[Taxacom] Asterales

[Curtis Clark]

I'd like to add two things. First, 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_English_pronunciation_of_Latin, which 
explains the way Latin is traditionally pronounced in English.

Second, Prof. Lehtinen sent a response off-list which I suspect he meant 
to go to the list. I asked him about it, and have not heard a response, 
so I won't forward it, but he did bring up an interesting 
interpretation: That the requirements of both the ICZN and ICN that 
scientific names be in Latin form also refers to their pronunciation. 
Unless something happened at Melbourne that I don't know about, I don't 
think the ICN mentions pronunciation. If in fact the ICZN does, I 
apologize, and will endeavor to use Latin pronunciation with my 
zoologist colleagues (who will be greatly befuddled).

What I still don't understand is what constitutes "correct" Latin 
pronunciation. I learned a pronunciation in school in the 1960s that 
differs from the current scholarly views 
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_spelling_and_pronunciation), 
especially in such thing as nasalization of vowels and the value of some 
of the consonants. It is of course a reconstruction (all the audio tapes 
were burned in Nero's Rome :-), but its pronunciation must have been 
quite different from that of either Linnaeus or the Church of Rome. 
Certainly, the differences are no greater than those of English among 
Received Pronunciation, General American English, Cockney, and 'Strine, 
but those are often mutually unintelligible to unfamiliar listeners.

-- 
Curtis Clark        http://www.csupomona.edu/~jcclark
Biological Sciences                   +1 909 869 4140
Cal Poly Pomona, Pomona CA 91768