Talk:Arkansas

Wikipedia says "Citizens of the state of Kansas often pronounce the Arkansas River as ɑrˈkænzəs ˈrɪvər, in a manner similar to the common pronunciation of the name of their state." - -sche (discuss) 22:33, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

Pronunciation defined by Arkansas Legislature

The Arkansas Code of 1987, Title 1 Chapter 4, Section 1-4-105, defines the pronunciation as follows (emphasis added):

Be it therefore resolved by both houses of the General Assembly, that the only true pronunciation of the name of the state, in the opinion of this body, is that received by the French from the native Indians and committed to writing in the French word representing the sound. It should be pronounced in three (3) syllables, with the final "s" silent, the "a" in each syllable with the Italian sound, and the accent on the first and last syllables. The pronunciation with the accent on the second syllable with the sound of "a" in "man" and the sounding of the terminal "s" is an innovation to be discouraged.

Note two things:

• The vowel is the "a" sound found in Italian [a], which is used in some dialects of English, but is not the pronunciation [ɑ] used in most American English (specificially Southern AE)
• That vowel is used for all three syllables
• They didn't specify whether the "r" was pronounced or silent

In other words, the Arkansas Legislature's suggested pronunciation is /ˈa(ɹ).kanˌsa/ (AHR-kahn-sah). That's quite different from the way that Arkansans normally pronounce it. -- ABehrens (talk) 03:00, 28 July 2024 (UTC)