Comment T’appelle Tu?
One tricky thing when speaking another language is how to pronounce words that come up in your own language.
For example, if an Inuit* is speaking to a Spanish person, does he pronounce his home town of Juneau as “Juno” or “Yuno”?
It’s a tricky one.
I was once looking lost in a jazz record store in Nice when the salesman asked if he could help me.
“Avez vous du Sonny Rollins?” I said, pronouncing Sonny Rollins in an English accent, because that’s how you say Sonny Rollins.
“Comment?”
“Sonny Rollins, il joue le saxo tenor,” I expliqued.
He looked perplexed. I thought for sure a jazz record store would know who he was. All the other records were there: Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, King Oliver, Sarah Vaughan - all that jazz, but I couldn’t find Sonny Rollins.
“Sonny Rollins,” I said again, but he squinted at me and went to get someone else.
They both squinted at me as I said it again, then they looked blankly at each other.
I know, I thought. “Sun-EE Reau-LEENSZ”
“Ahh, Sun-EE Reau-LEENSZ!” They said, “Mais oui, on a. Don’t Stop Zee Carnivale!”
So you see, just because you’re right, it doesn’t mean it’ll get you anywhere.
*Many Inuits consider the name”Eskimo” offensive. It comes from the language of the Cree tribe further south, where it means “eater of raw meat”. It’s a generic term for one of the tribes of Native Americans who live in the far north of the continent, but Inuits, like their Yupik neighbours, don’t like the term.
October 14th, 2005 at 1:29 pm
i used to get the same in Italy. what would annoy me was when they laughed at me like i’d been a gibbering fool before finally learning the error of my ways and realising that Clint Eastwood was really called ClEEnt AystwOOd.