How do you pronounce these people's names?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around the pronunciation of various mathematicians' and physicists' names, including Ramanujan, Feynman, Germain, Brouwer, Lagrange, Lebesgue, Stieltjes, and Galois. Participants share their insights, experiences, and challenges regarding these pronunciations, reflecting a mix of linguistic backgrounds and familiarity with the names.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Debate/contested
  • Technical explanation

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants suggest that Feynman is pronounced as "FINE mun," while others provide variations like "Feyyhnman."
  • One participant offers a pronunciation for Lagrange as "la-grant-ch," while another suggests "lah-grahnzh," indicating different interpretations.
  • Stieltjes is proposed to be pronounced as "steal tjus," with a note on the vowel sound.
  • Monique attempts to explain the pronunciation of Brouwer, suggesting it sounds like "flower" with a "Br" at the beginning.
  • Galois is discussed with varying pronunciations, including "gahl-wah" and "gahl-wah," with some uncertainty about the accentuation.
  • Participants express difficulty with names like Huygens and t'Hooft, with suggestions like "Hi-jens" and "HOY-(g)hunz" being offered.
  • Some participants correct each other on pronunciation details, such as the "zh" sound in Lagrange and the closed "e" sound in Germain.
  • Humorous anecdotes about mispronunciations and cultural references are shared, reflecting a light-hearted approach to the topic.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

There is no consensus on the correct pronunciations, as participants present multiple competing views and interpretations. The discussion remains unresolved with various suggestions and corrections being offered.

Contextual Notes

Participants express uncertainty about specific sounds and accents, indicating that some pronunciations may depend on regional accents or linguistic backgrounds. There are references to the challenges of translating sounds from one language to another, particularly with Dutch and French names.

DeadWolfe
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Ramanujan
Feynman
Germain
Brouwer
Lagrange
Lebesgue
Stieltjes

..thank you.

I have only read about them, and was curious about the correct pronoucniation of their names.

EDIT - I was also wondering about Galois.
 
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I've heard Feynman pronounced as FINE mun.

Not sure about the others.

The word "spinor," by the way, is pronounced like "spinner," not "spine ur."

How about Gell-Mann? Is it a hard 'G' like in "golf"? Which half of the name gets the accent?
 
Lagrange: la - grant - ch
this is how my professors pronounce
 
answers.com has entries with pronunciation key for all but Stieltjes.
 
Stieltjes: steal tjus (u as in truck)
 
Monique,are u Dutch speaking native...?

Daniel.
 
Galileo should help us.He's a student at Leiden,where there's this College of Mathematics bearing Stieltjes' name...

Daniel.
 
dextercioby said:
Monique,are u Dutch speaking native...?

Daniel.
Yup.

I'm trying to think of a way to explain the pronounciation of Brouwer.. but that is really a hard one :confused:
 
Ah! Easy: flower, brouwer. Just replace the F with Br.
 
  • #10
I'm french, so when it comes to saying the name of a mathematician it comes out right. :)
 
  • #11
I've had a lotta trouble with Huygens...Or t'Hooft...How are they spelled ?

Daniel.
 
  • #12
There was one prof I had from India and when he was covering quantum physics (which he pronounced phyg-uks) in a graduate class my friend was taking he would make references to using the Hartree-Fock method. Of course he would say something like: 'Theese is whare you need the Hearty-F**k' or at least it sounded that way to the amusement of the class. :smile:
 
  • #13
Feynman : fine(like the word)-muhn(rhymes with 'bun')

Brouwer : brow(as in 'eyebrow', rhymes roughly with 'how', but closer to the German 'frau')-uhr(like the ends of 'fur' and 'her') - edit : use Monique's pronunciation.

Lagrange : lah('ah' as in 'hard')-grahnzh (the 'zh' as in 'pleasure' , 'pressure' , 'leisure' - courtesy dexter)

Germain : zhuhr(rhymes with 'fur' and 'her')-man(like the word, closer to the è sound in French)

Lebesgue : lə('luh', rhymes roughly with 'the')-beg(like the word)

Galois : gahl(rhymes with the Dutch 'vaal'; 'ah' as in 'hard')-wah(same 'ah' sound)

Ramanujan : rah('ah' as in 'hard')-mah-nu('u' as in 'put')-juhn(rhymes with bun)

I've heard Gell-Mann pronounced with a hard 'g' (by some old physicist on Discovery Channel - he sounded like he was a contemporary). He (and others I've heard) pronounced the name gell-muhn (to rhyme with 'sell bun'), but I recall one time when I heard it pronounced gell-mahn.

