To think that children's names should be spelt roughly how they sound

[cleggy36]

There's a boy in my Cub pack who has a name which sounds like a very common boy's name but which has what I assume is a traditional Gaelic spelling. As a result it is more than twice as long as the more common spelling and has only the first letter in common. There is no possible way that anyone not familiar with the name could get even close to pronouncing it correctly. And it's not one I've ever come across before, such as Niamh, which is also tricksy, but slightly better known.

I just think that as a child life has enough challenges without being lumbered with a name which almost everybody is going to pronounce or spell completely incorrectly just to satisfy the parents cultural identity.

What do we think of "QT", as a play on "cutie" is that ok? Yes ladies I actually know a child with this name.

Yabu.

Do you live in middle England? I love the variety of names at my dcs school. Who wants to go back to the days when everyone was called John?

YABVU. We're not talking about bad spelling, we're talking about a name from another culture.

I don't know about BaggyCoconut, but I just bellow my name. I spell it out. Clearly. And sometimes slightly patronisingly.

Oh I also found out that an old schoolfriend had called her dd Jorja. Can't tell you how disappointed in her I was!

YABVU. Ridiculously, unreasonable, racistly unreasonable, so many kinds of unfucking reasonable.

(by the by, "Gaelic" is not the language of Ireland, its called Irish.)

Phoebe is pretty silly when you think about it. But it looks so good.

well - my DS's have "foreign" names - they are however (well 2 out of 3) written how they sound

And DS1's shortened name is a very well know nickname for a Welshman (not always a positive one - but in my defence when the name was chosen we were stll 5000 miles away from the UK). People STILL get them wrong.

My married name (which I'm keeping) always has poeple going

but my maiden name very standard English surname and I often had to spell that too.

"chooses to saddle the poor child with a name like a bad hand at Scrabble"
Well I admit sometimes I found it a bit of a pain in the neck that noone ever knew how to say my name but I don't think I was 'saddled' with it and I didn't regard myself as a 'poor child'. I think my name is pretty and although I was called it because my parents wanted us all to have traditional Irish names to reflect our culture and heritage, I don't think that makes much difference. Non Irish people should be just as free to give their children strong meaningful beautiful Irish names to. that 'poor child' will be no more or less 'saddled' than I was.

Yep, I think YABU

Interestingly, my married surname is an Old English name. It is not spelt phonetically at all, because as with a lot of Old English names, the spelling and pronunciation have become disconnected through time. English spelling was only standardised relatively recently in the grand scheme of things. It's not just Gaelic names in which traditional spelling does not reflect pronunciation. Perhaps I should suggest to DH that we change the spelling of our surname by deed poll?

YABU IMO

my DD is sian. should i have spelled her name as sharn just so it is spelled as it sounds?? no...? leave the boy alone he might like how his name is spelled/pronounced

I agree - which is why I couldn't give my dc an English name.

You see they just aren't spelt the way they are pronounced in Spanish.

My daughter's name is Elisa and we get so many different pronunciations of it. (its simple eh- lisa) Maybe different spellings have slightly different meanings too which is important to some people. Think it's nice to be different and origional but I kind of agree that some names nowdays are ridiculous!

YABU and ignorant. Basically, you are saying that English names are the only names acceptable, are you not?

Fwiw - I think Niamh is a beautiful name. Neve / Neave / Neev etc are ugly bastardisations.

Is it something like Sadhbh? I can understand why some people are baffled by that one.

Really you must know YABVU - why should the child's name be spelt any way other than the correct way just for you?!!

YABU. I have two scottish gaelic names. Because they cannot be pronounced correctly by english people does this mean I should live only in the Highlands? One of my names starts "mh" - "v" in gaelic. I'll only need to tell you once.

Irish spelling and Irish pronunciation were put together in completely different factories. That's just the way it is. And it pisses off outsiders, which is always a bonus.

Get over it.

Unless you're talking invented spellings like Jorja or Tray-c, in which case obv you are right to go after the parents with a blunderbuss.

I've got a very English name and English people can't even spell it right- I still get letters sent to me with extra T's, O's instead of E's, an E where there is ever an E....
Gah!

I know of a Niamh and her family pronounce in Ny Am ey (to rhyme with Miami)

I hate my name. It is welsh and is pronounced exactly how it is spelt. My friend has a PhD in phonetics and says that in the english language there should be no problem in pronunciation.

However I have to tell people time and again how to pronounce it and they still get it wrong. I get fed up in the end and don't bother to correct them.

I've had many people ask how it's spelt and then they say "Oh so it's xxxx then" as they pronounce it the wrong way. As if I don't know how to pronounce my own name.

I hate having to tell people my name.

I have a fairly 'common' name, but with a VERY uncommon spelling. I hated it as a child, especially as my surname also has an unusual spelling, so I frequently had to put up with awful mispronunciations from supply teachers etc, and I do have to spell both my names, all the time as an adult on the phone etc...BUT now that I'm an adult, I love the spelling of my name and the uniqueness of it. And YABVU if it's a gaelic spelling...the gaelic spelling will have been around long before the 'anglicised' version!

AlpinePony - one of your names wouldn't be Mhairi would it? Only asking as it's one of my auntie's names! (And a lovely name it is too!)

Yabu.

(Klara isn't a "trendy" spelling by the way. It could be because a parent is Polish, Russian, etc. etc.)

Loudlass -

Oooh purplefeet- angharad?!