Pronounce Nikon

[Alan Gales]

That's why I bought a Contax. I knew how to pronounce it.

 

[Fixcinater]

I say "nick-on", the first syllable rhymes with stick or pick. This is probably wrong but I've watched way to many DRTV videos with Kai Wong and I copy his pronunciation.

I wish I could say it like he says it. I'd probably like their cameras better.

 

[mooseontheloose]

As an example of how we butcher our own language, what common word in English could well be spelled ghoti, using bits of pronunciation from other words?

fish

 

[Agulliver]

In my experience...

Most Americans say "Nye-Kon"

Most Brits say "Nick-On"

And our respective advertising and service agents do the same.

The one Japanese person I have discussed cameras with said something akin to "Knee-Kon"

When I lived stateside I discovered that the car we limeys call a "hye-unn-dye" the Merkins refer to as a "Hun-day". It's probably something completely different in Korea. And most Brits still have no clue hot to pronounce Nike.

 

[Europan]

Nikon, nee-kon. Combined from Nippon (Japan), spoken nihon, and Ikon, Greek eikon, spoken ee-kon, picture.
Canon, kwann-on
Zeiss, tsa-iss. The german z is spoken ts.
Paillard, pai-arh. That’s French, so pull yourselves together. La nouvelle Orléans, New Orle-ã. Noo Orleens, just horrible. Saint-Louis. Français
Bolex, not boulex. A short straight o as in sock. Bolex. Rolex. From Greek roloi, watch.
Kern, the e as in then. Aarau, ahr-ou(ch)
Angénieux, Benoist Berthiot Lacour, Boyer, Royer, Beaulieu, Chamonix, what gives.
Sinar, seenar
Plaubel, plough-bel
Hasselblad, hassle-blood. Joking, but it’s close to that. Note that it’s hassel. Give the e some value.
Tungsten, also Swedish, the u as in burn, tung-stehn. Means heavy stone, the ore from which Wolfram is extracted.
Kodak, again a short straight o. Not koudak. http://www.darklanecreative.com/blog/the-meaning-of-the-word-kodak

 

[benjiboy]

I worked in photography for almost thirty years and never found a definitive answer, so I use Canon because at least I can pronounce it .

 

[Theo Sulphate]

... what common word in English could well be spelled ghoti, using bits of pronunciation from other words?

Well, despite what's often been written about "ghoti" in the last few decades, "fish" could never be spelled that way.

English spelling really does conform to rules.

For one thing, an initial "gh" will always be pronounced as a hard 'g' (as in "ghost"). A medial or final "gh" is pronounced as 'f'.

A final "ti" (which I think occurs mostly in words borrowed from other languages into English) never has a 'sh' sound.

 

[zanxion72]

Same as "Ikon" in Zeiss, but with a leading "N"

 

[cooltouch]

Despite spending several years in Japan, I usually accommodate American style and say Neigh-kon with the o as in the word no. however, Knee-kon is correct. As an example of how we butcher our own language, what common word in English could well be spelled ghoti, using bits of pronunciation from other words?

I envy you for your getting to spend several years in Japan. I'm a linguist by education (BA and MA in Linguistics) and my specialty language as a student was Japanese. I've visited Japan once, on holiday many years ago now.

Anyway to answer your riddle question about ghoti, the obvious answer is 'fish'. Ghoti is an old joke of sorts in Linguistics -- I believe it was a topic that was first presented by Noam Chomski. So, how could ghoti possibly be pronounced 'fish'? Simple. The /gh/ as in the word 'cough', the /o/ as in the word 'women' and the /ti/ as in the word (and many others with the same suffix) 'ambition'. See? Simple.

<linguist hat>
In Japanese, words can be spelled using one of two syllabaries -- each is a group of symbols that represent some 46 possible phonemic syllables in the Japanese language. To spell Nikon, the Japanese will use three characters. The character for 'ni' (pronounced knee), the character for 'ko' (pronounced, well, ko, as in 'coal'), and the third character, which is sort of unique because it's the only one that doesn't contain a vowel -- the 'n' sound. It's worth noting, perhaps, that Japanese phonological rules permit only vowels or the sound /n/ to appear in word-final position (that is, at the end of a word). So we have ni-ko-n, with each syllable having the same length -- of time. So that means that the /n/ lasts as long as the /ni/ and the /ko/. As a practical matter, though, this specified length for the /n/ doesn't really matter.

