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Topic: Pronunciations2 (Read 17291 times) |
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Phil98122
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I have been reading some math history and was wondering if anyone can write out how to pronounce the following names
1. Picard
2. Lebesgue
3. Stieltjes
4. Tchebychev
5. Dirichlet
Thanks in advance.
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Barukh
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #1 on: May 20th, 2005, 4:04am » |
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I'm not sure, bit here's how I pronounced some so far:
Lebesgue - Lebeg
Stieltjes - Stil't'yes
Tchebyshev - Chebeeshev
Dirichlet - Dirihle
I'm sure you can find a lot about this on the Web (and from native speakers, although there is not always an agreement).
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Michael Dagg
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #2 on: May 20th, 2005, 10:28am » |
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1. Picard : Pa-kard, like the captain on Star Trek.
2. Lebesgue: Lee-Beg, like the name Lee and a street begger
3. Stieltjes ; Steel-chiz, like the man of steel and chiz that rhymes with wiz (as in mathwiz).
4. Tchebychev : Cheb-ee-chev, Cheb rhymes with web, ee as in the letter e, chev like a chevy truck without ee.
5. Dirichlet : Der-ick-lay, Der rhymes with sir, ick rhymes with pick, lay as in the potato chips.
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Michael Dagg
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Icarus
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #3 on: May 20th, 2005, 3:48pm » |
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It can depend on how the name comes to you as well. I had a Russian professor in college, and it was always a bit odd to hear him pronounce Pythagorus as "PITH-a-GORE-os" (short vowels except for the first o), where I had always heard it as "pie-THAG-or-us" before. I have since realized that his pronunciation is closer to the actual than the one I had grown up with.
The pronunciations I know are the same as Michael's, except I learned Picard as "PI-card" (short i, as in "pit").
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And e is just as cursed.
I wonder: Which is larger
When their digits are reversed? " - Anonymous
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Sjoerd Job Postmus
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #4 on: May 20th, 2005, 4:40pm » |
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on May 20th, 2005, 3:48pm, Icarus wrote:| It can depend on how the name comes to you as well. I had a Russian professor in college, and it was always a bit odd to hear him pronounce Pythagorus as "PITH-a-GORE-os" (short vowels except for the first o), where I had always heard it as "pie-THAG-or-us" before. I have since realized that his pronunciation is closer to the actual than the one I had grown up with. |
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Wasn't it Pythagoras? At least, that's the way I learned it. Same pronounciation as you, accept "us" vs "as"...
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StonedAgain
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This is a good tread. I have wondered for a few years if I was saying them right - nope, I wasn't. I thought Picard was Push-shard. Michael, how about these as you did the others
Haar
Dirac
Legendre
Frobenius
Weierstrass
Liouville
Lipschitz
Liapunov
Poincare
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rmsgrey
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #6 on: May 21st, 2005, 6:40am » |
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My variants (those with an * I'm less certain of):
Picard - Pick-ar(d) (like the ST:TNG captain)
Lebesgue - l'-bayg (the"luh" sound like when you sound out words followed by "bay" with a g on the end)
Stieltjes -  (I don't pronounce this at all)
Tchebychev - Cheb-ee-chev (as Michael_Dagg)
Dirichlet - di-rish-lay ("di" as in "dick", rish rhymes with -ish and lay rhymes with bay - actually, I pronounce it more like Barukh, with an aspirated(?) 'h' but this, in the absence of formal phonetic notation is probably clearer for English/US tongues)
*Haar - Hah (as in "hah hah")
Dirac - dee-rack (dee as in fourth leter of the alphabet, rack as usual - rhymes with stack)
Legendre - l'-jh-on-dra (the same "luh" as Lebesgue, then a phoneme I can't think of an actual occurence of in English, "on" as in "con" and "dra" as in "drag" (maybe "dru" as in "drag")
*Frobenius - frow-been-ee-us ("frow" rhymes with "throw", "been" with "seen", "ee" as the letter, and "us" rhymes with "fuss")
Weierstrass - vi-er-strass ("vi" as in "violin", "er" rhymes with "sir", and "strass" with "crass")
Liouville - lyoo-vill (rhymes with "you vill" as in a bad German accent in a war film "you vill answer my questions")
Lipschitz - lip-sh*ts (as it looks)
*Liapunov - lee-ap-oon-ov ("lee" as in "sleep", "ap" rhymes with "chap", "oon" with "spoon, and "ov" with "of")
Poincare - pwon-car-ay ("pwon" rhymes with "won", "car" with "scar", and "ay" as the first letter of the alphabet)
As a general note, the pronounciation of these names by anyone other than a native speaker of the name's original tongue is likely to be at least a little off. And the attempts to render the names phonetically are liable to be slightly further off...
