Not only is Judge Sotomayor frivolous with money, she is also trying to damage our traditional American pronunciation values.
Putting the emphasis on the final syllable of Sotomayor is unnatural in English (which is why the president stopped doing it after the first time at his press conference), unlike my correspondent's simple preference for a monophthong over a diphthong, and insisting on an unnatural pronunciation is something we shouldn't be giving in to.Damned right! What was Obama thinking?
right, because English is so well-known for its rational, uniform, and natural pronunciation rules.
It's actually? Not hard to say.
The Harvard economist who was shocked that the future Justice only had $50,000-$115,00 in bank accounts last year did admit that he was basing this on things his grandmother told him. My grandmother told me not to go to Harvard.
Glenn Beck's calling her Soda Meyer.
The only choice is, do you want to sound like the idiot who can't pronounce her name or not?
"you want me to pronounce souter like sooooter? that feels unnatural. why can't i rhyme it with router or doubter? i'm not giving in to this unnatural pronunciation!"
"SkuhLEEuh?"
In Maine, we'd say "SkuhleeYER".
Can I roll the R like Ricardo Montalbán? I don't know, as there are very few Puerto Ricans in Washington state.
My monophthong helps me avoid unsightly pronunciation lines.
I like how pronouncing her name correctly would be unnatural and wrong.
"Deferring to people's own pronunciation of their names should obviously be our first inclination, but there ought to be limits."