Named daughter Saoirse - Seer- sha

[Kira22]

Wrote post earlier but had spelling errors! I put cha instead of sha. Many of you pointed this (quite rightly out) as being different sounds- I'd realised as soon as I wrote it I had got S and C muddled (I am dyslexic) but wasn't in time enough to edit. MNHQ kindly took original post down. Just spent awhile going through it and somehow lost entire original post, DOH!

In short, daughter is called Saoirse - named after the girl in the film Song of the Sea www.imdb.com/title/tt1865505/ We fell in love with the name, we pronounce it Seer-sha - the Irish people in the film also say it this way.

I know the actress, Saoirse Ronan (who I actually don't know at all/never seen her films/just get informed alot about her when I say my daughters name!) pronounces her name SUR-sha. She says herself Seer-sha is also another, very common way. Different accents, regions and all that jazz.

An older couple today were basically telling me I was saying my own daughters name wrong today and that they had Irish in their family and it is Sur- sha. Even when I said yes my dad's side are Irish (not that is blooming matters) they wouldn't have it - the woman even said how are you spelling it so I spelt 'Saoirse' and she said 'when you said her name (Seer-sha) I wouldn't have known her name was Saoirse unless you had spelt it for me because it is pronounced 'Sur-sha'

Am just amazed sometimes people ask her name I say it is 'Seer- sha' and they say 'Ohhh, SUR- sha' with huge emphasis on Sur. When someone tells me their name/ their childs name I make a huge effort to say it how they say it, because, well, that is their name!

I wasn't going to repost but many of you kindly had taken time to write replies before, so felt I should

Sorry @PuddingAunt. I just re-read your comment over a cup of coffee and I see I didn't answer you properly the first time.

It is hard to get native speaker recordings of all the names. Teanglann.ie doesn't do names unless they're words as well. You don't have to be a native Irish speaker to record on forvo.com, though I think many are.

But you are right about the indeterminate vowel and that is what I was trying to convey (quite ineptly). My main point was that names like Saoirse, Caoimhe etc do not end in a strong aah sound...as in Baa. I often hear people saying their name is Ee-faa or whatever and there's quite a bit of emphasis on the second vowel sound. This probably happens to a greater extent outside Ireland, but it happens within Ireland too. Anyway, it's not how the sames are said in Irish...the last vowel is unstressed, a schwa. That is the point I was trying to convey, but probably shouldn't have written as 'eh' to make the point. It's hard without ipa.

I tried to compare the sound to the sounds you get at the end of Anna or Diana or Clara to emphasise the difference, but I really messed up as I wrote Ciara not Clara! This was a typo, but was totally confusing. I didn't even see it until I re-read it again just now! So sorry for that confusion, mea culpa. I might see if Mumsnet will remove that post for me altogether.

@PuddingAunt

https://forvo.com/word/caoimhe/

https://forvo.com/word/aoife/

As I said, pronunciations on forvo may not all be from native speakers though I think many are. The last Irish pronunciation of Aoife sounds a bit different to my ear. I don't usually hear it said like that. I'm not a native speaker myself unfortunately.

@TwirlBar Maybe like Paula (unless I've been saying that wrong my whole life 😅)? Paw-luh not Paw-laaah. Seer-shuh not Seer-shaaah.

Not anglicised at all, this is a gaelic medium class where pupils take history exams in Scottish Gaelic.

This is in a Gaelic medium class ^^ typo

Absolutely love that film.

Okay, but do you mean it's the name of a person in the class? Because a person's name may not be translated.

We have Gaelscoileanna here...Irish medium schools. Some of them do translate the children's names to the Irish version, but many don't. So Michael can stay as Michael and not be called Micheál for example.

This is from a Scottish person

https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/lg-dic/54507.mp3

Thanks @twirlbar ! I couldn't link it....a very handy site.

That last one of Aoife sounds like the fellow adores her and is dreaming of her lol😍

Maybe that's it !😂😂

Sorcha is a very old established name and I sometimes wonder if Soirche was also used. ie that there may be families where it was passed down, with the meaning, and without a high standard of Irish spelling. And to learner / Anglophone ears Soirche does sound like Sor-sha.
Equally it might just be that even in Ireland people seem to have a hard time saying ch these days.

