I’m all for pronouncing things properly. I correct my wife all the time. I’m a pain in the butt. But I always love it when the ever-so properly bilingual French/English multi-cultis in Canada—like on the CBC—are forced to utter the name of, say, a Frenchman from The Nation of Quebec. For example today, hockey player Guy Lafleur is in the news. The news anchors and reporters are practically turning their heads inside out today to pronounce it like they’re suddenly, momentarily—just for the duration of this one word—located in Dollard-des-Ormeaux, Quebec.
I can just imagine their butt cheeks tightening up as they get ready to pronounce the name. Then they get it out, excruciatingly French-like, hyper-articulating the La in Lafleur and pausing ever so slightly before going on with the f in fleur, then sort of gargling on the r at the end for a good second or so… and release. And it’s back to normal plain old English.
Sometimes, in the next sentence, they have to say the name again, but say it, you know, like a normal English-speaking person. They suddenly forgot to make that quick trip to Dollard-des-Ormeaux, Quebec. It all makes for a good time watching the news.
I just say “Gee Laflurr”. Nobody laughs at me. Similarly, when I say a Scottish name, I don’t say it with a Scottish accent suddenly. And when I go to Taco Bell, I don’t roll the R in Burrito for 16 seconds when ordering. I just say “burreedo”. Perhaps I need rehab. Or as Doug on King of Queens would say, “rehabilitay-shee-own”.
You get this same hyper-pronunciation technique down south when some Americans suddenly become Latinos right off the boat from Cuba—just for a second—when they have to pronounce a Spanish name, or even say the word Latino.
This hyper-pronunciation technique is fun to listen to.
PTBC was founded by Mr. Johannesen in 2000.
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