American pronunciation

[dicky113]

Why do Americans pronounce Iraq as eye-rack? How do Iraqis pronounce the name of their country?

[bernardo]

(a) because they are uncultured, isolationist, ignorant of world culture and language, arrogant and stupid
(b) "iraq" with the Arabic guttural "q" sound

[Headtime]

I think it's ee-rack

[Quizmonster]

Americans say 'eye-rack' whilst we say 'ear-rack' for exactly the same reason as they have a herb called 'bay-zil' whilst we have one called 'baz-ill'....and a host of other such differences.

It cannot seriously be contended that a professor of Comparative Religion, say, at Harvard is less cultured than a British yob kicking someone's head in on the pavement outside Yates's on a Saturday night in Stevenage!

[dicky113]

Granted. But why? what is that 'same reason'? when the Iraqis and the rest of the world pronounce it ea-rack. My guess is that someone who had never heard the correct pronunciation read the name and perhaps being in a position of power / receiving publicity / airtime, it stuck. Like the Bushism 'nucular'. Just wondering if anyone can pin it down.

[dicky113]

Nucular was a bad example. What I was trying to say is that if you hadn't heard the word Iraq, you may follow the majority of the 'I-consonant-vowel' words in English and come up with eye-rack. Ivory, iron, icon,irate ISOLATIONIST ironic idea etc.

[Quizmonster]

Is it really so very different from our calling the capital of France Par-iss, when the French call it Par-ee?

Anyone with an interest in horse-racing, for example, sees/hears this sort of thing on a daily basis. A large percentage of active racehorses are owned by Arabs and have Arab names, but British commentators make no effort whatever to discover how to say these correctly.

Remember Afghanistan a year or two ago? ITV newsreaders called the capital cab-ool, whilst BBC ones - correctly - called it caa-bil.

It just seems that hardly anyone from the English-speaking nations can be bothered to handle foreign words correctly...end of story.

[dicky113]

"Is it really so very different from our calling the capital of France Par-iss, when the French call it Par-ee? " Yes it is very different. In the English-speaking world we all say Pariss. No one in the English-speaking world says eye-rak but the Americans. It would be ridiculous to expect everyone to pronounce words as they are said in their country of origin. Does anyone know why only the Americans say eye-rak? Please explain without mentioning tomatoes.

[moggyday]

i think its actually eee-raahck

[Quizmonster]

The earliest-recorded use of the word 'Eyetalian' - for Italian - in the USA dates back to the early 19th century. In other words, this sort of pronunciation, particularly in place-names, has been in use there for about two centuries.

They have a state over there pronounced 'Eye-da-hoe'...it's not called 'Idd-a-hoe'...and that is very similar in structure to 'Iraq'. It opens with an 'I' followed by a single consonant and then an 'A' with another consonant.

The answer to your question remains just this...it is historically justified in exactly the same way as they have a letter called 'zee' whilst we have one called 'zed'...and yes...in the same way as they have tom-ay-toes and we have tom-ah-toes!

You might as well ask why people in the north of Scotland - certainly in my schooldays - pronounced 'school' as 'squeal'. It is just a matter of dialect/accent together with historical linguistic development.

[plantpot]

In some ways it may be a tad unfair to hold it against Mr Bush, personally, for being unable to pronounce foreign words. It is unfortunate, but unavoidable, that people will still base some of their judgement of him, and America, on how he sounds; regardless of whether he is good or bad, stupid or intelligent. One would expect that a high degree of literacy and preparedness are a pre-requisite for anyone appointed to the position of "spokesperson" for any company, organisation or Country. To this end, any administration ought to be careful with their choice of figure-head.......in my humble opinion! And yes, I know, my grasp of English could be better too. Sorry!

[female19]

in a different language bet you feel silly now.