englishhobby
Key Member
- Joined
- Jun 19, 2009
- Member Type
- English Teacher
- Native Language
- Russian
- Home Country
- Russian Federation
- Current Location
- Russian Federation
Hello,
I have a rather "cultural" question. Do the natives always follow phonetic reading rules when they pronounce English surnames they've never heard before? Supposing, you see an unusual surname in the newspaper - will you read it loud according to the accepted rules of reading?
So, how would you pronounce "Knebel"? Kn is usually pronounced as [n] at the beginning of the word, e is in an "open" stressed syllable, so it will be [i:], the second e is not stressed, so it will be [ɪ] (or [ə]?). All these elements combined, the whole word should be pronounced as ['ni:bɪl]. Am I right? :-?
If one reads an unfamiliar surname accoding to the accepted reading rules, is there a big chance that they'll pronounce it correctly (in general, not taking into consideration the speaker's individual articulation peculiarities)?
Thank you in advance.
I have a rather "cultural" question. Do the natives always follow phonetic reading rules when they pronounce English surnames they've never heard before? Supposing, you see an unusual surname in the newspaper - will you read it loud according to the accepted rules of reading?
So, how would you pronounce "Knebel"? Kn is usually pronounced as [n] at the beginning of the word, e is in an "open" stressed syllable, so it will be [i:], the second e is not stressed, so it will be [ɪ] (or [ə]?). All these elements combined, the whole word should be pronounced as ['ni:bɪl]. Am I right? :-?
If one reads an unfamiliar surname accoding to the accepted reading rules, is there a big chance that they'll pronounce it correctly (in general, not taking into consideration the speaker's individual articulation peculiarities)?
Thank you in advance.