How Will We Address The First Female President? (1 Viewer)

[rockaction]

I just want to give you guys heads up on an issue and thoughtpieces that will be coming down the pike when Kamala Harris wins in '24. Will she be Mrs. President? Ms.? Miss? What will her feminist bona fides look like? Will she insist on Ms. from the '70, Mrs. for traditional concerns, whatever will she do? Will she insist on being called "Mr." like everyone before her? Will she don a Charlie Chaplin hit and wear a little Hitler mustache to go with it?

What, I ask? Tell me before the thinkpieces start tumbling down from every corner of the feminist landscape and our national nightmare begins.

 

[Sea Duck]

Madam President.

And she won't win in 2024.

 

[Quint]

Your Majesty? 

 

[rockaction]

Madam President.

And she won't win in 2024.

No way do they name her after a television show with Tea Leoni.

 

[Steve Tasker]

I don't know.  Maybe ask her how she wants to be addressed?

 

[Don Quixote]

Madam President is right. Just like how Pelosi is referred to as Madam Speaker, and Kamala Harris is being referred to Madam Vice President-Elect.

 

[NorvilleBarnes]

Comrade.

 

[rockaction]

I don't know.  Maybe ask her how she wants to be addressed?

Madam President is right. Just like how Pelosi is referred to as Madam Speaker, and Kamala Harris is being referred to Madam Vice President-Elect.

You guys are spot on here, but you're not taking the opportunity to rip hand-wringing thoughtpieces about issues of such importance. I personally loved the kerfuffle over how to pronounce her name. I still don't know where the emphasis goes on each syllable.

 

[SoBeDad]

You guys are spot on here, but you're not taking the opportunity to rip hand-wringing thoughtpieces about issues of such importance. I personally loved the kerfuffle over how to pronounce her name. I still don't know where the emphasis goes on each syllable.

An academic breakdown of how to pronounce Kamala and whether it's racist, from a linguist: https://theconversation.com/its-comma-la-insisting-on-mispronouncing-kamala-harriss-name-is-racist-144523

I've mispronounced many student names - primarily "black" names - but I usually say sorry, not whatever. Hispanic Spanish names are almost always phonetic with defined accent rules, or accent symbols, so you have to try harder to be racist in Latin American. 

On ebay, you can buy a Newsweek Madam President, November 2016 edition, for $189 in mint condition, only $19.99 pre-owned.

 

[rockaction]

An academic breakdown of how to pronounce Kamala and whether it's racist, from a linguist: https://theconversation.com/its-comma-la-insisting-on-mispronouncing-kamala-harriss-name-is-racist-144523

I've mispronounced many student names - primarily "black" names - but I usually say sorry, not whatever. Hispanic Spanish names are almost always phonetic with defined accent rules, or accent symbols, so you have to try harder to be racist in Latin American. 

On ebay, you can buy a Newsweek Madam President, November 2016 edition, for $189 in mint condition, only $19.99 pre-owned.

That's tons to grow on. I hope the beanstalk doesn't hit your head while you're in the academic clouds.

Good to know about the Newsweek magazine. I'll hang it on my wall and think of her gentle laughter raining down on me like soft precipitation in June. 

 

[Roy L Fewks]

Potus With The Mostest

 

[IvanKaramazov]

You guys are spot on here, but you're not taking the opportunity to rip hand-wringing thoughtpieces about issues of such importance. I personally loved the kerfuffle over how to pronounce her name. I still don't know where the emphasis goes on each syllable.

I'm a serial mispronouncer -- I'm not sure I'll ever be able to stop saying it as kah-MALL-uh.  I also know exactly what the problem is in my case -- I read a lot, but I very rarely watch anything news-related on television, YouTube, or any other media format where I would exposed to other people pronouncing Harris's name out loud.  So for the past however-many-years that she's been in public life, I've always been left to my own inner voice when I "say" her name mentally in written contexts like this one.  And unfortunately kah-MALL-uh is pretty much frozen in amber at this point.

This isn't an isolated thing for me.  When I have to speak in front of an audience, I often find myself having to look up the pronunciation of words that I use in writing all the time.  I've also just removed some words from my spoken vocabulary because the correct pronunciation is so violently "wrong" to my own ears that it makes me uncomfortable to say them out loud.  "Bona fides" is a good example of one of those.

Anyway, in the very rare instances when I find myself discussing the VP-elect, I always just go with "Harris."  I can't screw that one up.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

Edit: PG-13 joke in a PG forum.

 

[The Z Machine]

Bona fides

How is this pronounced in your head?

 

[IvanKaramazov]

How is this pronounced in your head?

first word rhymes with Donna.  Second word rhymes with "rides."  I know that's wrong but I'm too old to do anything about it.

 

[AAABatteries]

Mrs. Obama?

 

[lardonastick]

Bona Feedays