This isn't specific to English: it's the general question of whether a speaker should always stay within the phonemic inventory of the communication's main language.
This isn't specific to English: it's the general question of whether a speaker should always stay within the phonemic inventory of the communication's main language.
English-speakers like to struggle with issues of pronounciation of non-native words. Some other languages are just hardcore "naturalize the hell out of foreign words". I personally don't see much of a moral component in English approach. Though I understand that many people are super big on it as indicating respect, for me, I'd never be so arrogant as to judge people of random language X too harshly for only getting a rough approximation of my name, or mapping it to the nearest common name in their language.
My own name is foreign. Native English speakers cannot pronounce one of the vowels in it, and if they try, they end up using what is to me a different vowel entirely (imagine someone saying "Dive" instead of "Dave"). I gave up when I was about six, and am quite happy for people to use a common, roughly similar English name for me instead. In fact I prefer it, since then I don't have to hear it being mangled constantly.
It's frustrating that doing my best to sing with an Australian accent is surely entirely unacceptable in 2021, even if it's an Australian composer and the rhyming scheme makes no sense in an American accent.
At least for some reason it's perfectly fine to use a British accent at all times, even if it's a horrible accent. We almost always sing with a "British accent" by default because of particular ways it improves the understandability of the words when sung. We tend to only use an "American accent" (and even then, which one right?) when singing Gospel music.
The rules are a little strange and clearly asymmetric in the sense that adopting accents that have historically been over-emphasized or glorified or straight up were the accents of conquering empires is fine while the reverse is not. This is a reasonable guideline, but I admit it feels hollow as someone who simply wants to sing as best I can.
Yeah; it's possibly ironic that a lot of efforts/values in this direction have a strong indirect effect of enforcing the status quo and the cultural norms of the prevailing power. ("It's always ok to wear jeans" is my shorthand).
I remember being surprised at Hugh Laurie's blues recordings. He's the person I can think of off-hand that went all-out on accent while singing with his mother tongue.
OTOH if you go all out and sing in another language it's regarded as ok try to try render things more exactly (But most people make lots of mistakes that native speakers pick up on and so the audience may not enjoy the aesthetic outcome. It's super hard!)
"I’m deeply jealous of people who are fluent in a second language and can apply that skill to their creative work in a way that doesn’t seem like cultural appropriation of the most offensive and embarrassing kind" ( https://www.openculture.com/2021/07/they-might-be-giants-joh... )
So, an Australian? :D
Marry (tie the knot), Mary (the person), and Merry (happy at Christmas). My parents and I pronounce them differently (mah-ry, mai-ry, meh-ry). My younger sister, who lacks any Scottish accent, pronounces them the same. Same with the woman's name Carrie/Kerrie - same in the US, but subtly different in Scotland.
Then there's the "wh" sound. More of a "hwh" sound vs the American plain-old "w". Lots of teasing from friends when I say white or wheels or which.
This all used to cause good-natured fun for my mom and her peers, as she was an ESOL teacher.
For the most part, I'm just happy if people get my name mostly correct. Alistair shouldn't be that hard, but apparently it is.
The South had a large influx of Scottish immigration 200-300 years ago and it still shows.
Listening to audio mentioning Susan Wojcicki, I could never figure out the spelling of her name... BTW, Polish pronunciation for Wójcicki (notice the 'ó') is Vooy-chits-ki
Note that 'ó' in not a form of 'o' but of 'u' so subsequent pronunciations with 'o' sounds a bit weird for us polish speakers
What the article is really addressing is how different orthographic romanization systems map to English sounds. It's not advocating (as far as I can tell) that English speakers attempt to produce non-English sounds, which is, as you say, a difficult issue and probably not realistic without phonetic training.
I've noticed a similar thing with Spanish (my second language). I can kind-of read Portuguese as a side effect, but if I try to listen to spoken Portuguese I find it completely incomprehensible. My auditory circuits just aren't wired for it.
And for the pleasure of observing someone mistakenly do so. How many Pauls build a Les Paul?
For my part, even my two syllable first name can be hard for Anglophones, though they are usually very eager to learn how to say it (people are usually very kind). I Postel principle the shit out of it, anyway.
I know it was a discussion for many decades about whether a piece of music should be in the original language or the translation. Everyone settled on the original, so we all sing with absolutely atrocious accents in foreign languages as best we can.
I feel like this whole area is a giant minefield for actors now, switching accents for roles is extremely normal. If that is suddenly interpreted as signaling a lack of respect for the real accent of the people they are portraying it makes an awful lot of everything harder.
I can relate to that. Pre-pandemic, I was singing in a community chorus, where we routinely had to sing in languages we don't necessarily speak. Typically, the director would coach us. We had an actual German in the audience one time when we did some Christmas pieces in German, and he told us that we sang the words correctly, but it was still odd to hear German with a Chicago accent. :)
I've heard of one top-level group bringing in a professor to coach Church Slavonic when they did Rachmaninoff's _Vespers_. Since I don't even speak modern Russian, I have no idea how well they did it, but their musicianship was outstanding.