Four Corners: Pronunciation wars

REPORTER

Sarah Foster, who's 13, shifted last year from Melbourne to Townsville, and she writes, 'First, in Melbourne we would say, "It's hot, isn't it?" Whereas here you say, "It's hot, eh?" You say in Melbourne, "She's good-looking, though." Here you say, "She's good-looking, but." After a while you find yourself saying crazy things like, "It's good but, eh?"' It's an amusing geographical difference, but the fact is that there can be as much diversity in pronunciation amongst a room full of Australians as there is across the entire nation. Here's a classic example.

A group of people seated around a table.

MAN

Don 'Quick-sot'.

MAN 2

Now, this word's been up before the committee umpteen times. I'm sorry, I don't quite remember why it's come again.

WOMAN

I think we thought we should settle it once and for all.

ALL

(Laugh)

WOMAN

I don't think we could face it last time.

MAN

Every time I've said 'Don Quick-sot' on a news bulletin, I've been besieged with telephone calls from irate viewers.

WOMAN

Me too.

MAN 2

And now, let's be clear…

MAN 3

How often does Don 'Quick-sot' get into the news?

MAN

Every time the ballet is performed in Sydney.

MAN 2

Have you a comment to make on… on Don Quixote and the Spanish pronunciation?

WOMAN

Well, the Spanish is Don 'Ki-hotay', isn't it? And 'Ki-hoti' is the Australianism anyway. So I think it should be 'Quick-sot' myself.

(Speaks indistinctly)

I think it's more correct.

MAN 4

If the excuse for saying anything other than Don 'Quick-sot' is that we're using the correct Spanish, then we're not, as Benita points out. And I get a feel… if I feel odd saying Don 'Ki-hoti' I'd going to feel much odder saying Don 'Ki-hotey', you know, or trying to get close, which I can't do.

MAN 2

It's really the extent of anglicisation that we use that's at issue, and our firm feeling, I think, up to now, is that the anglicising should be fairly thorough. There has been some doubt about whether it should be less thorough when we're referring to the musical work than it is when we're referring to…MAN 5But there's several musical works. There's a ballet, there's an opera by Massenet, there's the tone poem by Strauss, there's songs by Ibert, I think. And each one is different. I think anglicise the lot.

MAN 2

Put Spanish in one…

MAN 6

Yes, well, then there's the book itself. What do you… How do you refer to that?

MAN 5

Well, I would've thought 'Don Quick-sot' because it's been like that for hundreds of years.

MAN 2

Always has been. ?Quick-sot?, for the book itself.

WOMAN

Yes, yes.

MAN 6

Has it?

MAN 2

Yes, I think so. It looks as if we stick to our card. The card, in fact, says 'Don Quick-sot'. Though it has got a note on, which I presume you'd like left — that, during interviews, the ABC should adopt the pronunciation used by the interviewee. This is our normal habit, of course. But perhaps there'd be a special reason to have it on the card for this one word.