Heill Oskar!
you wroute:

>Heill Keth,
>>Well, thanks for at least being the only one who comments on
>anything :)

Well, that is a compliment as good as any -- I think!
Of course I realized that you probably wouldn't agree with me.
But the result was that you wrote an excellent piece of prose
that gave some very convincing arguments; and I am sure I wasn't
the only one who benefitted from your insights.

What you have to remember, though, is that it may seem like quite a task
for someone ignorant of the phonetic alphabet, to learn a whole new
alphabet in addition to learning the ins and outs of a difficult
language like Old Norse!

So, I thought that the process of communicating a rudimentary
outline of ON pronounciation, maight be facilitated by using
a tool that almost everyone who uses Webster's or AmHer, have
under their noses every day! But of course I agree with you that
the result would be very much an Old Norse spoken with a heavy
American accent.

Unfortunately, it is very difficult to filter out the "tonal quality"
of a national language, in the study of another language. Especially
if the second language is learned at home, or, as with Old Norse,
the language to be learned is a dead language.

Take for example the Dutch: Known throughout Europe and the world
as among the most prone towards mastering almost to perfection a
number of foreign languages. And yet, whenever I hear a television
interview with a Dutchman, e.g. on BBC or wherever -- say it is
some EU official or a holder of some such high office, with a
correspondingly high education and well travelled, whose daily work
consists of written and oral communications of international format --
then I can always pick them out as Dutchmen after few seconds of
listening to the way they pronounce English.


As another example, take the "typical" German accent (the one that
Hollywood loves to put on display in its movies, where you see
the whole 3rd Reich establishment speaking English with a "funny"
accent -- or perhaps the TV program "Halo, Halo" provides an even
better example).

More mundanely, I often encounter immigrants who came here after
they were grown up, and they hardly ever learn to speak the language
accent free. I seems like it is only the youngsters who arrive here
before they are 10 years old who ever learn to pronounce correctly.
And incidentally, this also agrees with the observations of a Russian
language professor who I once met. She, being a neutralized US citizen,
also spoke about an age limit somewhere near 10 years.

>Ok, I'll say straight-away that I disagree with your suggestions; the
>reason is, however simpler using your "phonetic alphabet" (I'd rather
>call it "approximation alphabet"), it's way inaccurate for the
>phonetication of Old Norse, or in fact any language other than
>English.

Here I very much agree with you. (see above)

>It's logical, you see, if you think about it: How can a system that
>refers exclusively to the sounds of one language, appropriately
>describe sounds that don't exist in that language of reference?

Very true!

>Take for instance some of your examples:
>
>> Example of use (arbitrarily chosen):
>> Chá-vez (ch a4' v a2 s) Carlos. Born 1899. Mexican composer,
>> conductor and educator.
>>
>> If you go to the table you will see that a4 = <the a of fAther>
>> and a2 = <the a of pAY>
>
>That would yield something that I know you'd instantly brand as a
>horrible English accent! In "standard" Spanish (let's say
>Mexican), 'Chávez' is pronounced (using IPA) ['tSABes], AFAIK; using
>this system, we'd make out ['t^hSAveIz], certainly not like any form
>of Spanish existing. Using only English approximations, we'll never
>be speaking anything but "debased English", instead of Old Norse or
>Spanish or whatever.

I also always thought that the "US" way of pronouncing Spanish
was "funny". Although I do not know a lot of Spanish
(total time spent in Spain: maybe 6 weeks of my whole life
when everything is added up). Take for example the pronounciation
of names like "Juan" or "Mexico". AmHer says "Juan" = <hwän>
which expands to:

< "h" as in Hat + "w" as in With + "ä" as in fAther + "n" as in No and
suddeN >.

What do you make of that? And how would you explain the proper
pronounciation of "Juan" to an Icelander?

>I think in the end you don't actually agree with what you're
>suggesting (I know this seems like an arrogant assertion, sorry) -
>because I know you're a man of languages who doesn't care for mangled
>accents; but that's what using a system of approximations like this
>will yield, and nothing else.

No no, that is quite alright!
And I very much agree with the view you here express.

>The phonetic system that I use is a computerized representation of
>the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). IPA is universally
>recognized and used by linguists around the world. IPA attempts to
>provide writeable symbols for each and every identifiable sound ever
>used in speech. If you look at an IPA chart, you'll see the wildest
>sounds and combinations of sounds, ones you've never imagined or even
>heard. A vast amount of different sounds are in active use in the
>world's 8000 (or so) languages. To ever attempt to scientifically
>identify those sounds, no approximation tagged to a specific language
>will ever do the trick.
>
>SAMPA, the alphabet that I consistently use, is then just a
>conversion of IPA into symbols easily produced by English keyboards.
>Don't consider it a system of its own, it's essentially IPA.

Thank you for the references!
I will try to find some descriptions of both IPA as well as SAMPA.
But I cannot guarantee you that I will immediately be fluent.
The way you describe it, it sounds like a big task!

>I recommend to you, Keth, that you read a bit about phonetics and
>phonetic transcription. It's a friendly recommendation, really, for I
>think you'd enjoy it once you'd get into it. I once used to disdain
>phonetics and thought, "I know lots of languages, I can always just
>approximate to sounds I know...". But once I studied some phonetics
>by myself and learned to use IPA, I realized that I was wrong; sounds
>that I thought the same are actually different, and sounds I thought
>different are the same. It surprised me how little I had known about
>the phonetic structure of the languages I spoke (even my native
>one!).

Probably very very true.
One important concept Odd Einar Haugen uses in his book
is the concept of the PHONEME. That seems to me like an
important concept! With it, we may sum up what we have been saying
in the statement that the set of PHONEMES valid for the main modern
Anglo/American dialects, cannot be mapped in a unique manner onto
the set of PHONEMES that one theorizes was once valid for OLd Norse.

So perhaps we could next turn our conversation to PHONEME systems?
(or maybe you already did mention it?)

>Besides, it's very practical when accessing academic information on
>the subject; it allows me to "cut the crap" when reading through
>pronunciation guide, provided they have IPA.

Perhaps in the same way as it is difficult to understand
today's technical literature, if you never understood what
a mathematical formula is!

>Anyway, keep commenting, it's useful for us all :)

Thank you for the encouragement!
I hope you don't mind, though, if I attempt (no, not quite yet)
to produce a "mapping" from the OLd Norse PHONEME system
to the system given in AmHer and Webster's.
I know you are probably against this.
But if it is added that it is ONLY to serve as a first
guide to the lazy: as an easy way of "zeroing in on the target".
My father took a course as chief canonneer in Vancouver B.C.
during the war. And he was taught that 3 shots were usually
sufficient to produce a hit. This only involved a rather
simple and clever trick of interpolation.

Kveðju!
Keth


P.S. Don't recall if the above is correct any more.
It would help my long term memory, if I knew whether
to read the -u in kveðju as a dative or genitive ending.
I thereby assume the folowing to be the correct scheme:

N. kveðja (f.) | kveðjur
G. kveðju (sing.) | kveðna (j falls away?) (plur.)
D. kveðju | kveðjum
A. kveðju | kveðjur


Ketill sendir Óskari kveðju guðs ok sína!


(was that correct? why is it "sína"?
It might be instructive if you explained the sentence.
I think guðs = Gen. & sína = Acc.)