Theos-Talk Archives (February 2004 Message tt00186)

--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "adelasie" <adelasie@s...> wrote:
> Steve,
> 
> Akira Kurosawa, the director with
> > the most commonly mispronounced name in the world.
> 
> How should it be pronounced, if you would be so kind?

I asked a fellow who spole Japanese. Akira is pronounced with the 
emphasis on the first syllable, whereas Americans tend to emphasize 
the second syllable, Thus it should be AK-ira and not a-KIR-a the 
way it is commonly pronounced outside Japan. I am less sure of my 
memory about the last name but Kursawa should be proounced koor-OH-
swa if I am not mistaken.

If you watch RAN there are several miracles in which Kuan Yin saves 
someone from disaster, but they are subtle and the non-Japanese 
viewer may miss them if not knowing the story.

Likewise, most people pronounce Augustine (as in St. Augustine) wotj 
the emphasis on the first syllable, but the correct pronunciation is 
au-GUS-ten. That I learned from bishop Sheen's program as a kid.

In the case of the infamous Aleister Crowley I do not remember for 
the life of me where I read or heard this, but the last name rhymes 
with "holy" and the first is pronounced ah-LESTER.

Or in the Kabbalah the word sephiroth as an example is not pronounced 
as it is spelled, but is pronounced sfir-OTE. No one who is not a 
learned rabbi really knows much about the Kabbalah, despite all the 
popular books on the subject, but I have heard mispronouncing the 
terms immediately flags one as an ignoramus. In that case I am so 
painfully aware of my ignorance that I would not pretend to be 
anything else. Probably if you meet a learned Kabbalist and he 
agrees to discuss it with you (which a few of them will), it is best 
to be as humble as possible, since most of it is unknown to outsiders.

So much for phonetic spelling.