Friday, October 20, 2017

How Locals Pronounce Some Street Names in New Orleans

No shit, dear readers. One of the reliable markers distinguishing long-term New Orleanians from others is how we pronounce local streets and neighborhoods.  Here's a sample:

Tremé - Tre-may.

Marigny - Mar-in-yee

Calliope - Cal-ee-ope. 

Melpomene - Mel-po-meen. This street is now Dr. Martin L. King Boulevard.

Therpiscore - Ter-pis-core.

Clio - C. L. Ten.

Erato - Ee-rat-oh

Urania - You-rain-e-ya

Thalia - Thal-ya.

Carondelet - Ca-ron-de-let.

Euterpe - You-terp

Iberville - Eye-ber-vill

Bienville - Bee-en-vill

Charters - Char-ters

Conti - Kawn-tie

Dauphine - Daw-feen

Kerlerec - Ker-ler-ek

Thoupitoulas - Chop-a-tou-las

Classical scholars may roll over in their graves; but these pronunciations are the modal ones actually used by Orleanians. Sometimes it is due to the peculiarities of the languages originally used by different ethnic groups; sometimes it's to be funny; and some is due to sheer perversity. C. L. Ten, indeed!


5 comments:

Bilbo said...

C. L. Ten reminds me of the error code often cited by help desk techs to refer to the root cause of a computer problem - I.D. Ten T, or "idiot."

Mike said...

When a new news person comes to St. Louis there are a whole bunch of street names they have to learn to pronounce the St. Louis way.

Jono said...

No wonder they are so hard to understand.

Cloudia said...

Local Usage RULES! Thanks for these, Angel.
Warmly, Cloudia Charters - Char-ters

Big Sky Heidi said...

Charters is not pronounced like the French city?