[Taxacom] pronunciation of Latin, concluding remarks

[curini]

...............thank you................
Marco Curini-Galletti
Dipartimento di Scienze della Natura e del Territorio
Università di Sassari
Via F. Muroni, 25 - 07100 Sassari (Italy)
Tel: +39 079 228662 Fax: +39 079 228665

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Pekka T. Lehtinen" <pekleh at utu.fi>
To: <taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu>
Sent: Monday, March 19, 2012 11:22 PM
Subject: [Taxacom] pronunciation of Latin, concluding remarks


A thread beginning from the question about correct pronunciation of the
group name Asterales has led to a long discussion about pronunciation of
both names not regulated by a Code as well as later also about
scientific names regulated by Codes of every group.  First of all Reg
Handford, who opened this thread actually stated that he has got a
satisfactory answer to his question.  As I am personally very much
interested to get also well grounded discussions of this kind of
widespread problems in international forums, for profit of high class
oral communication, especially in all types of congresses and symposia,
understandable for as many of their participants as possible. This form
of communication is certainly important, too, not only the written text
in our scientific publications. I still want to make some concluding
remarks as a retired Commissioner of ICZN and, at the same time,
representing a non-anglophone experienced specialist of taxonomy and
nomenclature. First of all, I would like to inform everybody again that
a carefully formulated opinion of an American specialist of Latin
language, Dr. Michael Covington is available in
http://www.ai.uga.edu/mc/latinpro.pdf.  As everyone can become
acquainted with his text, a thorough presentation of his opinions as
such is not necessary here.  Anyway, as interpretations of his text
deviating from those of mine have been presented in off-line
discussions, I want to make some comments here to some details of
Covington´s conclusions.
1. The Codes are MAINLY created for regulation of written text, but as
SCIENTIFIC NAMES OF ORGANISMS are by definition either Latin words or
Latinized words of variable origin, which must be treated according to
the Latin grammar, it is obvious that this definition provides also that
their pronunciation agrees with Latin pronunciation  and not with the
pronunciation of any local language. Here it is essential to note that
although we NOW MORE OR LESS GENERALLY AGREE that English is the
dominant and preferable language of taxonomic descriptions and other
text in taxonomic  publications, NO RULES DERIVED FROM THE PRONUNCIATION
OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE CAN BE APPLIED TO  THE SCIENTIFIC NAMES OF
ORGANISMS.
2.  Covington recommends that among his four alternatives of LATIN
PRONUNCIATION the so-called “Northern Continental” should be used for
"unfamiliar scientific terms", which absolutely cannot be interpreted to
mean the exclusion of SCIENTIFIC NAMES, as he even stresses the
inclusion of Linnaeus, the creator of the concept of binominal
scientific names,  among his list of "pioneers of science" ? For most
people outside the specialists of a few BIOLOGICAL DISCIPLINES
(taxonomy, nomenclature, genetics, molecular analysis) everything
connected to the SCIENTIFIC NAMES of organisms are extremely UNFAMILIAR
and sometimes it is even difficult to get permission for inclusion of
scientific names (in parentheses, at least) in addition to local
vernacular names IN ARTICLES PUBLISHED FOR PURPOSES OF SOME OTHER
DISCIPLINES IN BIOLOGY (e.g., environmental science or nature
conservancy).

                            The value of a recommendation of a
specialist of linguistics is GENERALLY EVEN MORE ESSENTIAL than the
value of recommendations ADDED TO STRICT RULES (as in ICZN).  The four
alternative pronunciations listed by Covington  are not "co-equal" as he
clearly indicated the WIDE DIFFERENCES of usage for his four different
alternatives.
3. I could easily deduct from Covington´s text that his "ENGLISH
PRONUNCIATION" (of Latin!) would be more or less completely RESTRICTED
TO "HISTORICAL  AND MYTHOLOGICAL NAMES", but not the pronunciation of
Latin names WITHIN A CERTAIN PERIOD OF HISTORY ! The classical
pronunciation seems to be reserved to OLD TEXTS OF THE CLASSICAL PERIOD
and are therefore not at all suitable for scientific names.
4. The DIFFERENCES OF “ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION” and the “NORTHERN
CONTINENTAL” ONE are not restricted to some VOWELS and the consonant "c"
in different positions in regard to next vowels. For me the reality is
far from that.  In all widespread languages of Europe and America
(English, French, and Spanish) the pronunciation of quite many
CONSONANTS and combinations of consonants, too, is widely different in
different words and because of that also between the pronunciation of
these languages and Latin. As the most elucidating instance I want to
mention the names of persons, according to whom a lot of scientific
names have been dedicated.