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| « Last Edit: May 21st, 2005, 6:46am by rmsgrey » |
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Icarus
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #7 on: May 21st, 2005, 7:27am » |
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on May 20th, 2005, 4:40pm, Sjoerd Job Postmus wrote:
Sorry - that was a typo induced by thinking out the pronunciations.
Actually, the more I think about it, I believe my professor's pronunciation was closer to "pi-tha-GORE-os". While the "pi" (s was emphasized more than "tha", it was definitely less than "gore".
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| « Last Edit: May 21st, 2005, 7:30am by Icarus » |
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"Pi goes on and on and on ...
And e is just as cursed.
I wonder: Which is larger
When their digits are reversed? " - Anonymous
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towr
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #8 on: May 21st, 2005, 1:26pm » |
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on May 20th, 2005, 10:28am, Michael_Dagg wrote:| 3. Stieltjes ; Steel-chiz, like the man of steel and chiz that rhymes with wiz (as in mathwiz). |
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Stieltjes is Dutch isn't it? Then that's not the way it's pronounced..
Of course it's near impossible to pronounce anything Dutch in English 
st
il (as in the french word for he, so a shorter 'ee' than in steel)
t
y (as the y in you)
uh (or just pretend it's not there at all)
s
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Another Aggie
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Michael's pronunciation is correct when it comes to saying it without a slight accent on the L, which really has some slight sustain on the L but is hard to put in English well, as in stēl'chiz, which is the same as steel-chiz.
One must remember that the proper pronunciations of surnames rests upon who has the name not on what we might think is the correct pronunciation.
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Sjoerd Job Postmus
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #10 on: May 21st, 2005, 2:42pm » |
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on May 21st, 2005, 1:26pm, towr wrote:
Stieltjes is Dutch isn't it? Then that's not the way it's pronounced..
Of course it's near impossible to pronounce anything Dutch in English |
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Well, just checked, and yes, you're right. Didn't even know it was, shame of me! Don't really know how to translate into english, though.
I think it's a bit like steel + tjes, with a short 'ee'-sound. The 'tjes' sound, would be a bit like the 'jus' from 'just', but with a tj sound in front. I think... Are we allowed to make audio samples? Way to tempting. Just that my voice isn't well suited for this, I have a bit of Frisian accent when it comes to pronouncing dutch words.
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Michael Dagg
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #11 on: May 22nd, 2005, 6:45pm » |
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Having done mathematics for about 50 years and, with fluency in several languages, I can safely say that my pronunciations are correct with or without imposing a written accent. The basic problem is, as Icarus mentioned, how these names are delivered to you in the first place. Naturally, if you are a mathematics/science major you will eventually become exposed to them in some form and furthermore it is only sensible that you should be able to state them within some variation of their originality.
My surname is pronounced Dae or Day, surprisingly, and is so because there is no general way of accenting it herein. So, you'd never know otherwise if not informed.
While several of the pronunciations in the second batch of names are closely correct, there are several that are not. One of the names therein has historical sexiness that is somewhat interesting but actually has nothing to do with mathematics at all. But, the pronunciation given is fairly close but this is simply due to the fact that it is someone's variant, which is certainly natural and by all means OK.
I leave it up to the reader to determine what name that is.
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Another Aggie
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Yes, that is a sexy name. I recall that there are some funny stories about it but don't quite remember where I've read it.
