The Pronunciation of Newfoundland

• Format: Manuscript
• Language: English
• Subjects: English language > Dialects > Newfoundland and Labrador; Newfoundland
• Online Access: http://collections.mun.ca/cdm/ref/collection/elrcdne/id/60167

newfoundland The Editor, The Daily News. Dear Sir, - Hardly anyone living outside this province knows how to pronounce its name correctly, and my experience is that visitors and immigrants to it do not take the trouble to attune their ear to catch, and their tongues thereafter to use, the proper way. The latter class seem bent on misapplying the emphasis to the first syllable instead of the last. Permit me to site the following rules for the correct pronunciation, as developed over the centuries of local, historical, majority usage:- 1. Pronounce the first syllable as _new_, giving the terminal letter its full value, rhyming with _few_; do not pronounce it as _noo_. 2. In the middle syllable, elide the vowels _ou_ and the letter _d_; pronounce the syllable in a slurred fashion, as if it were written as _f'n_. 3. Give full value to every letter in the last syllable, _land_, reserving all your emphasis for this last syllable and sounding the vowel as a short _a._ To sum up, the word runs like this: New-f'n-_land_ You say the first two syllables at the same tempo, rather rapidly and short and then let _land_ be fully accented with a rising emphasis. PRINTED ITEM DNE-cit N.C. Crewe 16 April 66 Used I and Sup Used I and Sup Not used