Nikkor and Nikkormat are more complicated, however. The double /k/ indicates the likelihood of gemination of the /k/ sound. Gemination is a four-dollar linguistic term meaning a doubling of the sound or consonant length, in this case. With the /k/, the sound is made and then held for a beat before moving on. This is something not encountered in English -- we don't lengthen hard consonants like the /k/ sound. But the Japanese do. In fact, the name of their country, which is Nippon, has a geminated /p/, which is held for an extra beat. If you listen closely to a Japanese citizen pronounce their country's name, you will hear this pause.

Further, with the case of Nikkor, recall that, in Japanese, words can end only on a vowel or /n/, so a vowel is added to the end. In this case, it is a sound most closely resembling the /u/ in English, but it isn't the same. The sound is known as the "high back unrounded vowel," and is not found in American or British English, but it is found in Scots English. When you listen to a Scot pronounce the /u/, it isn't. It is the high back unrounded vowel. Remember the movie Shrek? Mike Myers, who did the voiceover for the Shrek character, actually did a great job of hitting that high back unrounded vowel, cuz Shrek spoke English with a Scottish accent.

Also, Japanese does not use a rotacized /r/, as found in the American pronunciation of 'hear'. We Americans rotacize the /r/ in Nikkor, but the Japanese don't. Their /r/ is known in linguistics as the "flapped r", most similar to the way we pronounce the middle syllable in "butter" or "ladder." Hence, Nikkor is pronounced ni-k..-o-ru (the dots following the /k/ indicate the gemination, and don't forget the flapped /r/.) Nikkormat would be ni-k..o-ru-ma-to, with the /ma/ pronounced as, well, as we pronounce 'ma' when we're talking about our mothers. The /to/ holds no surprises either. It's pronounced as the final /to/ in 'tomato'. As for Nikomat, the gemination has been removed, as has the /r/, so it's pronounced ni-ko-ma-to.

Simple, eh?
</linguist hat>

And that's all I have to say about that.

 

[cooltouch]

When I lived stateside I discovered that the car we limeys call a "hye-unn-dye" the Merkins refer to as a "Hun-day". It's probably something completely different in Korea. And most Brits still have no clue hot to pronounce Nike.

As you probably know, Hyundai is a huge manufacturing conglomerate in Korea, and for years before they imported cars here, they were known for their steel production. Working in the "awl bidness" I knew about Hyundai back in the 80s, when my company was buying lots of piping products from them. Back in those days, the Hyundai folks were rather picky about the pronunciation of their company name. Now that they're selling millions of cars over here, they're not so picky any more.

For some ineffable reason, Americans balk at the pronunciation. The /y/ is pronounced, and that's where the trouble lies. But it needn't. If we would just think of the /hyu/ as being the same pronunciation as the word 'hue' we wouldn't have a problem. And the final syllable is not pronounced 'day,' for pete's sake, it's pronounced the same as the word 'dye' or 'die'. So, hue-n-dye. That is actually the correct pronunciation. You Brits get closest to it with your over-pronunciation of the word. The American abomination is laughable.

Hey, regarding Nike, for the longest time, I thought it rhymed with 'bike.'

 

[fstop]

"Hi, my name is Johanna. I am an assistant marketing manager at Nye-con [USA]..."

http://www.nikonusa.com/en/learn-an...tting-started-with-your-nikon-d3300-dslr.html

Thank you.

 

[CMoore]

I envy you for your getting to spend several years in Japan. I'm a linguist by education

A Linguist.?
Good For You. I never went to school, and have a life-long Appreciation/Admiration for people with a degree. Well Done.

Anyway....... do you know anything about German.?
I was reading on another Forum about a guy that had some letters, written by his Grandfather, to his Grandmother.
These two people would have been about 20 years old in 1940.
They lived in Germany.
The man was a soldier of The Wehrmacht, and the woman was his young wife.
This guy was born in the usa and wanted to get these letters translated to English. He was told by a few people that the "type" of German used up to that point was no longer used today. The people he asked said they could not really translate the letters for him.
Does this make sense to you.?
Would this, perhaps, be unique, because of the horrible time frame......would this have anything to do with WWII/Nazis/Restructure after the war/Etc. etc.
Can/Does this happen.? Does a modern language change that fast.?
Thank You

 

[MartinCrabtree]

N-eye-con
N-eye-core

 

[anfenglin]

A Linguist.?
Good For You. I never went to school, and have a life-long Appreciation/Admiration for people with a degree. Well Done.

