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ArchivesProper French pronunciation of Mélusine
in reply to a message by JHK
The correct pronunciation is [mely'zin], which in the respelling pronunciation used in this site would be may-luy-ZEEN.
Since the standard English language has not the sound [e] excepted in the diphthong [eI], represented by the group AY in the key guide, and since most of the English speakers hear [eI] as [e] (that is why they rhyme "no way, José"), that is why the more approximate respelling would be with "may" and not with "me" (which according to the key represents [ɛ], open-mid, and not [e], closed-mid).
JHK's option (me-luy-ZIN) was not correct in relation with the first [e] and the [i], but absolutely accurated for the stress and the sound [y]. On the other hand, Shaymin's option (may-lew-zeen) was correct with the [e] and the [i] but wrong for the sound [y] and the stress.
(And since in French mélusine is also a noun, and not only a name, it has been very easy to check the IPA transcription in a good dictionary with phonetic transcriptions.)
The only reliable way to transcript sounds is with IPA transcription. Any other system will be failed because it will be always based in a language to represent sounds of another language, which means two big problems:
a) some sounds will not have representation (as [e] or [y] in English);
b) other sounds, different but close, will be mixed up (as the English S and the Spanish S).
That said, I agree with JHK that this site's key is not perfect (several sounds of my native languages are not in it), neither non-IPA key is, but it is a coherent and reasonably comprehensive key (it includes a representation for [y], for instance). And, most important, since it is THE key of THIS site, the non-IPA transcriptions should adhere to it. If someone thinks that it can be improved, then send a message to MikeC with the proposal, in a constructive way.
Lumia
http://onomastica.mailcatala.com
Since the standard English language has not the sound [e] excepted in the diphthong [eI], represented by the group AY in the key guide, and since most of the English speakers hear [eI] as [e] (that is why they rhyme "no way, José"), that is why the more approximate respelling would be with "may" and not with "me" (which according to the key represents [ɛ], open-mid, and not [e], closed-mid).
JHK's option (me-luy-ZIN) was not correct in relation with the first [e] and the [i], but absolutely accurated for the stress and the sound [y]. On the other hand, Shaymin's option (may-lew-zeen) was correct with the [e] and the [i] but wrong for the sound [y] and the stress.
(And since in French mélusine is also a noun, and not only a name, it has been very easy to check the IPA transcription in a good dictionary with phonetic transcriptions.)
The only reliable way to transcript sounds is with IPA transcription. Any other system will be failed because it will be always based in a language to represent sounds of another language, which means two big problems:
a) some sounds will not have representation (as [e] or [y] in English);
b) other sounds, different but close, will be mixed up (as the English S and the Spanish S).
That said, I agree with JHK that this site's key is not perfect (several sounds of my native languages are not in it), neither non-IPA key is, but it is a coherent and reasonably comprehensive key (it includes a representation for [y], for instance). And, most important, since it is THE key of THIS site, the non-IPA transcriptions should adhere to it. If someone thinks that it can be improved, then send a message to MikeC with the proposal, in a constructive way.
Lumia
http://onomastica.mailcatala.com
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Replies
Thank you so much for settling this discussion for us :)
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Thank you Lumia. Really, melusine is a noun in French? I've never heard it used, I know that in Czech or Slovak (forget which one) that it is a noun for a wailing wind. Does it mean the same thing in French, because I cannot find it any of my French dictionaries, or is it no longer in usage?
This message was edited 8/27/2009, 2:42 PM
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In French, mélusine is a noun with two different meanings. The first one refers to a mermaid picture in heraldry representations; it exists in other languages (the Catalan melusina, for instance). The other one refers to a type of felt, common in hat making.
The word is not a dark one since it appears in the big general French dictionaries (Académie, Larousse, Petit Robert). The Académie dictionary and the Larousse dictionary are available online. My Petit Robert (1993 edition) has the word (page 1380, second column, between melting-pot and membranaire) but the online free edition doesn't offer the word (perhaps it is in the subscription part).
I agree with you that if the person asking was an English speaker, it is probably that she doesn't understand the IPA transcription, which seems to be ignored in the English speaking countries even among university students; obviously, that is generally speaking and reasserted by my own experience in online boards, with American students in academic stages in Europe and with American (and some British) English dictionaries.
But I strongly disagree with you on the supposition that: "I think its safe to say that most people in the world would be utterly confused with the pronunciation of mely'zine if they never took a phonetics or linguistics course."
