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Now I know why Americans say i-RAHK...

by anonu 5y ago

meitham 5y ago
I pointed this earlier and was downvoted. As far as I know only Bush called it i-RAHK! As an Iraqi of course I felt it was idiotic of him not to know how to properly pronounce a name of a country he's leading a war into!
- umanwizard 5y ago
  That has always been the normal pronunciation in American English — at least where I’m from. It’s not something Bush invented. I am sure there are also plenty of countries whose names are pronounced differently in Iraqi Arabic than in those countries’ native languages. That doesn’t make it “wrong”.
- anonu 5y ago
  You put "Bush" and "idiot" in the same sentence. I suppose that's not really promoting positive dialogue on HN. Hence why you got flagged
umanwizard 5y ago
Presumably the manual says that because that’s how Americans pronounced it, not the other way around.
- agustamir 5y ago
  May be, but Iran is pronounced correctly in the guide (EE-RAHN, in section 'The Country'). Why mess up Iraq then. Strange.
  - umanwizard 5y ago
    Well, language being a social phenomenon, neither pronunciation is incorrect according to any objective standard, since they are both rather common variants. Is it “incorrect” that Germans call France “Frankreich” ?
    - agustamir 5y ago
      What I'm curious to understand is how Iran and Iraq came to be pronounced differently in this guide (or otherwise), when they are both spelt almost the same way. The social phenomenon explanation, while I get it, seems too broad.
      - umanwizard 5y ago
        I don’t think there’s really a difference between “Iraq” and “Iran” for most Americans (other than, obviously, in the final consonant). Both pronunciations exist for both words, with the one that’s closer to the native pronunciation being more prestigious and the other one being often perceived as backwards or uneducated. (Nowadays, that is. I have no idea what the situation was in the 1940s). It’s indeed surprising that the two are used inconsistently within the same book, but I suspect that’s just due to some uninteresting artifact of random chance. Perhaps the two sections were written by two different authors, or perhaps there was one author who happened to have an Iranian friend who exposed him or her to the native pronunciation. Who knows.
      - riahi 5y ago
        Because they aren’t pronounced the same in their respective countries/languages. As mentioned elsewhere, Iran is “ee-raan”. Iraq is more like “eh-raaq”. They have different initial vowels which are obvious in Persian/Arabic script, but harder to translate into latin script with variable vowel pronunciations in English.
mcguire 5y ago
How do you pronounce it?

Now I know why Americans say i-RAHK...

by anonu 5y ago

Now I know why Americans say i-RAHK...

I pointed this earlier and was downvoted. As far as I know only Bush called it i-RAHK! As an Iraqi of course I felt it was idiotic of him not to know how to properly pronounce a name of a country he's leading a war into!

umanwizard 5y ago
That has always been the normal pronunciation in American English — at least where I’m from. It’s not something Bush invented. I am sure there are also plenty of countries whose names are pronounced differently in Iraqi Arabic than in those countries’ native languages. That doesn’t make it “wrong”.
anonu 5y ago
You put "Bush" and "idiot" in the same sentence. I suppose that's not really promoting positive dialogue on HN. Hence why you got flagged

umanwizard 5y ago

Presumably the manual says that because that’s how Americans pronounced it, not the other way around.

agustamir 5y ago
May be, but Iran is pronounced correctly in the guide (EE-RAHN, in section 'The Country'). Why mess up Iraq then. Strange.
- umanwizard 5y ago
  Well, language being a social phenomenon, neither pronunciation is incorrect according to any objective standard, since they are both rather common variants. Is it “incorrect” that Germans call France “Frankreich” ?
  - agustamir 5y ago
    What I'm curious to understand is how Iran and Iraq came to be pronounced differently in this guide (or otherwise), when they are both spelt almost the same way. The social phenomenon explanation, while I get it, seems too broad.
    - umanwizard 5y ago
      I don’t think there’s really a difference between “Iraq” and “Iran” for most Americans (other than, obviously, in the final consonant). Both pronunciations exist for both words, with the one that’s closer to the native pronunciation being more prestigious and the other one being often perceived as backwards or uneducated. (Nowadays, that is. I have no idea what the situation was in the 1940s). It’s indeed surprising that the two are used inconsistently within the same book, but I suspect that’s just due to some uninteresting artifact of random chance. Perhaps the two sections were written by two different authors, or perhaps there was one author who happened to have an Iranian friend who exposed him or her to the native pronunciation. Who knows.
    - riahi 5y ago
      Because they aren’t pronounced the same in their respective countries/languages. As mentioned elsewhere, Iran is “ee-raan”. Iraq is more like “eh-raaq”. They have different initial vowels which are obvious in Persian/Arabic script, but harder to translate into latin script with variable vowel pronunciations in English.

mcguire 5y ago

How do you pronounce it?