Mark Krirkorian set off a blogstorm with this post at The Corner about pronounciation. He followed up with this:
Deferring to people’s own pronunciation of their names should obviously be our first inclination, but there ought to be limits. Putting the emphasis on the final syllable of Sotomayor is unnatural in English (which is why the president stopped doing it after the first time at his press conference), unlike my correspondent’s simple preference for a monophthong over a diphthong, and insisting on an unnatural pronunciation is something we shouldn’t be giving in to.
Kerry Howley in Reason:
Hear hear! And it’s a crying shame we all capitulated to the Italians in calling Alito Aleeto. Henceforth I encourage all of you to order whores-de-vores if you’d like to eat something prior to an entree main meal. Anything less would be downright disrespectful to the English language, which as we all know rose fully formed from the magical tongues of Anglo-Saxon royalty, wholly unpoisoned by Latinate or Norman influence. (And let’s please hand it to conservatives for consistently denying evolution in any form.)
Kevin Drum and James Joyner posted about the same time on this. Drum:
You know, I’m lousy at pronoucing non-English words. If you want a nicely rolled R, look elsewhere. But so-toe-my-OR? Give me a break. A five-year-old can do that. Just like we all got used to pronouncing the president’s name ba-ROCK.
This is going to be a long couple of months.
Joyner:
Ultimately, American English both evolves and has regional variants. The further a foreign pronunciation from sounds familiar in American English and its local dialects, the less likely we are to adopt it. But once-unfamiliar names can become familiar over time. I’m sure even in Tuscaloosa, they pronounce our president’s name “Oh BOM uh” rather than the more natural “Oh BAM uh.”
Holly Bailey at The Gaggle at Newsweek
Changing from language to food, Alexander Bolton in The Hill:
This has prompted some Republicans to muse privately about whether Sotomayor is suggesting that distinctive Puerto Rican cuisine such as patitas de cerdo con garbanzo — pigs’ feet with chickpeas — would somehow, in some small way influence her verdicts from the bench.
Curt Levey, the executive director of the Committee for Justice, a conservative-leaning advocacy group, said he wasn’t certain whether Sotomayor had claimed her palate would color her view of legal facts but he said that President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee clearly touts her subjective approach to the law.
Brian Beutler at TPM:
Slightly gobsmacked, I called Bolton earlier today and asked him whether this was for real–whether any conservatives were genuinely raising this issue. He confirmed, saying, “a source I spoke to said people were discussing that her [speech] had brought attention…she intimates that what she eats somehow helps her decide cases better.”
DougJ wants to see her birth certificate.
Ezra Klein on more important matters:
Sadly, Sotomayor will find Washington, D.C. a bit bereft of good Latin food. As a native Californian, that’s done the most to slow my adjustment to District-living. But there are exceptions. Mt. Pleasant and Columbia Heights can occasionally taste of home. Pollo Sabrosa has wonderful Peruvian chicken, fried yucca, and Mexican-style tacos. Taco District Federal has a chorizo, goat, and pork skin tacos that will make you want to firebomb a Cosi, not to mention the outdoor grilling they do on weekends. And the delightful Taco Pepitos Bakery 2 stands in silent rebuke to the nearby Mixtec, which charges $12 for a couple of tacos and a handful of chips.
A recipe for patitas de cerdo con garbanzo.
EARLIER: The Spanish Word For “Kabuki” Is Kabuki
Jeffrey Rosen Gets A Post Of His Own
UPDATE: Steve Benen on food.
UPDATE #2: Conor Friedersdorf on Krikorian
Krikorian responds to all.
UPDATE #3: Paul Krugman
John Hood in NRO:
Anglicizing foreign names while speaking in English isn’t just a practical necessity and a sign of good manners (yes, that’s right). As others have said, it’s a habit that helps to bind together people of diverse backgrounds. I’m not just talking about the recent past. Let’s just be clear here: If the new rule is that it is disrespectful to pronounce proper names in any way other than how the natives say it, then I’m putting all Yankees, Midwesterners, and pedants on notice that I will be outraged if my first name is not henceforth pronounced with both syllables.
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