Elia Meyer I was referring to the fact that it sounds like the Americans are adding extra letters in random places. What I typed out were phonetic representations of what I heard being said throughout the video. I mean, eye a fire player kadool? 0:41 Just... wtf.
Elia Meyer As i mentioned in my first comment, I'm Welsh. The reason it annoys me so much is because Americans in this situation seem unable to comprehend that there are different pronunciations of letters in the world. Perfect pronunciation? Nah that's too much to expect. But the way I look at it is this. Iceland is a nordic country right? Nordic languages share a root with german (even if people don't know that, surely they know of some similarities in the languages.) So let's break it down. Eyja. Well you could either think it was Ay or Eye, but you should know that Ja is yah (Fjord, the german word for yes etc) Fjalla, using what we just learned, you can assume its Fyah lah (which is slightly wrong, but not far off) and last Jokull. Again, remembering that pesky J, the worst you could do is Yokel. And yet they pronounce it as things like eyer fire player kadool (O.o) Surely any self respecting journalist or news presenter wouldn't want to make themselves look ridiculous on national Tv and at least TRY to find out how a foreign word is pronounced? You'd think so, but generally americans just steamroll ahead, assuming everything is as they think it is, and they are always right. They bend and mispronounce so many words that they have bastardised the entire english language, let alone any other they try to speak. So annoying! Edit: You assumed I was American? Even though I called Americans fucking retarded? Lol wut?
will ellerton The problem here is two-fold. First, you are making the generalization fallacy based on the pronunciation of a few journalists. Do you think they represent the totality of Americans? If so, by that logic I would be free to assume that making logical fallacies is something all Welsh people do, correct? Second, the sad fact of the matter is that I'm quite sure you'd make the same mistakes if your native language AND CULTURE were as far removed as English is from Icelandic. English might have a German root (more than 1000 years ago), but the connection for the pronunciation of words has long since ended. All that's left now is a few sounds for similar meaning but different words. But as for Icelandic and English? It is hard to find two languages further apart. And third, you are failing miserably to take into account GEOGRAPHICAL separation and how that affects culture, which in turn affects language awareness and understanding. The United States goes from one coast of an entire continent to the other, and is surrounded by nations that only speak English or Spanish (which itself is close enough to English to practically be a sub-language in comparison to the difference between English and Icelandic). Your nation is about 20,500 square kilometers, while the United States is almost TEN MILLION SQUARE KILOMETERS. When you can drive OVER FOUR THOUSAND KILOMETERS and still be in ONE country, with ONE language universally spoken almost everywhere, there are going to be some things you'll miss out on in terms of multiculturalism that you wouldn't in a nation in which you can walk across the span from one border to another in two or three days. (Wales by comparison is less than 150 kilometers wide). So many of you Europeans are completely in the dark about this reality and how it affects how someone views the world and what information is considered crucial to learn. For being so arrogant about their supposed cultural awareness, I do find this quite ironic that you would completely miss the reason Americans lack that awareness, and assume it's just that their "fucking retarded." If anything, your post proves that you aren't as smart as you think you are.
