Comments on: How do I say "raison detre" without sounding like an idiot?

Question: How do I say "raison d'etre" without sounding like an idiot?

survivorman — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:32:31 -0800

How do you say the commonly used phrase "raison d'etre"? Anybody have a sound file I could listen to?

By: thinkingwoman

thinkingwoman — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:34:14 -0800

RAISE-un DEH-truh

By: The World Famous

The World Famous — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:39:09 -0800

I say "raisin detra," but that's because I love Raising Arizona and I know that pronunciation is wrong.

By: phaedon

phaedon — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:39:54 -0800

reh-ZON DEH-truh.

By: Listener

Listener — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:43:45 -0800

I'd say if you don't have any French, you can get away with raise-on DETre (that last e is a shwa) or rehzon DETre. I would say there is one major stressed syllable in that expression rather than two, indicated by capitalization. Of course, some idiots will mock you for not having a French accent, but they're wrong. It makes sense to incorporate foreign words into your own speech's natural flow of phonemes. I couldn't find a soundfile of this, but I could get my sis to make you one in about two seconds if you like.

By: sbutler

sbutler — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:44:33 -0800

Wiktionary has some good audio files (one for both UK and FR).

By: survivorman

survivorman — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:44:58 -0800

Wow. Now I can speak french. It feels awesome being bilingual.

Thanks everyone.

By: acoutu

acoutu — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:45:23 -0800

reh-ZON DEHt. You kind of swallow the "truh".

By: wuzandfuzz

wuzandfuzz — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:45:56 -0800

Seconding Phaedon.

And if I could hijack a bit, because it seems to have been answered, I would like to know the same for schadenfreude.

By: survivorman

survivorman — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:48:36 -0800

Yes, schadenfreude. I want to know German now. ~~The women will go mad with desire!~~

By: cgc373

cgc373 — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:51:48 -0800

wuzandfuzz, here's James Earl Jones. It's SHAH-den-froy-de. American Heritage has a dictionary at Bartleby, and Jones is their reader. Quite awesome, in my humble.

By: katillathehun

katillathehun — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:52:09 -0800

Isn't it SHAHD'n-FROI-duh? I took two years of high school German. I know EVERYTHING. As long as it involves counting, the alphabet, some stuff about hospitals, and the word for "eraser."

By: mhz

mhz — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:56:18 -0800

Yeah, the German accent would be more like katillathehun's, strong SHAD(in) with a slightly less strong FROY(duh)

By: cgc373

cgc373 — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:57:11 -0800

(I guess I could link The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, huh?)

By: survivorman

survivorman — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 18:00:21 -0800

Clarification: Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary/ Encyclopaedia Britannica online did work - just not in Internet Explorer (imagine that). In Firefox it worked fine.

By: melissam

melissam — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 18:17:33 -0800

I always remember how because Dogfish Head has a beer called raison d'etre that is brewed with raisins. It's good too.

By: IndigoRain

IndigoRain — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 18:24:07 -0800

Haven't ever seen that Simpsons episode where Lisa tries on different personas eh? She says raison d'etre in that ep.

By: Phire

Phire — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 19:01:19 -0800

Rubber. Makes sense. Also the coolest thing about German stationary is Tintenkiller. Ink Killer, how fking cool is that? Way more interesting than 'White-out'. Plus white-out doesn't dissolve the ink or anything kickass like that.

By: Electrius

Electrius — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 19:31:50 -0800

ray son dee truh

By: Dee Xtrovert

Dee Xtrovert — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 20:42:50 -0800

The Buzzcocks song "Raison D'Etre" isn't a bad place to get an idea of how most English-speakers say it. Phaedon's got the English pronounciation pretty right, but as Acountu says, one should "swallow" the "-re" a bit, and make the "zon" kind of nasal, that'd be closer to the French.

By: acoutu

acoutu — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 21:47:13 -0800

I'm Canadian, so perhaps I'm doing a Canadian (and French-influenced pronounciation). But that's really how people here say it. Not sure what the world standard would be.

By: Reggie Digest

Reggie Digest — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 21:55:09 -0800

What Dee said. The "n" in raison is silent, but you can still tell it's there, and that last syllable in être is like the sound of a quickly-deflating balloon.

Personally, I'd go with "life's purpose" or somesuch.

By: blue_beetle

blue_beetle — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 21:55:23 -0800

How do I say "raison d'etre" without sounding like an idiot?
Pronouncing it "my reason for being" and you won't sound like an idiot.

