Sunday 7 February 2010

How Brits say "Barack Obama"

I have often wondered about my fellow Brits' tendency to call Barack Obama "Barruck" with the stress on the first syllable when the correct pronunciation seems to be something like "BurrOCK" with the stress on the second syllable. Over on Separated by a Common Language, Lynne Murphy has a characteristically excellent post on the topic, including a nice quotation from Mock the Week about "Barrack Obama". One thing that Lynne does not mention is that the British pronunciation enables Vic and Bob to do their little Barack Obama ditties: