Of course, irony being what it is, people will now flag the Alicorn—MIT reference as nonfictional, and be referring to Alicorn’s MIT example for the rest of LW history :)
Attempting to analyze my own stupidity, I suspect my confusion came from (1) both Alicorn and Yvain being both high-karma contributors and (2) Alicorn’s handle coming more readily to mind, both because (a) I interacted more with her and (b) the pronunciation of “Alicorn” being more obvious than that of “Yvain”.
In other words, I have no evidence that this was anything other than an ordinary mistake.
I’ve been imagining “Yvain” to be pronounced “ee-vane”. I’d be interested in hearing a correction straight from the ee-vane’s mouth if this is not right, though ;) I’ve heard people mispronounce “Alicorn” on multiple occasions.
No, it’s not a real name (as far as I know). It’s a real word. It means a unicorn’s horn, although there are some modern misuses mostly spearheaded by Piers Anthony (gag hack cough).
I’ve been saying “al-eh-corn” in my mental consciousness. Also “ee-vane”, which suggests my problem being less “Yvain is hard to pronounce” than “Yvain doesn’t look like the English I grew up speaking”.
Incidentally, I can’t remember how to pronounce Eliezer. I saw him say it at the beginning of a Bloggingheads video and it was completely different from my naive reading.
“Alicorn” is pronounced just like “unicorn”, except that the “yoon” is replaced with “al” as in “Albert” or “Alabama”. So the I is an “ih”, not an “eh”, but you can get away with an undifferentiated schwa.
That was me.
Of course, irony being what it is, people will now flag the Alicorn—MIT reference as nonfictional, and be referring to Alicorn’s MIT example for the rest of LW history :)
Attempting to analyze my own stupidity, I suspect my confusion came from (1) both Alicorn and Yvain being both high-karma contributors and (2) Alicorn’s handle coming more readily to mind, both because (a) I interacted more with her and (b) the pronunciation of “Alicorn” being more obvious than that of “Yvain”.
In other words, I have no evidence that this was anything other than an ordinary mistake.
I’ve been imagining “Yvain” to be pronounced “ee-vane”. I’d be interested in hearing a correction straight from the ee-vane’s mouth if this is not right, though ;) I’ve heard people mispronounce “Alicorn” on multiple occasions.
You mean Alicorn is a real name? I had assumed a combination of Alison and Unicorn, with symbolic implications beyond my ken.
“Ye-vane” here, with the caveat that I was quite confident that it was way off.
No, it’s not a real name (as far as I know). It’s a real word. It means a unicorn’s horn, although there are some modern misuses mostly spearheaded by Piers Anthony (gag hack cough).
Ahh. And I’ve been going about calling them well, unicorn horns all these years!
I’ve been saying “al-eh-corn” in my mental consciousness. Also “ee-vane”, which suggests my problem being less “Yvain is hard to pronounce” than “Yvain doesn’t look like the English I grew up speaking”.
Incidentally, I can’t remember how to pronounce Eliezer. I saw him say it at the beginning of a Bloggingheads video and it was completely different from my naive reading.
“Alicorn” is pronounced just like “unicorn”, except that the “yoon” is replaced with “al” as in “Albert” or “Alabama”. So the I is an “ih”, not an “eh”, but you can get away with an undifferentiated schwa.
Thanks!
(I think that’s how I was saying it, actually—I wasn’t sure how to write the second syllable.)
ell-ee-EZZ-er (is how I hear it).