By: teg

teg — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 21:57:45 -0800

Agreeing with acoutu and Dee Xtrovert, if you want to say it with the correct French pronunciation. You'd also want to roll the first R a bit. For an English pronunciation, phaedon's got it.

By: zorro astor

zorro astor — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 06:10:34 -0800

You don't roll 'R's in French; they are pronounced from the back of the throat. And as for the d'etre part, I learned that in colloquial French they don't really say it. So d'etre would sound like debt, except you want to say the 'T' very distinctly.

By: zorro astor

zorro astor — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 06:12:25 -0800

Edit above: They don't say the re part of d'etre

By: languagehat

languagehat — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 07:18:56 -0800

My wife and her sister like to say "raisinette" for this phrase; it's so catchy I find myself doing it, and someday I'm going to embarrass myself in public.

For the love of god, don't pronounce borrowings from French with a French accent when you're speaking English. Vikings will come and slay you in your dreams.

By: CunningLinguist

CunningLinguist — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 08:42:08 -0800

Not to derail, but I speak French and never know how to use French terms like this in English without worrying that something thinks I sound like a pompous jackass. Are you saying I should use a wrong Anglified pronunciation?

By: geckoinpdx

geckoinpdx — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 10:09:11 -0800

CuniningLinguist, I have the same problem with German words and phrases such as the aforementioned schadenfreude. To my ear it's a German word and it just sounds completely wrong to mangle it with an English-speaking accent.

By: languagehat

languagehat — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 11:07:45 -0800

Are you saying I should use a wrong Anglified pronunciation?

No, I'm saying you should use a correct Anglified pronunciation, of which there are usually several. For this phrase, for instance, you can say reh-ZON DEHt, reh-ZON DEHt-ruh, raisin deht, raisin deht-ruh, and probably several other things without setting off any alarms. But if you say rrrreh-ZOHNH DEHTRRRRRR, with ostentatious French r's and nasalization, yeah, you're likely to sound like a pompous jackass.

Imagine the situation with a language you don't know. When I speak Russian I say the name Khrushchev more or less like khru-SHCHOFF, with a nice spittle-spraying kh and a rolled r. When I speak English, I say KROOS-chef, just like everybody else, and I'm pretty sure you'd think I was a jackass if I came out with khru-SHCHOFF. Or take wasabi: in Japanese the accent is on the first syllable, but I bet you don't say WAH-sah-bee.

I mean, you say Paris and not pah-RREE, right? English is English and French is French. Also, when the French borrow English words and phrases, they Frenchify them (notice how a French person says smoking or parking?), and turnabout is fair play.

By: CunningLinguist

CunningLinguist — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 16:15:06 -0800

Eh. I hear what you're saying but I'd rather be considered a pompous jackass than pronounce it with an American accent. Not that I go out of my way to roll the French Rs, but there is an R in there, damnit, it feels like pandering to know-nothings to say "raisin debt" or whatever.

By: languagehat

languagehat — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 17:17:51 -0800

I don't see how speaking English the way English-speakers speak it could be considered "pandering to know-nothings." Do you consider French-speakers know-nothings when they say "pahrrr-KEENH" instead of good old English PAR-king? And do you apply the same stringent standards to borrowings from other languages, taking pains to acquaint yourself with the correct Greek pronunciation of Socrates, the Latin pronunciation of et cetera, et cetera?

I guess there's no point arguing about it, but it seems bizarre to me: I can see wanting to show off the fact that you know French, but the whole "pandering to know-nothings" thing seems pointlessly insulting.

By: Reggie Digest

Reggie Digest — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 21:06:54 -0800

Anglified or not, you'll get an eyeroll from me. Say something else.

By: genghis

genghis — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 13:11:51 -0800

Top marks to Electricus for breaking the uniform consensus of broadly-right-ness, and choosing instead to try making the OP sound like an idiot.

Comments on: How do I say "raison detre" without sounding like an idiot?

Question: How do I say "raison d'etre" without sounding like an idiot?

By: thinkingwoman

By: The World Famous

By: phaedon

By: Listener

By: sbutler

By: survivorman

By: acoutu

By: wuzandfuzz

By: survivorman

By: cgc373

By: katillathehun

By: mhz

By: cgc373

By: survivorman

By: melissam

By: IndigoRain

By: Phire

By: Electrius

By: Dee Xtrovert

By: acoutu

By: Reggie Digest

By: blue_beetle

By: teg

By: zorro astor

By: zorro astor

By: languagehat

By: CunningLinguist

By: geckoinpdx

By: languagehat

By: CunningLinguist

By: languagehat

By: Reggie Digest

By: genghis

Comments on: How do I say "raison detre" without sounding like an idiot?