people in the country want me to call it, so i guess i have some research to do.”
That is assuming that everyone in the country pronounce the name of the country the same way.
There are regional and class differences within every nation. Not all Americans say “America” the same way and none are more correct than the other.
“correct” pronunciation is really just a matter of positioning. There is really no absolute “correct” way to say anything.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 9:12 pm ¶
Aishtamid wrote:
I feel like the mispronunciations mentioned are just a result of American ignorance. It sounds like a bit of a conspiracy theory to say that these mispronunciation are intentional. Think about how Americans are among the worst in the world with language ability. Also, the examples of Nicaragua and France show that this isn’t limited to Muslim countries.
Also, I do think that Maher is an Islamophobe. Much of that comes from his anti-religious views; he’s no more forgiving than he is to Christians or Jews. But unlike his other religious phobias, his views on Islam contain many Orientalist stereotypes.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 10:00 pm ¶
Aishtamid wrote:
Also – why is it considered pretentious when Americans try to pronounce foreign names properly? I’d say it’s a good thing.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 10:01 pm ¶
Tracey wrote:
I do not think it is at all pretentious to try and say a country’s name correctly. As someone said above, this only really works for some countries, especially those that were not widely referenced in public forum until rcently. Because, if you try to pronounce Mexico or France correctly you’re probaly going to be read as pompous and pretentious.
I also don’t think most Americans intentionally try to do this, rather they just repeat it as heard. While I knew there was a problem with Iraq and Iran, I never knew there was a problem with Pakistan and Afghanistan until people in media start talking about how Obama says it.
Joseph, funny coincidence, I saw this on your blog and wasn’t sure how to bring up intentions and sincere ignorance, a little later I was listening to Rush Limbaugh and he pronounced Pakistan the way it is commonly done in America. He then pronounced it closer to what is proper/correct to mimic Obama. I wonder what it means when someone knows how to pronounce a country’s name correctly and refuses to do so. I guess part of it was anti-intellectualism, but given Limbaugh I’m guessing it was at least partly a way of exerting power. I wonder how many people know haw to say it properly, but refuse to do so and not out of fear of appearing elitist?
Posted 19 May 2009 at 10:16 pm ¶
queerhapa wrote:
Didn’t Bush I deliberately mispronounce Saddam Hussein’s first name (SAH-dum, instead of suh-DAHM) in order to be insulting? Or that was the rumor back then, at least…
Posted 19 May 2009 at 10:28 pm ¶
Paz wrote:
“But is “EYE-rack” intrinsically stupider because of the way it sounds… or is it stupider because Bush said it that unique way so often that it’s become associated with his stupidity?”
The Bush administration is not the first to pronounce it EYE-rack and EYE-ran. My father pronounces them like that; I assume that’s how he learned it growing up.
@Aishtamid: “Think about how Americans are among the worst in the world with language ability.”
Is there a study you can reference? I had an Australian friend who said that he was never required to take a foreign language class in school.
–I’ve always wondered why we don’t say Italia or Nippon. I mean they’re not difficult to pronounce.
Posted 19 May 2009 at 11:32 pm ¶
kate wrote:
As a well meaning white social democrat (I just can’t identify as liberal) raised in small-town Canada, this is what I think I’m thinking when I say “PAHk-i-stan” (it’s never occurred to me to say “Eff-GAHn-i-stan”): I am basically remembering that when I was in first year of undergrad and new to the big city I played on a sports team with a Pakistani-Canadian woman who told the whole team that it was properly pronounced “PAHk-i-stan”. It seemed important, so I tried to remember. Later I had a crush on a Pakistani-Canadian guy and the matter of pronunciation came up in a group discussion. I said it the way my teammate had explained, and he seemed pleased. That cemented it. It has become habit now. Just as trying to approximate the francophone pronunciation of Quebec became habit when I learned French in school. Before reading this post I had never given conscious thought to why I said either, but there are probably some of the impulses laid out in the post and comments at work in why it became habit. However, I do think that the first time I made the effort in these specific instances I can pinpoint the impulse to an attempt at respect.
