Comments on: So much angst, so little time

By: There’s a pattern here to see » Blog Archive » AWWW …

There’s a pattern here to see » Blog Archive » AWWW … — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 18:48:19 +0000

[...] closing, I can’t resist another jab at Barnette. In the comments section of this post, Barnette replies to a comment from a listener in [...]

By: David B Norvell

David B Norvell — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 06:48:06 +0000

Dear Pronunciation Staff:

I was introduced in highschool to the pronunciation for angst as the a in father. Do I need to include the umlaut “aegst”? Or are both acceptable? Is there a preference?

Thank you,

David B Norvell
yogabksi@aol.com

By: phonoloblog » Language use on NPR

phonoloblog » Language use on NPR — Sat, 12 Nov 2005 20:32:26 +0000

[...] In his comment on my recent post on angst, Adam Ussishkin notes this recent piece by NPR ombudsman Jeffrey Dvorkin on language use on NPR, some of which happens to relate to my two posts last month on foreign pronunciation. Ben Zimmer writes to point to this response to some of what Dvorkin writes in the piece, which Ben found via languagehat. Here’s my favorite quote from the response: [...]

By: Adam Ussishkin

Adam Ussishkin — Thu, 10 Nov 2005 05:05:36 +0000

I listened to the couple minutes of the show with the ‘angst’ question. Based on that, the show reminds me of the language-related section of the Atlantic Monthly: somewhat interesting, but completely off-base overall. By the way, I just noticed a little NPR piece relating to linguistic norms that might be worth checking out.

By: Ben Zimmer

Ben Zimmer — Tue, 08 Nov 2005 22:02:17 +0000

But using /ng/ for /ŋ/ is lame, I’ll grant you that.

By: Ben Zimmer

Ben Zimmer — Tue, 08 Nov 2005 21:45:56 +0000

What you call the “lame transcription” used by the Compact OED is actually (AIUI) based on a conscious decision by the Oxford folks to keep up with changes in RP pronunciation over the past few generations. They have decided that [a] represents the RP “cat” vowel more accurately than [æ]. You’ll see this in the Compact OED, the New Shorter OED, and recently drafted entries of the OED online (see, for instance, the entry for “man”, which gives “Brit. /man/, U.S. /mæn/”). The OED entry for “angst” has not yet been fully revised, but when it is I’d imagine it will have /aŋst/ to match the other Oxford dictionaries.

By: Bob Kennedy

Bob Kennedy — Mon, 07 Nov 2005 03:09:11 +0000

How frustrating that show must be to listen to. Personally I'm willing to forgive when journalists get a little mixed up about language stories. But when a radio host who claims to be an expert treats their subject with such flippance, I'm annoyed.

I did a little search on how to pronounce angst, to see what attitudes might be out there:

This fella, angstfully, sees the [æ] pronunciation as a corruption: "All these are considered acceptable by dictionaries. Clearly the dictionary makers have given up and have caved in to the inevitable decline of everything." Clearly he never read the foreword to any dictionary, nor has he met a dictionary maker.

This guy seems more open-minded, and meanwhile his self-reported description is indicative of a California accent: "it is also often (espeicially in modern times) pronounced with a long 'a' like in the word 'day,' which is also how I pronounce it".