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towr
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #13 on: May 23rd, 2005, 7:56am » |
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on May 21st, 2005, 2:08pm, Another Aggie wrote:Michael's pronunciation is correct when it comes to saying it without a slight accent on the L, which really has some slight sustain on the L but is hard to put in English well, as in stēl'chiz, which is the same as steel-chiz.
One must remember that the proper pronunciations of surnames rests upon who has the name not on what we might think is the correct pronunciation. |
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Well, being Dutch myself, I do claim some knowledge of how typical Dutch names are pronounced.
And unless Americanized (or otherwise adapted to a new language), 'tj' is not 'ch' (which would be 'tsj', which you don't really have in Dutch, except from foreign or Frisian influence)
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towr
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #14 on: May 23rd, 2005, 8:04am » |
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on May 21st, 2005, 2:42pm, Sjoerd Job Postmus wrote:| I have a bit of Frisian accent when it comes to pronouncing dutch words. |
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Och ja, ik vergeet steeds dat hier nog meer Nederlanders, zelfs Friezen, rondlopen
Hehe, moet ik goed oppassen wat ik allemaal zeg.
Quote:| Are we allowed to make audio samples? Way to tempting. Just that my voice isn't well suited for this |
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Of course. You can attach pretty much any sort fo file, as long as the contents is legal 
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Grimbal
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #16 on: May 23rd, 2005, 9:19am » |
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Anybody dare to give a try at "de Broglie"? 
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| « Last Edit: May 23rd, 2005, 9:20am by Grimbal » |
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Deedlit
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #17 on: May 23rd, 2005, 2:43pm » |
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Speaking of which, we had "Grzegorczyk" from another thread...
"Grothendieck" also has an unusual pronunciation.
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Michael Dagg
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #18 on: May 23rd, 2005, 3:40pm » |
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on May 23rd, 2005, 9:19am, Grimbal wrote:| Anybody dare to give a try at "de Broglie"? |
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A student showed me this dictionary link today and I tried de Broglie and a few others in it and they came back right. I noticed it also gave some specific language variants too which is a plus.
http://www.infoplease.com/ipd/A0400578.html
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Sir Col
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We can only guess how the ancient Greeks pronounced their words, but Pythagoras (see attached image for Greek form) would probably have been pronounced: pu (long u, like ue/ü in German, or a little like, poo) thag orass (short o, like the o in hot, and a slightly rolled r).
I'd love to know how Dijkstra is pronounced.
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| « Last Edit: May 24th, 2005, 11:49pm by Sir Col » |
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towr
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #20 on: May 25th, 2005, 2:54am » |
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on May 24th, 2005, 4:03pm, Sir Col wrote:| I'd love to know how Dijkstra is pronounced. |
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Ah another Dutch name. Although.. hmm it might well be Frisian, which makes a difference for how his last name is pronounced. Notably whether the 'ij' is a short I, or a short E. (The problem is it's written Dutch, in Frisian it ought to be Dykstra) Around here I always encounter it as the first option, but Wikipedia opts for the latter pronunciation. dEX-trah (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edsger_Dijkstra#Pronunciation)
But note that the r should be a rolling r, your tongue should vibrate.
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Ajax
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #21 on: May 25th, 2005, 11:19pm » |
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After request, I visited this thread and I must say that I've never even tried to wonder how to pronounce correctly several mathematicians names, as they are almost riddles by themselves... (try to pronounce a Polish name by only reading how it's written and you'll know what I mean; a former football player of my favourite team was called Krzysztof Warzycha...)
Anyway, about Pythagoras: First of all the first syllable (Py) is not read as Pie, but rather as Pee. Spell the word pi like in the alphabet and you got it right. Actually, the greek letter pi is also spelled like that, which means that the same goes for the well known number. The second (tha) and last (ras) have no difficulties and are spelled as they are. The problem is with the third syllable. You see it's not a gee. In greek we have the combined consonants gamma kappa and gamma gamma which sound like golf and taph zeeta which sounds like george. However, here it is a gamma alone which gives a sound pretty close to "wonder" or "world" or a gargle . It's really difficult for me to explain this one...