I am worried now that I am maybe making this “about a Western person at the center of everything in the end.” Maybe I am, but I don’t consciously mean it that way. I just wanted to offer up my thought process when I pronounce things a certain way and say “thanks” for the room Joseph left for those of us who are trying (even if that wasn’t the main point of the post), because I am.
Posted 20 May 2009 at 12:13 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
Good article. I am torn with this one. I am a white American who happens to speak Arabic as well as a couple of European languages.
As a rule, I dislike the historical fact that people tend to want to change the names of countries, peoples and other ethnic identifiers to try and fit better with their own tongue.
Appropriation of language and names is one of the first things invaders, occupiers and colonialists do. In these circumstance changing the name of a country, race, ethnicity or people is a slippery slope.
I guess I will play extremist here and wish that if people were going to do this they’d go ahead and try and use the real names of these countries. Many of these adaptations have some pretty serious issues themselves, historically.
Many of the names, in Arabic, are easy to say in English, ie Musr (Egypt), Lubnan (Lebanon), Phalasteen (Palestine). No one would expect anyone to try and have a go at ” al Mamlaka alʻArabiya as Suʻudiya” (Saudi Arabia).
Anyway, I guess the whole name change is a pet peeve of mine.
Spot on Joseph and Sobia on your comments about Bill Maher and the Middle East/Islam.
My wife and I love to watch him, but we almost have to cover our ears when he talks about Islam and the Middle East. I remember a few years ago he showed a video of the Shi’ite celebration of Ashura and showed some of them who practice self flagulation.
His comments clearly wanted to equate what many would argue is a minority action in a minority sect within Islam as indicitive of the entire Muslim world.
Nothing worse than a person who is ignorant on a subject wanting to expound on it especially with a national venue.
Posted 20 May 2009 at 12:43 am ¶
pm wrote:
Surely its just common sense not to go to either extreme? Is it not reasonable to compromise on a pronunciation that is not as wince-inducingly wrong as ‘Eye-rack’, but also is sufficiently Anglicised to fit into the flow of an English sentence without sounding jarringly different, as if you are suddenly trying to mimic a foreign accent? Seems to me the Nicaragua example may be one where some people went too far the other way.
It must be possible to quietly shift the pronunciation of a place name in the direction of how the locals pronounce it without making a big song-and-dance about it and while still Anglicising it enough that it doesn’t sound pretentious?
(Also – arabi has a good point. How should non-Americans pronounce ‘New Orleans’? The way people in New Orleans pronounce it or the way the rest of America does?)
Posted 20 May 2009 at 4:28 am ¶
Jess wrote:
Y’know, let’s be aware that we’re speaking English. A lot of people have sort of noted this, but to be clear: We don’t spell Brazil with an “s” (the way the French and everyone else does) because the phoneme doesn’t work in American English. We don’t call the Netherlands Nederlands, nor do we call Germans Deutschelanders. (German is actually a Latin root, weirdly enough).
I mean, modern English is a linguistic train wreck anyway — it’s what happens when a bunch of people who speak a Germanic language try to speak French. So in one sense there is no “correct” pronunciation. (You’d have to decide what language you were speaking, first off. For Afghanistan, there are several to choose from, for India there are dozens at least).
I wouldn’t expect a Russian, when speaking Russian, to pronounce “America” as we do here. I wouldn’t expect that of an Arab or Frenchman either. So to me, the whole battle devolves into the silly pretty quickly.
But then, I suffered through a semester of Old English. Maybe we should open all our posts with “Attend! We heard of the thriving throne of Denmark!” and start singing. (The mp3 files would be a mite big tho).
Posted 20 May 2009 at 7:49 am ¶
BSK wrote:
I think the “white liberal” criticism has more to do with people who think JUST pronouncing the name correctly means their job is done. It’s like the people who say, “I’m not racist… I voted for Obama”, as if that is the sole litmus test. I think that if someone is doing their best to make the right pronunciation out of a genuine desire to show respect and in conjunction with other attempts to be respectful of the language/culture, people, that is fantastic. But if someone is just trying to “show off” their “awareness”… well, it just stinks of absurdity. And, unfortunately, a lot of people do this.