Incidentally, Gell-Mann was a dabbler in linguistics and often corrected other peoples' pronunciations of their own names ! :biggrin:

la-grant-ch is hardly acceptable
 
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  • #14
polyb said:
'Theese is whare you need the Hearty-F**k' :smile:
When little perturbations don't do it for you, you do need a hearty f**k ! :approve:
 
  • #15
What an embarrassment - the only thing I pronounced right prior to reading this was Feynman.
 
  • #16
That "e" without any accent is a closed "e" and is approximately French "eu" or German "ö".

Gokul,about that "zh",i think in English u have the words:"pleisure" and "leisure".It's almost the same sound.

Daniel.

EDIT:You might add:"treasure" and "seizure".
 
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  • #17
dextercioby said:
That "e" without any accent is a closed "e" and is approximately French "eu" or German "ö".

Gokul,about that "zh",i think in English u have the words:"pleisure" and "leisure".It's almost the same sound.

Daniel.

Ouch ! Guess that completely skipped my head. Hope you don't mind if I go back and put in a correction.
 
  • #18
Gokul43201 said:
Lagrange : lah('ah' as in 'hard')-grahnzh (the 'zh' sound has no English usage that I can think of, but is the French pronunciation for the letters 'j' and 'g'-soft)

It rhymes with a snooty, Frenchified pronunciation of orange (unless you're in CA, and you have to first learn that it's pronounce ahr-ahnj, not oar-inj) :-p That's the closest I can come up with anything in English that might help with that zh sound.
 
  • #19
Moonbear said:
It rhymes with a snooty, Frenchified pronunciation of orange
Snooty, frenchified ! :eek: That explains the weird looks I got at the grocery store. :biggrin:

Isn't "snooty, Frenchified" just short for 'French' ?
 
  • #20
Gokul43201 said:
When little perturbations don't do it for you, you do need a hearty f**k ! :approve:

:smile: :smile: :smile: :smile: :smile:

I guess that's what you need when a simple iteration by hand won't work! :smile:
 
  • #21
Gokul43201 said:
Snooty, frenchified ! :eek: That explains the weird looks I got at the grocery store. :biggrin:

Isn't "snooty, Frenchified" just short for 'French' ?

It's the redneck pronunciation guide (please, someone rescue me from OH! I'm turning into one of them). :biggrin: Sort of like going to Target and calling it Tar-zhay.
 
  • #22
Moonbear said:
Sort of like going to Target and calling it Tar-zhay.
You say that too ? Phew ! I got the feeling Billy Bob and Billy Ray didn't get what I was trying to say to them when I was giving them directions to the State Fair Rodeo event ("pass Target and keep driving till you see the red chateau; then turn left into the cul-de-sac").
 
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  • #23
Gokul43201 said:
You say that too ? Phew !

Yep, though have also been known to take the joke too far and insist on going to the local Kro-zhair (not sure how to show the pronunciation of the -er) for my groceries.
 
  • #24
Ooh, Tribby should make a table for thread hijackers next. Kro-zhair, I have been taught, is wrong :cry: Apparently it's supposed to be pronounced with a hard 'g'...the imbeciles !
 
  • #25
Huygens - "Hi-jens", or so I've heard.


And please, don't talk to me about the French today... Grrr!
 
  • #26
Gokul43201 said:
Ooh, Tribby should make a table for thread hijackers next. Kro-zhair, I have been taught, is wrong :cry: Apparently it's supposed to be pronounced with a hard 'g'...the imbeciles !

He'd top that list too. :smile: I don't call it thread hijacking, I call it free association. :-p Besides, original question asked and answered; not much room for debate on that.

So, it's Kro-gair? I can still say it all nasally, right?
 
  • #27
brewnog said:
And please, don't talk to me about the French today... Grrr!

Fine, we're not talking to you. :-p Actually, we're not really talking about anything French at this point either, but American mutilation of store names to make discount stores sound like they're fancy boutiques. This is what we call fun out here in these parts. :biggrin:
 
  • #28
brewnog said:
Huygens - "Hi-jens", or so I've heard.
Huygens is impossible to explain, I don't think there is an equivalent for "uy" or the "ui" sound that occurs in dutch.

HOY-(g)hunz would be close, with a long "g"
found this http://frank.harvard.edu/~paulh/misc/huygens.htm :biggrin: :biggrin:

listen to the mp3!
 
  • #29
So he letter "g" is pronounced "g" and not "h"...?

Daniel.
 
  • #30
Moonbear said:
Fine, we're not talking to you. :-p
Yeah, but it never stopped me before, did it?
Moonbear said:
Actually, we're not really talking about anything French at this point either, but American mutilation of store names to make discount stores sound like they're fancy boutiques.

Oooo, "boutique", get you, Mme Cultured...
 

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