[DF] How do you pronounce Paut?

[Flyndaran]

I and my GF only just yesterday realized that I pronounce cot and caught with a very tiny difference. I'm Oregonian, so that is odd.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by corwyn

That's what I figured as well. I've spent a lot of time in mid-western states (used to live in a town bordering Minnesota - the accents in the movie Fargo bothered me no end because I had never heard it before, sounded more Newfie to me) without ever hearing it.

Fargo-the-movies's accent is, as my friend puts it, "scandahoovian", ie still strongly influenced by the original settlers and "less" diluted by contact with neighboring communities. "Scandahoovian" doesn't mean it's actually Scandinavian in origin, by the by; it's just become a conversational word because we don't know of a good term from linguistics to replace it.

I have no idea if the actual Fargo has a scandahoovian accent or not, but I've heard enough critical comments from other Minnesotans that I suspect they are "relatively" isolated (ie not very, in the age of cable TV and internet).

And yes, it does sound rather Newfie to this Canadian, except it's much too slowly spoken.


We have some actual "scandahoovian" accents around this area, in the Mennonite communities.

[corwyn]

Originally Posted by Bruno

And yes, it does sound rather Newfie to this Canadian, except it's much too slowly spoken.

Well, that sounds about right, though Newfoundland is one of the few Canadian provinces/territories I haven't lived in so most of my experience is with the old show, Codco.

We have some actual "scandahoovian" accents around this area, in the Mennonite communities.

Is that Ontario, then? Because my dad's family is actually mennonite (from Manitoba) and they don't sound remotely like that, either. More Canadian midwest with a dash of German.

[evileeyore]

For me it rhymes with drow.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by corwyn

Is that Ontario, then? Because my dad's family is actually mennonite (from Manitoba) and they don't sound remotely like that, either. More Canadian midwest with a dash of German.

Like I said, "Scandahoovian" is a local slang term for "Sounds much more like community of origin (decades and decades later) than like surrounding communities", not "sounds like Fargo".

Here, the mix is definitely with German, more than a bit.

[Say, it isn't that bad!]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

The Egyptians didn't write their vowels, so we don't really know. We have some guesses based on comparison of sounds in other scripts, as on the Rosetta Stone, or comparing pronunciations in Coptic or names written in other ancient languages by Egyptians. Plus a few arbitrary rules just to make things pronounceable (like "if nothing else, just stick an 'e' between consonants").

The vulture we like to transliterate as "a" might be the sound at the end of the name "Cleopatra", or it might be a glottal stop. The hieroglyphic transliterated as "u" is also used for "w", so either there's a missing vowel, or it probably has the sound of a short "u" rather than a long one. (On the other hand, it's also used to write the name written in English as "Khufu", and which I usually hear pronounced as "Koo-foo" rather than "Kuh-fuh", if for no other reason than the alternative is Kh?wf?w, where you guess your favorite vowel, maybe "Khawfaw" or "Khehwfehw". Besides which that name is also spelled "Cheops", which gives you an idea of how much we're guessing.)

So, probably something like pah-uht. Or if you want to go with the glottal stop, think the Cockney pronunciation of "bottle", change the "b" to a "p", and the ending "l" to a "t", so like "p'uht".

Since it's a magical term, the meaning is probably close to something like "primeval matter", the stuff out of which the gods and the universe were made.

Sounds like a dialect and accent issue. Re: The British Isles alone, cross-reference "English".

[Say, it isn't that bad!]

...And I see I'm late to the party by a few parsecs.

I pronounce "cot" and "caught" with slight differences; a more extended, higher-pitched vowel sound. "too" is longer than "to"; or, you could say that "to" is cut off before it becomes "too". "two" softens half-way through.

And, I too have Mennonites perched in my family tree.