Swish

[shirei_shibolim]

Since it's coming up, I'd like to make a quick PSA:

It's pronounced Tu Bishvat. Not B'Shvat, or anything like that. Bishvat.

Comments

[margavriel]

Im kvar prescriptive, then "tu vishvat" or "tu vishvot".

If not, then just be descriptive.

[shirei_shibolim]

I tend to be prescriptive within the bounds of a language's contemporary behavior. Vernacular Hebrew does not feature a consonantal softening across word breaks except in phrases borrowed from earlier dialects. I see no profit in attempting to rewrite a dialect.

[margavriel]

"I see no profit in attempting to rewrite a dialect."

Isn't that exactly what you're doing each year, when you post this PSA?

[shirei_shibolim]

The difference is that the conversion of two initial sheva'in into a hiriq and a sheva is a feature of modern vernacular Hebrew. People don't say לְלְמוד, they say לִלְמוד. I'm merely correcting usage by following the forms of the dialect.

[lipman_]

Bid-yuk! Aval gam biNtanya?

[shirei_shibolim]

Well, no. I'm not sure how I feel about the Israeli tendency to treat proper names as somehow separate from the rest of the language. I'd be happy to see people pronounce גרתי בבלטימור as garti bevaltimor, but I know when to pick my battles.

[lipman_]

Or gartI vvaltimOr with a "shortened" chirek? (Not that I believe in the long vs short chirek.)

But I think it's not davke about proper names vs generic nouns, but that the i in lil- infinitives is morphologised, not an automatic phonemic thing.

[shirei_shibolim]

I disagree. It's an infinitive construct, and without the prefix it exists as לְמוֹד. Or if you like, בְ + שְבִיל = בִשְבִל.

[lipman_]

Nice example for what I say,: bishvil is a lexicalised phaenomenon, not even on the level of morphology anymore.

Out of very formal speeches, native speakers say "Notnim shem le-dvarim kaele", not "lidvarim".

BTW, I don't like the form tu beshvat either.

[lipman_]

Or, to use your won example, "I efshar la-lekhet be-shvil kaze," not "bishvil".

[margavriel]

or gartI vvaltimOr with a "shortened" chirek? (Not that I believe in the long vs short chirek.)

"gartI": ultimate stress? why?

"v(ə)valtimOr" would be no dialect of Hebrew known to me, certainly not massoretic. When two beisn follow in a row at the beginning of a word, with shva in between, the first one is WITHOUT EXCEPTION hard, even after a final vowel. This is even true for BEIS + PEI (ואכבדה בְּפַרְעֹה), though there may be some exceptions with the pei thing.

[margavriel]

שבט (however you want to pronounce it) isn't a proper name?!

[shirei_shibolim]

I never said it was consistent.

Hey, if you want to pronounce it as an initial sheva you're free to do so.

[margavriel]

No -- just like Lipman and you, I don't like the form bäshvat. I'm just trying to get you to figure out whether you're trying to be prescriptive or descriptive in this thread. And indeed, the answer seems to be that you're trying to be prescriptive -- yet according to what prescriptive set of rules?

[shirei_shibolim]

How about this: I'm being prescriptive, but only to the extent that I think any sizable population will listen.

[margavriel]

לִלְמוֹד versus לְלְמוֹד isn't a great proof, since the two would be pronounced almost identically (and, depending on the particular speaker, sometimes completely identically) -- /lilmód/ vs. /ləlmód/.

And anyway, with the infinitive, it's not really on the productive phonological level anymore, rather a morphological thing.