First at all, the knowledge of some rudiments of IPA symbols is expected in some countries for high school students in relation with the sounds of their languages and these symbols appear at least in exercises working on phonetics and orthography. For example, this is the case of France (as you know if you have studied there) and of Catalonia, where in the university entrance examination the students are asked to transcript (or to interpret the transcription) a word or a short syntagm. And the IPA transcriptions are common in dictionaries that include some type of phonetic indication, as Le Petit Robert or the Duden Lexikon der Vornamen, by Kholheim, which are not directed to linguistics or phonetics students but to the big audience.
The word is not a dark one since it appears in the big general French dictionaries (Académie, Larousse, Petit Robert). The Académie dictionary and the Larousse dictionary are available online. My Petit Robert (1993 edition) has the word (page 1380, second column, between melting-pot and membranaire) but the online free edition doesn't offer the word (perhaps it is in the subscription part).
I agree with you that if the person asking was an English speaker, it is probably that she doesn't understand the IPA transcription, which seems to be ignored in the English speaking countries even among university students; obviously, that is generally speaking and reasserted by my own experience in online boards, with American students in academic stages in Europe and with American (and some British) English dictionaries.
But I strongly disagree with you on the supposition that: "I think its safe to say that most people in the world would be utterly confused with the pronunciation of mely'zine if they never took a phonetics or linguistics course."
First at all, the knowledge of some rudiments of IPA symbols is expected in some countries for high school students in relation with the sounds of their languages and these symbols appear at least in exercises working on phonetics and orthography. For example, this is the case of France (as you know if you have studied there) and of Catalonia, where in the university entrance examination the students are asked to transcript (or to interpret the transcription) a word or a short syntagm. And the IPA transcriptions are common in dictionaries that include some type of phonetic indication, as Le Petit Robert or the Duden Lexikon der Vornamen, by Kholheim, which are not directed to linguistics or phonetics students but to the big audience.
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Ok, I suppose I stand corrected. I do remember learning it while in Lycée, but its vaguely all coming back to me now lol But I remember really studying it in University in the States. That was only roughly 2 years ago so maybe that is why I remember learning it there better than I remember learning it in France. Is there a way on the keyboards to reproduce some of the IPA symbols, or do you pretty much have to cut and paste?
I looked through my Larousse and it didn't really list Mélusine, (captilized), other than a folkloric figure, but then again, mine is an old edition. Interesting to know its the name of a type of material. I already knew about its heraldry. Supposedly Starbucks bases its logo off of the figure from legend. :))
I looked through my Larousse and it didn't really list Mélusine, (captilized), other than a folkloric figure, but then again, mine is an old edition. Interesting to know its the name of a type of material. I already knew about its heraldry. Supposedly Starbucks bases its logo off of the figure from legend. :))
This message was edited 8/31/2009, 4:27 PM
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In order to write the IPA symbols, I cut and paste (I write it in a Word document, with the font SILDoulos, which is specific for IPA). But even cutting and pasting doesn't allow to see the IPA symbols in a lot of forums.
Yesterday, while editing my post about Eilwen, I saw that the program converted the IPA symbols in codes (for instance "e" was transformed in "& # 601 ;" [without spaces]), so there is another way to write the symbols, but I don't know the equivalences yet.
Yesterday, while editing my post about Eilwen, I saw that the program converted the IPA symbols in codes (for instance "e" was transformed in "& # 601 ;" [without spaces]), so there is another way to write the symbols, but I don't know the equivalences yet.
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Thanks Lumia
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I agree with you here, I had to study IPA transcriptions in 8th grade in English class and I assume that Germany is not the only country in the world that expects high school students to deal with IPA in order to learn a foreign language (Thanks for giving me the English name for it, btw. We call it "Lautschrift" and our English teacher used to say "phonetic symbols").
Concerning [e]: I think you're right here, too. The French sound of 'é' also exists in German and many other languages which is probably why I did not use 'AY' for transcription. It is a totally different sound to me. That and the fact that I had been corrected for using 'AY' for [e] before.
Concerning [e]: I think you're right here, too. The French sound of 'é' also exists in German and many other languages which is probably why I did not use 'AY' for transcription. It is a totally different sound to me. That and the fact that I had been corrected for using 'AY' for [e] before.
This message was edited 8/30/2009, 11:30 AM
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to everyone who responded - many thanks. I would have assumed it was me-luy-sien - so was clearly wrong - and appreciate all of the detailed explanations very much.
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