Actually, I'm basing my generalisation on the constant stream of American media, celebrities, and general people that I'm bombarded with daily. Also, your attempt at reversing said generalisation is weak at best. I'm making a generalisation that most Americans can't even speak English properly, let alone any other language. You trying to say that because I'm generalising, you can generalise that all welsh people make generalisations? Just.....stop. As for the rest of your egregious drivel, the size of a country should have nothing to do with multicultural awareness. The reason Americans fail at this sort of thing is because they're ignorant. Not because they're country is too big. My point is this....if you're a reporter, and you have to pronounce something difficult in another language, surely you learn how to pronounce it first right? And if said story develops into a global scenario, surely subsequent reporters would learn how to pronounce a word that is being used so much? Nah....that's not the American way. They just keep trying and failing, and eventually give up and just refer to eyjafjallajokull as "the volcano". There's no effort made. I'm well aware there are exceptions to every rule, and that there are some incredibly intelligent and multicultural Americans. But they really are the minority. Americans, in general, are ignorant, arrogant, crass, and rude. Why do you think most of the world has an unfavourable opinion of the country? Oh and again, I'm not basing this on "a few reporters", I'm basing it on the fact that every country I've travelled to seems to prefer people from anywhere except America. That anytime I've been on holiday, 99% of incidents, rudeness, lack of etiquette, or cultural misunderstanding has been because of an American, the fact that I know quite a few people in America, and that I have a lot of family in America, who emigrated after the war. Just answer this....why do Americans say things like eyerack, even though plenty of middle eastern people live in America, people who would pronounce it properly? Probably for the same reason that Americans pronounce every word borrowed from French in the wrong way. Get over yourself. Whatever your personal level of intelligence or cultural integrity, America is generally the cultural equivalent of a squashed potato.
Ok I can't pronounce it either, but the guy at 0:40 makes me laugh so hard every time! He seems to be so confident about his pronounciation. It had to be Eyjafjallajökull, didn't it? You have Katla and Hekla but noooo, it just had to be Eyjafjallajökull, just to make life difficult for news reporters. :DDD
lol i was like.. are they finally going to pronounce it right this time? Eye-A-Fyat-La-Jo... KUTL ???? The ending makes NO sense! Everything was right but the end. This isn't hard =Þ
What I could never get is why they didn't just call it "Island Mountain Glacier". That is basically the name. They don't have to bother pronouncing it, as it is just those three words together, except in icelandic. If somebody said Island Mountain Glacier, I would actually understand it as Eyjafjallajökull, as that translates LITERALLY as the same thing. They could have just called it that. But then again, english speaking countries, unlike Iceland, has most of their names of places and stuff being from such old words and pronunciation that it isn't understood as english words, but rather as somethings "name". So I guess they just didn't realize that they actually COULD translate this name, as although it uses old words, those old words are still used as modern ones, so it is really just a descriptive name, like most of the icelandic places names (f.ex. Reykjavík = Smokey(steamy)bay).
Yo-gut ?? I just spent a week in Iceland. She is dead wrong....The T-Shirt I purchased says, AY-uh-fyat-luh-YOE-kuutl-uh and the lady at the register did not pronounce it like her....what a goof.
nonono, Ey- as in hey with out the "H" Yah- as in sweadish yes Fyatla- that is right Jö- "Ö" is pronunced as "uh" as in "uhh I don't know" Gu- as jim carrei said good in bruce almigty with out "D" Ll- like making a klik sound by using "L" _Inga Icelandic
Now imagine you're trapped somewhere in Iceland and you need to tell emergency services where you are - ejaghal... - eeljajnklak.. - ejelaai Just let me die
@Iceland1944 I'm proud to be one of this minority. Because of this . . . I can pronounce Eyjafjallajökull fairly passably . . . after getting help on here from Icelanders
mam i am Dr Thomas Sanders....and i am sad to say,..your daughter has Eyjafjallajökull. she aint gonna make it................(mom) NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!
bc everyone is strugling i am an icelander and here is the translation :Eyjafjallajökull, Eyja=island, Fjalla=mountains, Jökull=glacier so basicly its Islandmountainglacier
The last part she says completely wrong. It isn't a "t" sound in "jökuLL" and it doesn't sound shit like yoghurt.. The words on the screen should say "eye-a-fyat-la-YUH-kutl" >_>
This is hillarious when you know they're wrong and know how to say Eyjafjallajökull xd it's nothing like yoghurt, not even like hey i forgot my yoghurt ( or something like that xd ) this is a great entertainment for us who can speak icelandic xd
og aðalkonan í myndbandinu gat ekki einu sinni borið þetta fram rétt jafnvel þótt orðið stæði fyrir framan hana !! hún sleppti L-inu í lokin, og sagði EyjafjallajökuT ! lúðar
