> -- Funny that English would adopt everything French (words,
institutions, royalty) except the habit of changing /w/ to /v/. But
you know, this idea that /v/ is superior to /w/ is not dead in
English: today, Sony Wega TV's are pronounced as though spelled
Vega, which I think can only be explained by the idea that /v/
sounds more refined than /w/ and is associated with technologically
advanced economies like Germany's where written "w" is
pronounced /v/. I even have a friend of German parents here in
Canada who speaks no German, but has switched from pronouncing his
name, Werner, from the English way with /w/ to the German way
with /v/ because he finds the English way sounds like words
like "wiener" (with English pronunciation) and "worm". Formerly
people with German or Polish surnames with "w" regularly had them
pronounced with English "w" in North America or England, but
nowadays many celebrities and media people are insisting on
pronouncing their names with German or Polish "w"
> (e.g. Rachel Weisz, Terry Milewski in Canada) - helped no doubt
by the increasing knowledge of names like (Richard) Wagner which
people are very careful to pronounce with German "w" so as not to
sound uneducated. Thus the change of /w/ to /v/ occurs, if only in
names, even in English. Perhaps it's an inevitable death of /w/,
and English will eventually give in and join the other Indo-European
languages in this phenomenon, someday.
I don't think so. The relationship in English between native /w/ and
French /v/ was codified a long time ago, when the English nobility
decided to give up France and decided to make peace with the natives
at home. They had therefore been immunized, so to speak, by the time
the elites of Europe decided French /v/ was cool.
Torsten