Correct Pronunciation

[Daphneblue]

I'm an Italian student and in two weeks I'll have the oral presentation of my degree thesis in modern languages, so I'd like to know the correct pronunciation of some English names that I've quoted in my thesis:

Anne Hutchinson
Francis Quarles
Wither

[naomimalan]

Originally Posted by Daphneblue

I'm an Italian student and in two weeks I'll have the oral presentation of my degree thesis in modern languages, so I'd like to know the correct pronunciation of some English names that I've quoted in my thesis:

Anne Hutchinson
Francis Quarles
Wither

I don't (to my knowledge) have phonetic symbols on my computer so It'll take some time to explain:

Anne Hutchinson:
Anne rhymes with can, man
Hutch rhymes with much, such, touch
the 's' in 'son' is soft, like the first letter of 'soft'
the 'o' in 'son' is a schwa, so the syllable would look like this: s'n
The stress in Hutchinson is on the first syllable

Francis Quarles
The 'a' in the first syllable sounds like the 'a' in 'France'
the 'cis' sounds like the first syllable of 'sister'
Quarles sounds like this: kworls; and rhymes with 'falls'

wither sounds like the word 'with' followed by a schwa, in other words, the 'er' is pronounced like the 'a' in about.

Good luck with the presentation, you'll feel a thousand times better once it's over!

[Daphneblue]

Good luck with the presentation, you'll feel a thousand times better once it's over! [/quote]

Thanks a lot!!!!

[stuartnz]

Originally Posted by naomimalan

wither sounds like the word 'with' followed by a schwa, in other words, the 'er' is pronounced like the 'a' in about.

It's probably worth noting that many speakers of rhotic variants would clearly pronounce the terminal "r" in wither, after the schwa, making it sound different to the simple schwa heard from non-rhotic speakers.

[naomimalan]

Originally Posted by stuartnz

It's probably worth noting that many speakers of rhotic variants would clearly pronounce the terminal "r" in wither, after the schwa, making it sound different to the simple schwa heard from non-rhotic speakers.

My apologies, I overlooked that. Of course, yes!

[stuartnz]

Originally Posted by naomimalan

My apologies, I overlooked that. Of course, yes!

I'm non-rhotic too, but I know from painful experience practicing "venerdi" and similar words that Italian sure is not. So I figured it would be worth mentioning it to someone whose English would likely tend to the rhotic.