Anyway....... do you know anything about German.?
I was reading on another Forum about a guy that had some letters, written by his Grandfather, to his Grandmother.
These two people would have been about 20 years old in 1940.
They lived in Germany.
The man was a soldier of The Wehrmacht, and the woman was his young wife.
This guy was born in the usa and wanted to get these letters translated to English. He was told by a few people that the "type" of German used up to that point was no longer used today. The people he asked said they could not really translate the letters for him.
Does this make sense to you.?
Would this, perhaps, be unique, because of the horrible time frame......would this have anything to do with WWII/Nazis/Restructure after the war/Etc. etc.
Can/Does this happen.? Does a modern language change that fast.?
Thank You

That's bogus, as in bull.
German is German, maybe if you go back far enough it becomes intranslatable but I also doubt that. There are specialists for middle german and old German, they speak English to some extent and can translate the old German.
So, logically, (to quote Sir Bedevere the wise) it can be translated.
Maybe they tried to get rid of him because of the Nazi stuff, who knows.
The only reason for it to be difficult to translate is the type of writing used called Sütterlin font. Not everybody could read that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sütterlin

Back on topic, Germans are easily fooled by advertisements, especially if they are foreign, so people call the sneakers with the hook NYE-KEY which makes me sick.
Nike as in KNEE-Ke with a weak e was the goddess of victory in ancient greece, so normal people use the american pronounciation of NYE-K.

The most clever sort of people use KNEE-CON, my Nikomat is called KNEE-CO-MAT with an a as in "are" and Zeiss is spoken with a TS, like in badumm-tss.
Hope that helps.

 

[cooltouch]

CMoore, I studied German in high school, but that was many years ago, and I'm pretty rusty now.

There are different dialects of German and the dialect a person speaks depends on where they live. Some dialects can be quite distant from the mother tongue. I recall a discussion with one of my linguistics professors, who was German, and who described the language situation along the border between Germany and the Netherlands. He said there was no hard demarkation between Dutch and German. The closer one got to the border, the more Dutch words were found in the local dialect, until at the border itself, it was a pretty good mix of the two languages and then continuing into the Netherlands, the farther one got from the border the fewer German terms were found in the local dialect. So no hard demarkation, instead a continuum.

All languages change. That is a basic fact about language. When a language stops changing it becomes a dead language. Like Latin or classical Greek. Interestingly enough, that which determines whether a language is living or not is whether children learn it as a first language. As long as that continues to happen, it is a living language. When a language loses popularity because of economic or social reasons it is usually replaced by another, and this new language is the one children learn. So if a language reaches the point where children no longer learn it as a first language, it dies. Simple as that.

Might this have happened to the dialect you're asking about? Yes, it is possible. Languages change. Could it have happened in 70 years? Well, possibly, but that is a rather narrow time frame. However, major disruptions such as war, and the loss of a war, might have led to rather severe disruptions that could have affected things like children not learning the old dialect. I have a good example of a language almost dying because of social disruption and economic reasons: Taiwanese. In Taiwan, prior to about 60 years ago, most all Taiwanese people learned Taiwanese as a first language. But then by the early 50s, they also learned Mandarin in school, which had become the official language of Taiwan, thanks to the warlord Chang Kai Chek and his cronies, known as the Kuo Min Tang, that took over the island and put themselves in charge of things. They even tried banning Taiwanese. My wife, who is from Taiwan, and who speaks Taiwanese, told me about how, if kids were caught speaking Taiwanese in school, they were fined. The era of the Kuo Min Tang was a miserable time for the Taiwanese language, and it lasted for decades. It wasn't until the 1990s that the government woke up to the fact that the native language was on the verge of extinction when they finally tried to do something about it, and began teaching it in the schools. These days, it is recovering, albeit slowly, from almost dieing out. Many other languages have been less fortunate. You know, before settlers arrived in America, one of the most diverse language situations anywhere existed here. There were literally thousands of different native American languages. But by the turn of the 20th century, almost all of them had vanished. And it wasn't because their speakers had vanished. They had abandoned their native languages because there was no economic and little social benefit to retain them.