Finally, there is the accentuation. If you see Sir Col's image of the name written in greek, there is an accent over the vowel o. This means that in conclusion, it should be read as Pee-tha-go-ras and not as Pie-tha-go-ras
I hope I have helped a little bit. The difficult thing is to explain the letter gamma, which gives a unique sound. I'll post in a while an image of how Pythagoras would be written in greek if it was as it is assumed to be by the english speaking
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| « Last Edit: May 26th, 2005, 4:07am by Ajax » |
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Ajax
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I hope this will help a bit. Something else:
It's not Delta, it's The-lta, with "the" exactly like the article.
It's not Beta, it's Vee-ta, with "vee" like the you pronounce the letter v in the alphabet.
It's not Lamda, it's Lam-tha, with "tha" like "the" mentioned above.
I know there are difficulties, as there are in any foreign language. I was once speaking with a chinese student (I think his name in latin could be written Du) and he told me his name. Each time I tried to pronounce it, I was instantly corrected by him because according to him I was saying a totally different word, just by not achieving the correct depth of the vowel.
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Sir Col
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Re: Pronunciations2
« Reply #23 on: May 26th, 2005, 3:42pm » |
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Ajax, I notice from your profile that you are from Greece, but I imagine that your pronunciation is relating to modern Greek? I have studied koine Greek for many years and I don't understand why u would be pronounced ee? There are occasions when 'i' can be short and sometimes long, and this is something that needs to be learned; there is no rule. Consider a parallel in English: intrigue, the first i is short, the second i is long. For example, in Greek, bios (life) would be pronounced beeos (long i), whereas philos (friend) is pronounced filos (short i).
I have also been taught that the accent only adds a slight emphasis on the sound; scholars believe that a grave (\) would represent a decreasing pitch, whereas the acute (/) would represent an increasing pitch; the circumflex represents a slight rise and fall in pitch.
I also learned that omicron is a short o (as in hot), whereas omega is a long o (as in low).
[e]Edited to say that I found this interesting link which compares modern Greek with ancient Greek pronunciation:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A216073[/e]
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| « Last Edit: May 26th, 2005, 3:57pm by Sir Col » |
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Ajax
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I must admit that what I wrote was how modern greeks speak and pronounce.
Moreover, in modern greek we don't distinguish differences between different i's; no long or short, just ee.
As for the accents, yes in ancient greek there were three accents, more or less like in french, although I don't really know their differences (I did ancient greek in school, but not as much as I should and I didn't have then the appetite to learn).
About u: we call it eepsilon [I use ee so that noone may confuse the sound with i (e.g. life), e (e.g. method) or y (e.g. why)], which means "thin ee". So you understand that it's an ee. However, if there is "ou" it sounds like ou (once again I cannot give you information if it's long or short, you'll have to hear someone speaking to understand).
As for the importance of the accent, I give you an example in the image.
Finally combinations of vowels give other vowels. In case that we have two vowels one after the other in a word, but want them to sound as they usually are, we put a symbol over the second one, which is called dialitika (meaning diaeresis in punctuation, looks like in ü in german). I give some examples.
Once again, I admit that it's impossible to fully understand the sound of a language only by the text. I didn't know that there were such phonetic differences between greek and ancient greek (One must listen to it). Every language evolves through time (not always for better...). Koine helliniki (common greek) that you've been learning is the "version" that was spoken from the Hellenistic times (right from Alexander the great) and after as a common and formal idiom. Before then, every region had it's own idiom. Nowadays, there are still some idioms in Greece and it is concidered that Cypriots (from Cyprus) and Pontii (refugees from Trapezounda, in Turkey) speak idioms very similar to Koine helliniki. So, if you would like to find more about the "hellenistic" way of speaking, you should ask a Cypriot (we make fun of their accent but don't tell them ).
I hope I helped a bit. If you want to listen to more greek, come to Greece (Hellas as we call it). If someone ever come, please inform me and I will be glad to be your guide (no charge ofcourse ) I've already done it for friends and relatives from abroad, so I have some experience. Only, don't come this year, as I'll have to do my service in the army (yes, here it's still compulsory )
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