Thanks for your reply @TwirlBar and several others too, realise venom was the wrong word I guess, my bad. Underlying dislike? - I don't know just felt it with some comments where English was concerned that being English isn't very popular lol, - It is probably a chip on my shoulder/overreaction and also I could well have imagined it! I am not on any social media , i did have face book about (8 years ago) so I guess I am just not used to this kind of thing. Aw don't worry am not upset and you aren't blind :) Am glad I posted and I really appreciate everyone's comments and I have learnt things I didn't know too. My little girl loves her name and I do too. Bright blessing to you all

The English were historically unpopular in a few places around the world. You say you know irish history already, so I won't attempt to educate you any further on that. But nobody should actively dislike English individuals now for something well back in history. If that's what you've experienced on here (although I haven't seen it myself - admittedly I haven't read every post though), that's just awful 😔

Aw thanks for message, Oh my gosh yes, totally I am eye wateringly aware of what the English have done and do all around the world throughout history and currently still are doing things I do not agree with whatsoever - there are no words that can convey how much I hate our history. Rotten to the core.

I think as I say I maybe read into to comments and that they were not meant in the ways I conjured in my head- as I say I think it is probably the weight of having such a shit history and I never asked to be English, same the world over for us all.

Honestly not to worry at all, no one has directly had a go at me/English I guess it is just how you imagine a 'tone' someone might have when they write the post you know? This is the problem when you can't hear what is said - it is easy to read things how they were not intended... I hope that makes sense, my brain isn't working too well today, haha

This is along the lines of what I was meaning about the word ‘ freedom’ in my recent other post. As I say I had looked at the history of the name Saoirse before calling her it, and I get why people are not keen in that sense, totally not why I named her it.

For me, I personally love the word freedom and all it stands for. It is something not enough/very few people in the world have, some lack freedom much, much more than others.

My friend sent me this photo today she took it when she was out. I think it is a very relevant word/ name for so many reasons in the world today.

For me it sounds much more beautiful in Irish. When I look at my little girl, her innocence, her beauty, her sense of delight and wonder for this world I think to myself ‘for now you are free little one, long May it last’ she makes me feel free even in a world that I often feel suffocated by …. She is my little wild flower and the name suits her so much. When she was born there was no doubt in my mind when she looked at me that was her name.

I hope (yes I am a hippy) one day we can all be free and live our lives how they are meant to be lived, full of love, happiness and respect for one another ….. I mean in a reality somewhere that is happening right!? Sorry for the gibber, guess the photo got me thinking … cue Bert Bacharach …. ‘what the world needs me is love, sweet love, it’s the only thing that there’s just too little of’ hahaha

https://learngaelic.scot/sounds/ao.jsp

This is how Scots Gaelic native speakers say ao.
It is a little different to Irish ao.
I think it's impossible to write this sound down: you have to listen to it.

https://learngaelic.scot/dictionary/index.jsp?abairt=saoirse&slang=both&wholeword=false
And this is an example of Scots Gaelic saying the word "saoirse".

Sorry, only getting back to the thread now.
Thank you very much for your posts@Kira22. I'm really glad your little girl loves her name. Saoirse is so lovely and don't let that couple get to you.

Thanks for the links @PuddingAunt, they're interesting. I had actually thought the Scottish Gaelic equivalent of saoirse was saorsa, simply because there was a thread on it last year, but I don't really know. This was a link included in that thread.
https://learngaelic.scot/dictionary/index.jsp?abairt=saorsa&slang=both&wholeword=false

@PuddingAunt I suppose it's just down to dialectal differences though.

I was hoping @librathroughandthrough could comment because I think they said Saoirse was pronounced Sore-sha in Gaelic medium classes. Could have meant Sorcha though.

Yeah, I thought she meant Sorcha at the time but I'm not completely sure now 🤔
I replied to her as if it were Sorcha we were talking about and she didn't correct my spelling or anything though.
Saorsa is said differently so I guess it depends on the area too.

This thread has made me think of this video. Keep in mind she'll be facing having her name spelt wrong in Starbucks for life

m.youtube.com/watch?v=aVaHvRLlHr0

I'm Irish and would pronounce it Seer-sha

Both pronunciations are fine. They say it as Sursha and Sairsha and Seersha in the movie. It’s a regional accent thing. Everyone in the forum saying it’s only one way doesn’t understand how language works.