If you thought Russell Peters’ material was too stereotypical in New York, 
watch what happens when a desi comedian plays Cincinnati. Rajiv Satyal, a moonlighting P&G’er, plays to stereotype up the yin-yang with threadbare jokes about camels, Kwik-e-Marts, Slurpees, terrorists and ‘thank you, come again.’ Wince.
He even calls himself Razheev. It’s my pet peeve, the weird American idea that Indian languages pronounce ‘j’ like in French. If you’re foreign in the movies, you’re given a British accent; if you’re foreign in real life, you’re assumed to be French. Sometimes it seems the only countries we know are the ones which fought here 250 years ago. Over New Jersey.
So take back your ‘Veezh,’ please. It’s Vij, just like it’s spelled, thankyaverramuch. Like Spanish, we’re into phonetic spelling down on the subcontinent. For your confusion, thank the French:
Send these, the confused, pronunciation-challenged to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
Not funny at all. Not politically, not culturally, not observant, not nothing. To be fair, it was only like 5 minutes, but to me, it was 5 minutes too much.
Does anyone know of any desi-female comics????
Vijai Nathan and Shazia Mirza come to mind.
I’ve heard mixed reviews about him. You guys though just pushed me over to “see for yourself” section. Booked his upcoming show in So Cal.
Hey Veezh, thanks for the hard ‘j’/soft ‘j’ rant. As someone who had 3 j’s in her desi first, middle, and last name, I am always correcting people’s pronunciation.
You’re welcome, J^3. Ironically, my brother’s Latina soccer coach used to call him Ra-ha-neesh.
J’accuse….Razh Bhakta. (Refer to Apprentice 2.) Maybe it was the outrageous bowtie. Having that around my neck like a vice might have prompted a few soft j’s from me as well. But then, I would not sport polka-dots in the Boardroom.
Quelle dommage! Polkadots are hawt.
Et voila! That’s where my “nickname” comes from. – Canadians who pronounced my last name as if it was francais.
Desis who are in journalism (or media in general) should start with pronouncing the name the way they are supposed to. There is Laxmi Singh on NPR. She goes … “This is LAAxmi Sing” … In the typical American way of pronouncing A’s as A.
You know how the hispanics (in media) make it a point to pronounce their name the way it is pronounced in Spanish.
It reminds me of a somewhat recurring character on the Fox show “Married With Children” where there is this reporter who goes … “This is Miranda Veracruz De Cardinal ..” in a Spanish accent … totally over the top (like everything else on that show)
Canadians who pronounced my last name as if it was francais.
Ha ha! NOW I get it! I have a Mallu friend who must share your last name. I’m going to have to call her Ms. Maisnon now. 😉
holy hell, that has to be some of the worst stand-up i’ve ever seen. talk about trite! ugh, i couldn’t even watch all of it. my bro has a ‘j’ in his name too…he gets “arzhoon” or “ar-huan” on a regular basis. same goes with the “ch” sound…”chandra” is always pronounced “shaandra”…even if you say it slow or break it up into syllables.
I have noticed this too. Although I must say that its not just restricted to journalists, desis across the board pronounce their names differently. Russell Peters had a bit about saying Indian words with an Indian accent (at 43:35 in the newest vdo – wonder what a marathi party is?).
But is it “vihj” or “veej”? English doesn’t have consistent rules on prononciation, unfortunately. Consider the famous silent/contextually based letter combos: fish, phyt. Through vs. though vs. cough. ClaSSy vs. fiSSion.
And speaking of how to pronounce Indian names in English – whats with that “a”? It drives me crazy. Indians’ “A” is pronounced “uh,” except when it’s not. The only time I know of that “a” is pronounced thusly in English, is SOMETIMES the word “a.” When the letter “a” is between consonants, it’s almost always pronounced “ah” or that nasal “aaa” (can’t convey through type) – unless it’s an Indian name. And THEN there’s the variation of pronounciation and syllable emphasis from around India, so I never feel confident saying “Ramayana” or even “Rama,” because it will be wrong to someone. And that s/sh thing – in Trivandrum, we ate doSas and wore Salwar suits, but elsewhere they eat doSHas and wear SHalwar suits. Or is that SHuits? SHoots? Shoot!
The only WYSIWYG language I’ve ever encountered is German. If you can read a German word, you can prounounce it, by gott!
Re: americanization of names.
I had an embarassing experience in college — a student who had just immigrated from India asked me my name. Innocently enough, I told him. And he said, “Oh, you mean…” and then he pronounced my name as it is “supposed to be” pronounced.
I realized that, gosh, I do say my name with an American accent. Because I SPEAK with an american accent.
So I’m of two minds. It is annoying when people water down their pronunciations on purpose. But sometimes accents simply change.
I wonder, is it essentialist and annoyingly French, in an Académie française sense, to insist that change is not permitted?
