Tag: pronunciation

Nonet and nonnet

No, No, Nanette

Here is a word association piece involving the words nonet and nonnet.

I was reading a flyer from the Music Haven in Central Park, Schenectady and it was promoting a group called the Slavic Soul Party! (The exclamation point is part of the name.) It describes them as “A nonet of fiery Balkan brass, throbbing funk grooves, Roma Gypsy accordion wizardry, and virtuoso jazz representing the vast cultural expanse of Southeastern Europe promises to engage house and hill in a raucous dance party. It’s taking place on Sunday, July 21st at 7 pm.

I was taken first by the word gypsy.  I thought was no longer considered appropriate. The Merriam-Webster definition: “Though still frequently encountered in English, use of the term Gypsy to refer to Roma people or their language is increasingly regarded as offensive because of negative stereotypes associated with that term. Although Gypsy is sometimes used as a neutral or positive self-descriptor, it is recommended that those for whom it is not a self-descriptor use Roma or Romani/Romany instead.” So perhaps the description came from the Slavic Soul Party.

Next, I was curious about the pronunciation of nonet. I figured it would be similar to quartet, quintet, sextet, septet, and octet and it’d be Na-net. But, no.  It’s pronounced like no net.

Poetry

But there is a word nonnet, which IS pronounced  Na-net. Or I think there is. My spellcheck doesn’t like it, and neither does M-W. It is a nine-line poem with 9 syllables in the first line, 8 syllables in the second line, et cetera until it gets down to 1 syllable in the ninth line.

However, I find more references to this poetic device as nonet, such as here.

BTW, there’s also non-net, a UK adjective: “(of an amount) including tax and other sums in addition to the net amount.”

Nonet reminded me of the musical No, No, Nanette. My wife played clarinet in a pit band in high school for the musical, but I don’t even know the storyline. It is the source for the song Tea For Two.

Nanette reminds me of the actress Nanette Fabray (1920-2018)  who was very popular when I was growing up, notably on Hollywood Squares and One Day at A Time. Her niece Shelley Fabares was in the Donna Reed Show, Coach, and many other programs.

How do you pronounce Albany? Depends

Someone from the country of Albania is an Albanian. Someone from Albany, NY is also an Albanian.

As anyone who has lived in the state capital of New York or its environs for any period of time knows, you pronounce Albany as ALL-bun-ee, with first syllable rhyming with “fall.” One can always tell when an out-of-town advertising firm has created a television spot and the announcer says AL-ban-ee.

But how do you pronounce it in other parts of the world? In New Zealand, North Aucklanders can’t quite agree about its suburb of Albany.

“A 1980 North Shore Times story found ‘Al-bany’ to be the more common pronunciation. However, an English-born councillor at the time David Thornton confessed he said ‘All-bany’, due to a block of London flats called ‘The Albany’.

“Massey University linguistics lecturer Victoria Kerry said there is no ‘should’ when it comes to pronunciation. ‘I would say that there’s no one correct or incorrect way of pronouncing it. In linguistics, we would look at the variety of ways that you can say it that might associate you with a particular area.’

However, “the New York pronunciation is actually closer to the original pronunciation from Britain and Scotland, where past Dukes of Albany came from, she said. Albany originally derives from ‘Alba’, which is the Scottish Gaelic name for Scotland.”

So put New Zealand in the AL category, but with a strong ALL contingent.

Oregon Live says that state’s Albany mimics New York’s.

This guide puts New Albany, Indiana in the NYS camp. Yet a fellow on Englishforums.com claims: “Most Hoosiers say ‘New All-ban-ee.’ Some, that have more southern roots, say ‘Nallbanee.'”

I have found inconclusive polls about California’s choice for its city.

According to the Atlanta Journal Constitution, Albany, GA is pronounced “AIL-binny.”

It’s pretty definitive that Albany, Western Australia is pronounced “Al-bany”, the first syllable rhyming with “pal.”

One more thing: someone from the country of Albania is an Albanian. Someone from Albany, NY is also an Albanian, but pronounced differently, al-BANE-ee-in vs. all-BANE-ee-in.

Thanks to Arthur@AmeriNZ for the inspiration.

I’m just a soul whose intentions are good

If this had happened some years ago, I would been mortified, and probably depressed, for days.

There’s an article, Quoof and other family nonsense, which is about the mispronunciation of words, both intentional and otherwise. I have done both.

There are a slew of words I simply cannot spell unless I say them – sometimes in my head but occasionally aloud, albeit in fun – the way they are spelled. For instance, I’d say epitome is EP-i-tome, not e-PIT-o- me; facade is fa-CADE, rather than fa-SAHD . And my favorite word, because it has all the vowels in alphabetical order, is facetious, which I like to do as FACE-tious, rather than fa-SEE-shus; it also works with the adverb form, by adding the -ly.

But one word I simply had never said aloud was omniscience, which I knew from reading, often religious books, meant the state of knowing everything. When I saw it, I thought OM-ni-science. Now I could, and have, pronounced omniscient, and so I knew the emphasis was on the second syllable. But that last syllable confounded me.

I discovered this on Mother’s Day, when the youth of the church was running the services. So, instead of going to choir, I attended Christian education for the adults. Folks took turn reading this paper written by the leader, my friend Grace, about “Exploring the nature of God and the existence of suffering in the world.”

The word omniscience showed up, not once but about five times. After I butchered it a few times, someone said aloud, “om-NI-shents”, and the brain said, OK. Truth is, if this had happened some years ago, I would been mortified, and probably depressed, for days, or probably longer.

During the church service, two of our church high schoolers gave the sermon on diversity fighting hatred. One of them was Sofia, the daughter of the Transitional Presbyter for Albany Presbytery – well, not for too much longer. So I jokingly say to Pastor Miriam, in front of Shannan the Presbyter, “So we got someone to take your [preaching] job.” But I was misunderstood, with both of them thinking I wanted to get rid of Pastor Miriam, instead of sideways complimenting Sofia. I so hate being misunderstood.

And since Eric Burdon’s birthday was this month, it’s time for a #15 song in the US in 1965 by the Animals, oh, Lord, Please Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood.

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