Stan, Thy Name Is Ston

How are we, as Americans, to proceed with the modern security threats from Pakistan and Afghanistan? is a question I hope our elected officials continue to put lots of thought towards. Our relatively blessed Turdlog readers can help their faithful 'Dlogger with a simpler question: How do we, as Americans, pronounce Afghanistan and Pakistan?

President Obama does what most NPR correspondents do: pronounce Afghanistan with three short A's (as in cat) and a schwa for the I; then pronounce Pakistan with two long A's (as in taco) and a long E (as in sleek) for the I.

In general I am a fan of the way Obama et al. pronounce Pakistan, and I use the same techniques for Iran and Iraq (sleek tacos). My Iranian-American friend does so, too. In general, non-Germanic languages don't feature the schwa and short vowels sounds that we use, and because these sound lazy (as in uhhhhhhh and yeaaaaah) it seems a little disrespectful to pronounce non-Germanic country names with them. The mother of this phenomenon was Wolf Blitzer suggesting we pronounce Qatar as cutter a few years back. He interviewed quite a few Qataris to determine how they pronounce the place. (Classy move on one level, but on another level asking them this as we move the troops in to fight Iraq is a bit like asking a prostitute what you can call her, mid-thrust.) And they respond with a mellifluous Qatar, there being no real way to pronounce it in English without using a Qatari accent, so its pronunciation necessitates a transformation by Americans. Blitzer then decides to schwa all over the place and hold up a pair of hedge trimmers to remind us all that it's cutter. Ridiculous. The Turdlog ridicules it.

But so that all brings me back to the rub: Afghanistan. I cannot taco that name. Perhaps the stan part but Ahf-ghahn-ee goes against years of curling up in Mama's knittings, as well as what every American says, which crowd-control-level effects would totally paint the Ahf-ghahn-ee-stahn sayer as obtusely P.C.-slash-America-hating.

But for now it seems better to sound inconsistent, and gratingly so, as frequently as Pakistan and Afghanistan are mentioned in the same sentence. I suppose it comes down to priorities.