Yup, I’ve had the same thoughts/conversations. In particular, I remember a convo with a Chilean friend who was bitching about how Americans say Seville (instead of Sevilla.) I pointed out that that is how you say it in English, and how obnoxious would it be if I said Paree for Paris, or referred to it as Deutschland instead of Germany?
It’s been interesting to me how the pronunciation of Indian names changes w/the whole diaspora-thang. A woman I went to college with pronounced her name “na-LEAN-ee” [Nalini](her parents were Kenyan Indian), and a “Trini” friend pronounced her name “KAM-a-luh” [Kamala].
Come on: is there more than one way that a 3-letter english word with “i” as the second letter is pronounced ?
I agree with your other points about transliteration of Indian words/names, but I lay most of the blame on english: because of its inconsistent pronounciation rules and its shortage of vowels. All the options available to transliterate the indian “a” sound aren’t very good. For eg. the name Anil, could be mispronounced if spelt with a “Uh” (there is no “h” sound really), or with “U” (could be mistaken for “yoonil”).
My pet peeve is the use of “W”: i know of no indian word/name where “V” would not be more appropriate. Another fascinating convention is the use of “zh” in south indian languages to denote a sound that does not exist in english (it’s close to “r”).
It’s a name. An Indian name, spelled in English. By that logic I should pronounce Sita “Sitta,” and my great-grandmother Sima’s (Russian Jewish) name, “Simma.” I’m not trying to be provocative here; I have many good reasons to never assume an “i” in a name, especially a non-English name, is pronounced like the i in “pit.”
But at least you answered my sincere question – now I know it’s “vihj.”
And you’re so right about the shortage of vowels in the English alphabet.
Tell me about it. Made me look twice at the title of this post.
Fair enough. Good examples. Actually you could add “Nina” to that list. Still, I contend that “Vij” is a relatively non-controversial one.
I’ve met girls who mispronounce their name to me, and it’s an instant 4-point demotion. There aren’t many other things that can so quickly knock down the rating. Girl do you not see I’m desi too… I WILL remember your name if you tell me it’s Anjali, but I’ll be walkin away if you say “hi, I’m ‘awn-zha-li”. At least say ‘Angela’ if you’re embarassed of something.
Heh, good point! When I was a kid in Urbana, Illinois, a time and place in which “Nina” was an unusual name, some people would pronounce it “nine-uh” (“9a”). Sounded horrible. Fortunately, everywhere else on Earth I’ve ever been – Russia, Europe, India, South East Asia, Kenya – they pronounce it correctly.
English is missing more than half the letters of Hindi, almost all of the unaspirated consonants and many of the vowels, so any transliteration is going to suffer.
Another sore point! The ch -> sh is another Francophilic fuckup.
I find it funny when Brits can’t pronounce the d/r’s in their Indian names, because the British English r’s are silent. But I giggle only on the inside.
By the way, how is it that, except for country, Americans omit the r’s only when singing?
Change is inevitable, but it’s still going to strike some people as aesthetically odd, like American names pronounced in a Kazakh accent.
🙂
You mean, r’s are the only letter Americans omit when singing, or that Americans only omit r’s when singing? If it’s the latter, you need to visit Boston. 🙂
Like in Haah-vahd?
That’s my REAL name. Don’t wear it out.
Now what was the the “small fun size thing” in the bit. Indians R Hung especialy if they are Nihungs.
If you could read hindi you could pronounce it. The symbols form the basis for sounds used in language. Theres no basis for ‘ch’ as in children and on and on. A AA E EE U UU…odi baba odi baba
Ore’ baba, Ore’ baba (colloq. Bengali) ~ akin to ‘baap re baap’ (Hindi). Pronunciation Oh-ray baa-baa x2. Literarlly ‘Oh Dad, Oh Dad’, but roughly translated to ‘OMG’.
\begin rant
As for the general name twisting, I have felt the need to break my name down for people in coffee shops, airlines and restaurants — San (like in the San Antonio Spurs), Deep (like go deep, man). And thus, with the conflation of sporting analogies, my work gets done. I manage to get my name across with the right spelling and it is better than the crap that I usually get when hostesses or airline callcenter staff read my name out. I mean how hard is a 2 syllable name? And haven’t they outsourced the airline callcenter jobs to Gurgaon already? I would be mightily miffed if some Delhi gal was being trained to garble my Indian name. I mean, aren’t the airlines teetering on the brink of crisis already?
\end rant
For odi baba/ oria baba click
http://ww.smashits.com/music/remix/songs/977/rolls-royce-2.html
then click ori baba
well is it oDi or oRi baba jaldi karo na ni
Desis who are in journalism (or media in general) should start with pronouncing the name the way they are supposed to. There is Laxmi Singh on NPR. She goes … “This is LAAxmi Sing” … In the typical American way of pronouncing A’s as A.
The way she says it is apparently the “Trinidadian pronunciation of her name.”
What’s really irritating is when Western-based Indians/South Asians deliberately mispronounce other Indians’/South Asians’ names (and pronounce them the incorrect way that many — for example — English people here in the UK may do), even if they know damn well what the “correct” pronunciation is.
“Anjali” being consistently pronounced “An-jaaa-li” is one example, although I’ve heard plenty of others.
Just to clarify my previous message — and to differentiate it from the point made in post 30 by Guava — I’m referring to desis deliberately mispronouncing other desis’ names — and to their faces.
You can understand why some English people would have problems with some desi names, but if you’re South Asian, you have absolutely no excuse, unless the only language you can speak is English.
My “nickname” comes from the fact that the “ey” sound in my name has no direct equivalent in English (because it’s written with an “e”), and a guy at my last job botched the pronounciation… thus came rocko.
I’ve actually seen him numerous times and he ALWAYS has the whole crowd rolling. Maybe some of his stuff isn’t the most sensitive, but I give him a lot of credit for putting himself out there. Writing standup isn’t easy and overall, the guy does a good job.
Manish, in any style of music (except for country, but that’s a whole different thread) the harshness of an R is considered sonically unpleasant. Technique-wise, it also closes off the mouth and throat so you don’t get as much projection, power, enunciation or resonance. Vocal instructors will teach you to open your throat and shape your lips to simulate an R sound but still be able to sustain phrasing: instead of singing “together” you would sing “togethah”, for example.
(DesiDancer the triple-threat)
Ay Carrrrrramba! What about Mariachi?
I went to high school with a kid name Sanjay. Some of the teachers would call him Sanzhay. Granted, there are different ways someone who’s unfamiliar with the name could pronounce the ‘a’, but I will second (or at this point 25) the ‘j’ being pronounce ‘zh’ as always having been a huge pet peeve or mine. What kind of name is Sanzhay? That doesn’t even make any sense. Do I call you Zhohn instead of John?
As for Rajiv Satyal, he’s ok I guess. I’m a huge fan of standup, and kudos to him for being another brown face to look at on the comedy circuit; standup isn’t easy – but I don’t feel obligated to think he’s funny just because he’s brown and a comedian. His sets are ok. I’ve also listened to some of his podcasts… they didn’t really make me laugh.
DDIA- you’re right… I meant more American styles (pop, rock, even musical theatre and stuff). Anything “non-ethnic”… obviously Spanish/Latin/Portugese influenced styles of music are totally dependent on the R 😉
Bottom line on pronounciations is …. will you be at the mercy of the majority to be defined, or you will assert yourself and define yourself..
Right on, RC. Assert your brown self! 🙂
If the average American can pronounce “Stephanie”, “Alexander”, “Josephine” or “Christopher”, surely they can pronounce Rajiv or Anju. Whether or not we make the time to correct the way our names are mispronounced, is a different story. Mispronounce their name back! If you expect me to say “Alouwicious” and “Dartagnian” then for F’s sake– I have less letters in my name than that– say it right! A fellow named David finally got the hang of my name after I called him Daah-vidh enough times…
Right on! I mean, how hard is it to say:
Day-see Dan-ser
right?
😉
is it Eh-niss or EE-niss? 😉
Oh come on guys! You think only the Non Desis screw up your pronounciations, think again. My name was pronounced differently in different parts of the India… When I was in Chennai, they insisted on calling me Santhaanam, In Delhi it was Shaantnu, When I met a bengali, I was Shaantonu……..
No one except the good old maharashtrian ( or the Marathi Party as Russell Peters called us) say it like it should be: Shantanu ( Which incidentally should sound like “shun- ta-noo……I always end up writing this out for the Non-desis.) I should have done this in India, but strangely , it never bothered me much when fellow desis screwed up my name!
Ennis & DesiDancer,
Er, I thought you guys were married to each other ?
Actually, “Ennis” is pretty damn difficult to say. Does it rhyme with “menace”, or “venus” (which, incidentally, also kinda rhymes with pe…)
…..I’ll stop talking now…..Before you both gang up on me — God knows, DD already has a huge backlog of badmaashi to slap me around for 😉
Nina, that’s mainly the Bengalis.
Hindi is not completely WYSIWYG: राम गीत सुन रहा है। is not pronounced Rāma gīta suna rahā hai. (And the Hindi hai never rhymes with “why”, as it probably should.)
Sanskrit is WYSIWYG, as are probably Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam.
I heard one chap in Pittsburgh introduce himself as “Subra-MAY-nian.” Aargh!
It does in comic Bollywood accents. I assume they’re a parody of real ones.
And the Hindi hai never rhymes with “why”…
hey, that’s what my gujarati family says when I make a oopsie…………. 🙂
that’s where I was going with the joke 🙂