The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User • Hacker News Board

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#111

Post by amyjess » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 4:28 PM UTC

nkrisc wrote: post #63

Synaesthesia wrote: post #3

"But the famous ‘insularity’ and ‘xenophobia’ of the English is far stronger in the working class than in the bourgeoisie. In all countries the poor are more national than the rich, but the English working class are outstanding in their abhorrence of foreign habits. Even when they are obliged to live abroad for years they refuse either to accustom themselves to foreign food or to learn foreign languages. Nearly every…

I love listening to the English butcher (assimilate?) loanwords. Sure, other English-speaking peoples do as well, but the English in particular do it with gusto. Even McDonalds gets 'filet' mostly right.

One thing that really surprised me was when I first started watching Top Gear: they pronounced "Mazda" and "Bugatti" with flat As (that is, they used IPA [æ] for the first occurrences of 'a' in both words). I was really taken aback by how aggressively anglicized those names.

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#112

Post by amyjess » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 4:30 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #66

pjc50 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sounds be as close as possible to the actual letters used in the word So you'd pronounce "ghoti" as "fish" then?

Well, this got downvoted into the ground by people who aren't familiar with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghoti The point is that the "letters used in the word" are a really bad guide to pronunciation of English. They're not consistent across words or the place of the letter within the word. It's just consistent enough to make people think that might be the case. Then you get placenames like "Loughborough", "Worceste…

"Worcester" makes more sense if you split it up and pronounce it as "Worce ster". And remember that RP is non-rhotic; that'll help too (so "Worce" ends up being pronounced like "wuss").

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#113

Post by michael_h » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 4:54 PM UTC

csydas wrote: post #18

dmoy wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Portland is anything like up here in Seattle, it also doesn't actually rain that much (usually). More just a continuous drizzle for 8 solid months.

Yeah, I moved to Seattle about 6 years ago from the Midwest and was teased often by some Seattle natives for having an umbrella, which seemed to be fairly arbitrary to choose to pick on given that rubber rain boots were common enough to have fasionable variants made. Not everyone, of course, but quite a few of my colleagues would try to make it a point of pride. Tangentially, most Seattle-lites also didn't understand…

Smell of a storm: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petrichor

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#114

Post by linkregister » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 4:59 PM UTC

Maybe this is the origin of the prohibition of male American Marines from carrying umbrellas. I always wondered why the accessory was permitted for female Marines, but not for males.

That said, the trench coat (All-Weather Coat, Pewter Gray) is very water repellant. And Marines in utilities can wear the Gore-tex or poncho.

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#115

Post by digi_owl » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 5:26 PM UTC

brlewis wrote: post #65

In medium wind, the most practical umbrella is the clear plastic dome-shaped kind that you can hold in front of your face but still see through. Maybe there will be a new Jonas Hanway who pioneers men carrying this style of umbrella. I used to think that men wore whatever was practical and only women were bound by fashion. This may be true of shoes, but this style of umbrella revealed to me that it isn't true in gene…

Both are bound by fashion. But since somewhere around WW1, mens fashion have been somber and largely static (the largest change being the reduced use of hats since JFK).

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#116

Post by dingbat » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 5:33 PM UTC

f_allwein wrote: post #8

"In the minds of many Brits, umbrella usage was symptomatic of a weakness of character, particularly among men. Few people ever dared to be seen with such a detestable, effeminate contraption. To carry an umbrella when it rained was to incur public ridicule." This sentiment is very much alive today. I'm always surprised how I seem to be the only person carrying an umbrella in London when it rains. Especially bankers…

for some reason its difficult to even imagine two male bankers sharing one umbrella together

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#117

Post by School-Cotton » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 5:40 PM UTC

BjoernKW wrote: post #29

oblio wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At least the English tolerate all kinds of foreign mangling pretty well. That's because they mangle their own language awfully enough. I'm not a native English speaker but I've heard quite a few native Englishmen and their accents are horrible. Received Pronunciation is obviously nice to hear and quite clear, but those local accents... oh my! I'm not saying that my accent is any better, but at least I try to make m…

There's no letter-to-sound correspondence in English. English probably - at least compared with other European language - is one of the most irregular languages in terms of pronunciation: http://www.wordsmith.org/awad/english1.html This is simply due to the language having been heavily influenced by a host of other - quite different - languages over the centuries, Old Norse and French in particular. There's also the…

It's backwards to say the pronunciation is irregular. Spoken language is more fundamental than written language. The pronunciation is fine; it's completely arbitrary, like that of any language, and no way is inherently better than any other.

It's the spelling that is irregular.

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#118

Post by School-Cotton » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 5:41 PM UTC

amyjess wrote: post #109

gergles wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where the letters ARE in the word does have meaning and makes them a better guide to the pronunciation of English than you're letting on, in my opinion. The wikipedia article agrees: > However, linguists have pointed out that the location of the letters in the constructed word is inconsistent with how those letters would be pronounced in those placements, and that the expected pronunciation in English would sound lik…

See, for example, Mark Rosenfelder's attempt to algorithmically describe the pronunciation of English [0]. In his introduction, he takes ghoti to task: > Whenever the subject comes up, someone is sure to bring up all the words in -ough , or George Bernard Shaw's ghoti -- a word which illustrates only Shaw's wiseacre ignorance. English spelling may be a nightmare, but it does have rules, and by those rules, ghoti can…

ghoti actually can't be pronounced like "goatee", since the only way to pronounce the former is by stressing the initial syllable.

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#119

Post by duaneb » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 5:44 PM UTC

colanderman wrote: post #105

arprocter wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's kind of strange how the US pronounces French words more correctly than us Brits - I assume it's partly due to our historical disdain for those on the other side of The Channel. In the UK it's called a 'fillit of fish' and a car with 2 doors (coupe) is called a 'koop-ay' as if there was an accent on the e

There is an accent on the "e": https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/coup%C3%A9#English

The accent is a reflection of the British pronunciation; note the original French never had an accent either. It is absolutely incorrect in America and implies a different pronunciation than anywhere but Britain.

EDIT: I am wrong.

Re: The Public Shaming of England’s First Umbrella User

#120

Post by Paul_S » Thu, Jul 28, 2016, 5:50 PM UTC

digi_owl wrote: post #115

brlewis wrote: post #65

In medium wind, the most practical umbrella is the clear plastic dome-shaped kind that you can hold in front of your face but still see through. Maybe there will be a new Jonas Hanway who pioneers men carrying this style of umbrella. I used to think that men wore whatever was practical and only women were bound by fashion. This may be true of shoes, but this style of umbrella revealed to me that it isn't true in gene…

Both are bound by fashion. But since somewhere around WW1, mens fashion have been somber and largely static (the largest change being the reduced use of hats since JFK).

I think the crystallised male fashion is a massive cultural achievement. Right up there with shaking hands, sending letters and using cutlery. Shame about the loss of hats.