It might be that the people who said they couldn't translate the letters were unfamiliar with the dialect that was used in them. But I seriously doubt that they are untranslatable. This person just needs a better source for translation. My advice to that person would be for him to contact the German Department at a local university and ask them about translating the documents. Most foreign language professors at good schools are scholars of their language. They have PhDs in the subjects, and many, if not most, are native speakers of the language. So they should be acquainted with subjects such as dialects of their languages. The professor(s) will also be able to give him more information about the dialect being used.

anfenglin mentioned the Sütterlin font. I thought of this, but assumed that, if the people being asked to translate were native Germans, they'd be familiar with it, and it wouldn't have presented a problem. I could be wrong about that, though. It might have simply been too dificult for them to read because of the font.

 

[CMoore]

CMoore, I studied German in high school, but that was many years ago, and I'm pretty rusty now.

Wow.....very interesting indeed.
No doubt there was a problem (for the "translators") reading the way the German was written in these letters. It has been a few years and i cannot remember the details. I am sure those "details" would be clear to you.
I think you have answered my basic question.
Thanks Again

 

[guangong]

Three syllables, the n in Japanese is also a syllable. Japanese also distinguishes between short and long syllables, so that the kyo in Tokyo consists of 2 beats: Tokyoo. And no stress accent. All of this is too much to bother with, so following convention, call it a NYkon. Just for fun, pronounce Rolleiflex in proper German and see what you get. My French friend has tried to correct my pronunciation for Beaulieu movie cameras and has given up.
I grew up in a nisei family and learned early on to pronounce Japanese following the American convention in public. Nowadays almost all Japanese restaurants are operated by Chinese, which adds another twist to pronunciation.

 

[Arklatexian]

"Hi, my name is Johanna. I am an assistant marketing manager at Nye-con [USA]..."

http://www.nikonusa.com/en/learn-an...tting-started-with-your-nikon-d3300-dslr.html

Question? Pronounced "JOhanna or YOhanna"?

 

[AgX]

That's why I bought a Contax. I knew how to pronounce it.

Are you sure?

 

[AgX]

There are different dialects of German and the dialect a person speaks depends on where they live. Some dialects can be quite distant from the mother tongue.

He said there was no hard demarkation between Dutch and German. The closer one got to the border, the more Dutch words were found in the local dialect, until at the border itself, it was a pretty good mix of the two languages and then continuing into the Netherlands

Yes, there were/are different dialects in Germany. But until recently they typically were not used in writing letters.

Germany is a rather new country, amalgamated out of morsels, often with a history of varying leadership.
When that Prussia acquired those lawlands in the Far-West, the could hardly communicate with the locals (that included teachers with their pupils) as the locals were speaking Dutch.
However that common language no longer exists. On the german side the dialect has practically vanished (for several reasons) and what is left has got by now its very local forms.

 

[cooltouch]

Agx, what you're describing is the disappearing of dialects as a unified countrry moves toward an accepted norm, which is kinda what I was discussing earlier. Yeah, it's very common now in this modern world. I've noticed that many of the regionalisms here in the USA are disappearing too. I think it's TV that's doing it.

 

[AgX]

But there is also a contrary movement. I see this in parts of Netherlands, where in the past a child had to "wash its mouth" when speaking dialect, but today I hear people there from small child to manager speaking dialect in public.

 

[Alan Gales]

Are you sure?

Well, I pronounce it Con Tax. Do you have a different pronunciation in Germany?

In the U.S. many pronounce Porsche as Porsh. I've had people tell me I'm wrong when I say Por sha with two syllables. I then explain that the car was named after Ferdinand Porsche.

Don't you call your country Deutschland? How did we get Germany from Deutschland?

 

[cooltouch]

But there is also a contrary movement. I see this in parts of Netherlands, where in the past a child had to "wash its mouth" when speaking dialect, but today I hear people there from small child to manager speaking dialect in public.

I think that's a good thing. As a linguist, I want to see languages continue to live, not disappear.

 

[AgX]

Well, I pronounce it Con Tax. Do you have a different pronunciation in Germany?

Don't you call your country Deutschland? How did we get Germany from Deutschland?

If you pronounce Contax as in tax, you are little bit off. You better should pronounce the a as the u in tug.
(But your deviation is similar to us Germans mis-pronouncing the a in Kodak.)


Well, for a long time I refused the term Deutschland or Germany. As there were two of them and as for the recent past. I spoke of the Federal Republic instead. After the unification I gradually changed over to using both terms.

Deutsch in its original form meant local or indigenious and was used in a small part of the regions that later formed Germany.
Germany likely has a Roman origin, indicating a region that later partly formed Germany.