Posted 21 May 2009 at 1:26 am ¶
BSK wrote:
@atlasien-
I think USA is a trickier one than most, because it’s not just a name, it’s a whole goddamn sentence. And you are right to point out that simply shortening it to “America” is insulting to many. It just always confused me, as a child, to watch the Olympics and hear American announcers say USSR and see uniforms that say CCCP. It just didn’t fit. And I was like, 8. I realize it may be trickier with certain names, but if we’re all (meaning, the world) making a good faith effort, isn’t that the biggest thing?
A related point, because I often encounter this working my students, is to point out that *I* am the ignorant/uninformed one when I mispronounce a name/word from another language. Rather than act as if it’s just some whacky language I cannot be expected to know, I always say, “This is not a language I know a lot about, so I might make a mistake saying it… I need to learn more about this to make sure I say it right.” It’s a subtle difference, but one that I hope makes an imprint on my students.
Posted 21 May 2009 at 1:30 am ¶
Joshua wrote:
I don’t know about how I feel about the main point here as I can see both sides, but I have to defend Charlie Rose and say that he interrupts everyone and I haven’t noticed any pattern of gender bias in that respect. I will look for one from now on.
PS you may want to link to the podcast and not the youtube clip as they have been cracking down on copyright violations.
Posted 21 May 2009 at 4:55 pm ¶
Paz wrote:
@Abu Sinan – Thanks for sharing the names of soem countries – I always love learning the real versions. How do you pronounce Musr?
Posted 21 May 2009 at 7:24 pm ¶
Gail wrote:
Joe- I’m not sure if this is too far off topic, but it seemed to relate tangentially. Attached is an article on the politics of mispronunciation and the use of comedy or political theater to undermine racial intolerance. Clowns vs the KKK in Knoxville, TN.
A horrible violent crime took place some months before and a group of white supremacists took this as a opportunity to rally support. A counter demonstration was staged by a group of mostly white clowns.
http://indiequill.wordpress.com/2007/09/05/clowns-kick-nazi-ass/
In your post you describe somewhat subtle pronunciations that may be perceived as being less culturally sensitive or ignorant. perhaps they are just speech. I might posit they are Amerikanized dialects or Bush-ilects as they are not typical Bushisms like nuke-u-ler which is an actual English word– however they seem to serve a similar goal. The purpose of a Bush-ism is shifting attention away from the issue. Look over here [liberal media] and spend time and attention on the words and how they are said and not on the WTF the Bush administration is actually doing. This turn of phrase or slight of hand was used over and over again.
The clowns’ street theater either attempted to diffuse the power behind the hate speech or attempted to annoy the white racists and have fun doing it or a combo.
Gail
Posted 23 May 2009 at 4:30 am ¶
Jess wrote:
@BSK
You’ve illustrated another reason why “correct” pronunciation is a red herring from the get-go.
CCCP is actually (transliterated) Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik.
In Russian, it would look like Союз Советских Социалистических Республик. USSR is actually perfectly correct — in English.
For a Russian to pronounce “United States” correctly, they would have to use an English word and then, to spell it, take their own alphabet through all kinds of gyrations (just as we do in English for Russian words– it’s why transliterating Russian “correctly” is such a chore, because stylists disagree on which substitutions to make). It is far easier for them to say “Say-Shay-Ah” (CШA).
I wouldn’t even want to attempt this in, say, Arabic. Can you imagine them trying to wrap their tongues around “American” when it is easier (and correct in Arabic) to say “Amerki” or “Amerkiyyah” (assuming you are Syrian, I am not sure what it would look like in say, Maghreb). And I haven’t even tried to spell this in Arabic, which would complicate the picture, but the spelling I did use is what it sounds like to my ear. Since Arabic is written in another alphabet (strictly speaking an abugida) there is no really good way to do transliterations that is universally satisfactory. That’s one reason why Arabic names are spelled in such a variety of ways in Roman alphabets, even though in Arabic they are perfectly consistent.