                                             When I began my career as a
taxonomist, one of the first difficult and amazing things was TO LEARN
that "when a personal name is LATINIZED as a part of a scientific name,
its pronunciation will be CHANGED from the original language to the
pronunciation of Latin, INDEPENDENT IN THE ORIGIN OR DERIVATION OF THE
NAME" Sometimes this change is phonetically insignificant, but often
quite radical, especially in regard to names which are dedications to
French personal names. According to ICZN there are no EXCEPTIONS FOR
LATINIZED NAMES. They are just Latin and nothing referring to the
original language of the name. In applying this RULE to pronunciation of
these names we often get really FUNNY results, but when the CODE will be
followed, e.g., the specific name lavoisieri must be pronounced as a
LATINIZED word, which is, as a combination of each of its single letters
resulting to a string which has no more meaning in its original
language, and actually sounds to a Frenchman ENTIRELY DIFFERENT from
that of a (non-latinized) name derived from the French surname Lavoisier
by adding -i. I don´t even try to use here the ENGLISH “LETTER BY
LETTER” SPELLING, as it is EXTREMELY DIFFICULT TO NON-ANGLOPHONE PEOPLE
and I don´t even know whether EXACTLY SAME PHONETIC  SYMBOLS ARE USED IN
USA, UK and Australia OR NOT.
5. Michael Covington DISTINCTLY TELLS WHICH TYPE OF PRONUNCIATION should
be selected in different contexts TO REACH THE BEST POSSIBLE
UNDERSTANDING in optimal communication between large amount s of people
WITH SIMILAR INTERESTS.  For me (and hopefully also for many other
taxonomists) this is the AIM OF COMMUNICATION IN SCIENCE, including also
the oral one.  In discussions within the staff and students of AN
AMERICAN DEPARTMENT OF BIOLOGY the best possible understanding may be
(ALSO/STILL NOW) achieved in a slightly different way than in AN
INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS with hundreds of participants from all parts of
the world. In the case that SOME OF YOUR AMERICAN COLLEAGUES regard it
useful to maintain two different practices in pronunciation of Latin FOR
DIFFERENT AUDIENCES, it is acceptable, but then it should also be
UNDERSTOOD AND ACCEPTED that the alternative ADOPTED AND PREFERRED BY ME
(AND MANY OF MY NON-ANGLOPHONE COLLEAGUES) is more practical, as then it
will be necessary to learn ONLY ONE, “Code-Compliant”  PRONUNCIATION OF
LATIN. If this principle could be taught in basic biological courses of
universities of ALL COUNTRIES,   after some time EVERYONE ON THIS PLANET
USING SCIENTIFIC NAMES OF ORGANISMS in oral communication would need to
know only one pronunciation of Latin!!
6. When I mentioned that there are "linguistic problems which cannot be
understood by some people in English speaking countries" I really meant
a problem that is not, according to my discussions with people from many
countries" sufficiently included in the TEACHING OF THE ENGLISH
LANGUAGE. I don´t know whether it is DUE TO DIFFERENT PRACTICES IN
DIFFERENT COUNTRIES OR FOR SOME OTHER REASON which has remained obscure
to me. Here I really mean the phonetic symbols for different letters in
"LETTER BY LETTER SPELLING". At least for me, this sector of KNOWLEDGE
IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE is absolutely outside all practical possibilities
AND I KNOW THAT EACH LANGUAGE SEEMS TO HAVE ITS OWN STANDARDS. If you
will try to expect spelling of LATIN WORDS "letter by letter" and your
discussant is not an anglophone, you will certainly get a widespread
problem "WHICH CANNOT BE UNDERSTOOD", especially if you are waiting THE
USUAL LETTER BY LETTER spelling or something else that deviates from the
UNIQUE CHARACTER  of Latin within many widespread languages: every
letter has a single PHONETIC counterpart and it has nothing to do with
the ENGLISH (probably neither with French nor Spanish – I have no idea)
LETTER BY LETTER spelling.  As it is ABSOLUTELY not possible to provide
that most taxonomists could KNOW THE FINNISH LETTERS (and I would never
suggest it), it is not too far to TAKE THE GERMAN LETTERS as a "CLOSE
BY"- alternative, although even then the uniqueness of the pronunciation
of every letter is not as absolute in German as it is in Finnish.  Some
of my colleagues may conclude now that MY MOTHER LANGUAGE belongs to the
"underdeveloped" or in some way at least quite PRIMITIVE languages. I
don´t care about such possible classifications, but this matter of fact
may partly EXPLAIN TO THE TAXACOMERS, why I am a person, who can WITH
GOOD REASONS strive towards an optimal  solution in international oral
communication  by USING STANDARDIZED PRONUNCIATION  OF THE SCIENTIFIC
NAMES OF ORGANISMS, not recommended by users of any single modern
language, but by a specialist of Latin pronunciation.              Pekka
T. Lehtinen <pekleh at utu.fi>




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