Dear dreh, Dear dreh, Dear dreh

[Toomanythalias]

Following on from the Call the Midwife thread. Jeeze it's not difficult to pronounce Deirdre correctly, but so many English people continue to insult our beautiful old Irish name with that ghastly Coronation Street pronunciation. It's Dear dreh, folks, not DEEER DREEE.

😂

Scot here.

I don’t think I have actually met anyone called Deirdre in real life, so I’m afraid my frame of reference is Deirdre Barlow.

But YANBU. I have people butchering Scottish names too. Especially Scottish people butchering Scottish names.

I'm not sure about that though, there are so many names in the UK that have come from elsewhere and subsequently have an Anglicised version, no-one complains that we're not pronouncing Helen in the ancient Greek way.

And whilst I agree, it's a much nicer and softer name in the original Gaelic I don't think you can take too much umbrage at the Anglicised version. It's been around a while.

See it as an homage rather than an insult.

If you are a Deirdre who uses the typical Irish pronunciation and someone pronounces it incorrectly, you just correct them surely?

And the same if you use the English pronunciation.

The name has Irish origin but it doesn’t mean it’s pronunciation can’t evolve when used in other languages.

Having said that, when meeting an Irish Deirdre, I do know exactly how to pronounce it!

I disagree. If you appropriate a name from a different country or culture at least bloody pronounce it correctly.

Ha! This the country where where Ibiza is normally pronounced as Aibiza, Lanzarote as Lanzarotti, and Tenerife as Tenereef, where Beaulieu is pronounced bewley by the most upmarket locals even when trying to give directions to French tourists, and where chorizo is pronounced as treesay. Your expectations are a bit unrealistic, OP.

where Beaulieu is pronounced bewley
@CoalTit how are you supposed to pronounce it?

But that is how Beaulieu the place in Hampshire is pronounced. It's obviously not the French way but to be honest you'd look a bit of a twat saying it the French way!

How are we pronouncing the "dreh" part?
Like dress without the ss? Or drum without the m?

More drum without the m!

Sorry but pronunciation varies and I don't think it's a problem. No one gets upset that people in Yorkshire and Lancashire are unable to pronounce names ending in an "ee" sound. It's just accepted that Lilly or Poppy, for example, become Lill-eh and Popp-eh.

I agree with the meat of your post, but I am from Yorkshire and say ee rather than eh.

So I think we can all learn that it behoves none of us well to make assumptions based on geography!

That would be Deirdra, which is a different name.

Ohh, you might be right. I had Deidre in my head...

Anyhoo, my point remains.

I have. I was in school with a Deirdre of Scottish descent and she pronounced as the OP would like and always corrected those who pronounced it Deirdree. Don’t know where we got the Deirdree pronunciation from as it was years before the Corrie character. It was over 50 years ago and I’ve not met another Deirdre since!

Surely the owner of the name gets to decide how it is pronounced for them? And it is usual for names that occur in many cultures to be pronounced differently by those cultures - there are even names that are completely different eg John has many variations Inc Sean and my father's country a completely different version.

In 4 weddings and a funeral Tom marries second cousin Deirdre and he pronounces it in the Irish way.

No offence OP but no one in England can pronounce my name in the U.K. - because it’s French!

I could also start a thread whinging ‘why can’t anyone say it properly’? But that would be me basically forcing a group of people to conform (to more precisely roll their rrrrrrs).

I keep in mind that if they were to go to my home country, most wouldn’t be able to pronounce their English names.

It’s all even Stevens, hills to die on, battles to pick 🤷‍♀️

I went to school with 2 girls who both pronounced their names like that.

Hi from Ireland. 😀

Neither of those pronunciations sound in any way Irish, in any of our many many accents. I think they are both saying it wrong!

Séan is the much more familiar spelling and it's usually pronounced Shaw-n

It's pretty bad both ways tbh. So... dreary

It’s just like Dylan becomes Dillon and Rhys becomes Reece in England.

I roll my rrrs brilliantly!

What be your name?

A friend of mine is called Deirdre (pronounced Dear-dra - the Irish c̸o̸r̸r̸e̸c̸t̸ way) and has always hated the widespread mispronunciation in the UK of her lovely name. She always preferred Dee growing up and was only ever called her full name in school or if in trouble!!
When she moved over here she just asked to be called Dee, so it’s only at bank, doctors etc that she encounters any issues. Her main bugbear is that if she’s meeting someone initially or on the phone, she gives her full name, if necessary she also spells it and then people say “oh Deer-dreeee!” She politely corrects them, but they STILL carry on!

It’s just ignorance.

Unable to pronounce? GTF! And it's Manchester where the (appalling) -eh ending is prevalent. Go to Preston or Blackburn and it's Lill-ee all the way.

(I need to lie in a darkened room at the suggestion that we sound like Mancs 😂)