Israeli pronunciation

Seraph

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 5:00 am

If there is a name that Americans tend to pronounce one way and Israelis pronounce another:

If you're the parents and you're American and living in Israel, do you call your kids with the Israeli or the American pronunciation?

If you're the friends of the parent and you're also American, do you call the kid the American pronunciation, or the Israeli pronunciation, assuming that all Israelis are anyhow calling the kid by the Israeli pronunciation?

This is either if its an issue of taf and saf, or when Americans put the emPHAsis on the wrong syLLAble.

intrigued

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 5:03 am

I find that many Israelis don't change the pronunciation in Chu'L and it's acceptable. But then again only is Israel are people so sensitive about names and nicknames so I guess it's different.

BeershevaBubby

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 5:09 am

My son is net-tan-EL... not neh-SON-el.

My Lawnguyland sister has mentioned a neighbor's kid, Yekuse'el... took me a few seconds to figure out what she was saying....

Marion

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 5:28 am

That's not an "Israeli"/"chul" pronunciation issue, that's a Sefardi/Ashkenazi issue. Even in chu"l I would never have said "Yonasan", because that's not how I learned to pronounce it.

BeershevaBubby

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 5:30 am

Marion wrote:

That's not an "Israeli"/"chul" pronunciation issue, that's a Sefardi/Ashkenazi issue. Even in chu"l I would never have said "Yonasan", because that's not how I learned to pronounce it.

Except I'm just as Ashkenazi as she is. I tend to pronounce the names more Sephardi than she does, especially since moving to Israel.

shabbatiscoming

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 5:47 am

Ill give you all an example. I have a friend, american, that named her second child ayala. Now, at home, they say it like this: aYAla but an israeli will say ayaLA. Does that make sense?

Seraph

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 5:58 am

shabbatiscoming wrote:

Ill give you all an example. I have a friend, american, that named her second child ayala. Now, at home, they say it like this: aYAla but an israeli will say ayaLA. Does that make sense?

Exactly.
Do you call the kid aYAla even though thats a mispronunciation?

Would you call a kid neTAnel instead of netanEL?

BeershevaBubby

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 6:01 am

I would take the cue from the way the parents pronounce the name.

Like my nephew is called Benji, which is short for Benjamin/Binyamin. If his parents called him Benjamin, so would I. If his parents called him bin-YAW-min, so would I. If they called him bin-yah-MEEN, so would I.

It's the same with Shulamis/Shulamit

shalhevet

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 6:03 am

But AYAla is just a mistake. It sounds stupid in Israel because it's incorrect (like sometimes when people from chul sing kodesh songs and the words are pronounced incorrectly). YonaTAN/ YonaSAN or NetanEL/NeSAnel is a Sephardi/ Ashkenzai thing - but most Israelis - including Israeli Litvish - will use the "Sephardi" pronunciation.

shabbatiscoming

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 6:09 am

shalhevet wrote:

I was going to say that exact same thing.

Seraph, in my example, even though that is what the parents call her, they know that it is the chul way to pronounce it and so they do not expect others to call their daughter that. I dont think that I would be able to get AYala out of my mouth, then again, I know an israeli ayaLA, so maybe that is it, but AYala just sounds wrong to me.

But it is definitely chul vs israel. Growing up, I had a friend michal. In school, everyone called her MIchal. Then, I dont remember why, but either someone told me that was wrong or she said something and now, BH, for many years already, I call her miCHAL.

tovli toraspicha

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 6:15 am

I try to call kids by the pronunciation that their parents call them. So for instance, if I would normally say AyaLAH, but a child is introduced to me as AyALa, I would call them AyALa. same with Basya/Batya, NeSAnel/NetaNEL, etc...

chanchy123

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 6:23 am

I find that usually when speaking in Hebrew people will adopt the Israeli pronunciation and in English the American pronunciation. The same goes for nicknames.
At least this is what people around me were doing when I was growing up and what I find myself doing automatically as an adult.

EDIT

for example when speaking Hebrew שולמית was Shulameet but when speaking English she became ShuLAmit. Or my neighbor's daughter Shira who is ShiRAH in Hebrew but SHIra in English (the parents seem to do the same).

Interesting though, my friends who went by Dassi and Malki in English, made their English speaking friends drop that and insisted on their full names when using English as well as teens. So you may not have control over what your DC is called eventually.

Last edited by chanchy123 on Mon, Dec 05 2011, 6:32 am; edited 1 time in total

amother

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 6:30 am

I have a son named Hillel. I pronounce it the American Ashkenazi way- HIllel. My older kids actually refuse to use that name and call him by his second name, I think its because my pronunciation bothers them. . When talking to Israelis I sometimes say it the proper way - HeeLALE but usually not.

Ruchel

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 7:52 am

I use Israeli (with a French accent, probably wrong emphasis also) unless I davka go for "Yonoson" pronounciation.
As in I generally called myself Rahel, unless I davka want Ruchel.

This is what basically everyone uses here in every day life unless they are "Yiddish speakers".

amother

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 8:33 am

I'm an american living in israel. My son's name is Ze'ev (not zev). We do try to use the correct pronunciation of the name more often than not, though my family from the states does laugh at me for it sometimes...

and yes, he has an apostrophe in his name on his american birth certificate and passport.

zaq

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 8:54 am

Styles change. In the 40s-50s-60s, malKAH was a queen and MALkah was a person. If you called a girl malKAH you'd be laughed into next week. EeLAHN was a tree and EElahn was a person. In EY.

In the early 70s , "politically correct pronunciation" started coming into vogue and people in EY (and their au counterparts in chu"l who cared to be in fashion) started being named EeLAHN and AyaLAH. Why, I've no idea, unless it was a rebellion against the old order, an effort to rid the language of its last vestiges of Europe.

Like tovli toraspicha, whom I will resist dubbing tovli toratpicha, I will usually call a person by the name by which she's been introduced to me, unless it's something I just can't stomach. No Shulamisses for me, thanks, but if you call your Netanel Sani I can handle it and won't call him Tani. And if your kid is Roch'l, Roch'l she stays unless she asks to be raCHEL.

amother

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 9:07 am

Sometimes you get stuck on a certain pronunciation and can't or won't unlearn it. I have a niece ROnit. No idea why not RoNIT , it just worked out that way. Ronit's dh reverses the accent and calles her RowNEAT. I once asked him why he does this and he looked at me like I was from Mars. He couldn't hear the difference between ROWneat and RowNEAT, even when I exaggerated the stressed syllables. he said it sounded exactly the same to him. What I don't understand is why Ronit didn't set him straight as soon as they met. Maybe she tried and it didn't work. Anyway, she's married to him so I guess it doesn't bother her, but it bugs me to bits. Can't you get your own dw's name right?

tovli toraspicha

Mon, Dec 05 2011, 9:37 am

zaq wrote:

I appreciate that! It shows that you practice what you preach LOL