Discussion Groups / English Usage / January 2004

Love them Pontchartrain convertibles!

...

The capital of Iowa is pronounced /di 'mOin/.  (The first syllable has
a short i sound.  The second syllable is accented, and the s isn't
pronounced.)

I also had heard that the final n may not be 'fully pronounced'. thank you
for the info that it is predominantly the west.
Alan

[ . . . ]

From _Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Eleventh Edition_ (not to
check up on Donna, but to see how well the pronunciation is
shown in the _Collegiate_):

  Main Entry: Sche.ve.ning.en
  Pronunciation: ['ske v@ ,nIN @(n)], ['sXe]-

   I think this agrees in every detail with Donna's
explanation, except that they show a couple of variants:

   They first show the first syllable pronounced as an
English speaker would; that is, without gutturalizing the
"k".  They show the guttural pronunciation as the variant
['sXe]-.  If I were pronouncing the word I would use the
unguttural "k".  

   I also pronounce "Bach" [bA:k], not [bA:X].  I dislike
the idea of trying to use foreign sounds in speaking
English.  For me, "loch" is a Scottish word that the
Scottish people pronounce as they see fit, but it's also an
American English word pronounced in an American English way,
a homophone of "lock".

   Donna's apocope of the final [n] is a variant in the
_Collegiate_ pronunciation, shown by putting the "n" in
parens.  Maybe Dutch speakers drop the "n" in casual
conversation but supply it when speaking carefully.

   Not that it's a variant, but while they show the vowel
in the first syllable to be like the one in "day", I've
assumed the Dutch speakers really use a monophthongal "a";
that is [e] rather than [eI].  Maybe I'm wrong about that.
The dictionary pronunciation scheme would use the same
symbol either way.

I asked a Dutchman this question once, when I was living there. He said
that it's definitely "esher", and that it's a name so pronunciation
rules don't apply. Names go back before the time when spelling became
consistent, and people don't feel the need to respell their names when
the rules change. (The same is true in English, apart from the
implication that spelling is now consistent.)