Since different English speakers — and speakers of other western languages — will see things differently, it gets dicey.
Muhammed
Muhammad
Mohamed
Mohamet
Mahomet
Mohammed
Would all be spelled the same way in Arabic (which mostly omits vowels anyway) and probably pronounced in very similar fashion in different countries as well. But a Brit and an American from, say, Boston, and a guy from Alabama will pronounce all these names differently.
And a French or German guy? Probably a little better since both French and German are more consistent in spelling and pronunciation. But not much. (The French tend to use “Mussulman” for Muslim, but if you say it in French it isn’t a terrible approximation of late medieval Arabic).
As to calling people from the US Americans, I have never, honestly, heard too many Latin Americans complain about it unless I were reading a political tract.
Everywhere I have gone, people referred to themselves as “Colombians” or “Peruvians.” And in conversation, I usually hear about going to “Los Estados Unidos” if we are speaking Spanish. But they refer to people from “El Norte” as Americanos or Norteamericanos, so I don’t see much of a problem there. Probably because “personas de los Estados Unidos” is a bit long, and I can’t come up with a “United Statesian” like construction that doesn’t sound f-ed up in English, let alone Spanish. I would have gone with “Nortenos” but that one is taken already.
While I agree it isn’t strictly correct to refer to people from the US as Americans by itself, the common usage has spread all over the world and honestly, it predates the establishment of the US as a regional power.
[The first references I could find were from 18th century Brits -- when we weren't called "colonials." And I haven't seen any Spanish documents -- and I admit I haven't dug that deeply -- that referred to Mexicans or Brazilians as anything but that, even the ones from before independence. Actually, the Spanish would talk about "Indios" from "Nueva Espana" and it didn't look to me like they were referring too often to "America" in the same way we would now -- as far as I can tell the use was a a geographic region, much as we use "Asia" or "Europe." But someone tell me if they come up with anything better].
Part of the problem is grafting on terms that evolved in a very different world. I mean, much of the Spanish-speaking western hemisphere wasn’t even set up as separate states until 1810 or so, and the whole question of the regional power of the US would have been a bit silly at the time. It isn’t until the 1830s that the US could be considered a regional heavyweight, if then, and not until after the Civil War that we could really throw weight around. And the etymologies of various languages aren’t obliged to be politically correct.
Posted 23 May 2009 at 2:36 pm ¶
Joseph wrote:
@Jess
I think you are spinning the central questions of my post into several fanciful directions at once. Yes, of course we could debate the philosophical implications of what a “correct” pronunciation of a given place or people might sound like, adjusting for factors like dialect, ethnic origin of the speaker, ethnic origin of the listener, etc. etc etc.
But none of that is really central to the conversation we are having here. (The “Spanish speaking Western Hemisphere…”?)
You may be loathe to attempt Arabic pronunciations… but you are not the President of the United States, charged with creating positive relations with the Arabo-Islamic world. While a middle ground re: pronunciation may be theoretically impossible in the purest sense it is a necessary sign of respect, which has been woefully neglected under the previous administration. In my estimation, purposefully.
This post is not an attempt to impose “political correctness” (a term whose dubious power to silence gives me pause) but rather the opposite: to open a conversation about the political uses of pronunciation–which are many.
In other words, not a “red herring.”
Posted 24 May 2009 at 9:41 am ¶
atlasien wrote:
@Jess: “As to calling people from the US Americans, I have never, honestly, heard too many Latin Americans complain about it unless I were reading a political tract.”
Then your experience isn’t representative at all.
I’ve stayed for extended lengths of time in several different Latin American countries. People scrupulously used “estadounidense” over the shorter “americano”. People don’t complain about it to your face but if you asked them to call you an “americano” they certainly would.
Posted 24 May 2009 at 11:59 am ¶