people pronouncing my baby's name the way I dont

[SophieJoe2014]

I have called my dd elle (ellie) but everyone calls her el
I understand that in English it spells el but if you look up how to pronouce elle it comes up with el or ellie
it's making me feel like I have done it wrong people will judge me for it.
has anyone been in the same situation or have any advice?

There is no way people will see Elle and pronounce Ellie.

Of meet Ellie and know to write it Elle.

It'll be a total pain for her to correct all the time

I would pronounce it Ellie.

But then eveyone on MN says I pronounce my DSs name wrong, so what do I know.

Is Ellie an accepted pronunciation for Elle?

I'm going to put my neck on the line and say no.

I know some people like "creative" spellings, and some people think an E at the end of a name = an "ee" sound (like a boy called Alfe pronounced "Alfie") but... no. It's wrong. It goes against all linguistic conventions I can think of in the English language. And it looks illiterate.

Sorry OP, but I think you should change it to the accepted spelling.

This is what happens when everyone tries to be 'different'
Nobody can spell or pronounce anyone's name.

god help teachers.

I once knew a woman who insisted we pronounce her name (Siobhan) SHOW-bin. We all went along with it because we were polite, but were all very

You're pronouncing your baby's name incorrectly. Everyone else is right. Ellie is not a legitimate variation in the way it's prononced it's an ignorant one.

Your poor daughter

Please don't be stubborn and leave her with a wonky name.

To add to the Sians upthread, I was at school with a Sian pronounced Cyan.

Hi there Cyanide if you're reading this.

it's not ignorant at all
100% of these replys don't all say it's wrong. it is not 'wrong', it's just a very uncommon way of pronouncing it.
my partner grew up in new York and that is where it came from for the people who asked.
I feel some people have been massively unfair towards me on this post but then allot of people are very narrow minded.
I posted this originally to see how others saw it and not to be badgered.

Elle is a lovely name, but it is in 99% of cases pronounced 'El'.
Ellie is also very nice.
If you want her to be known as Ellie, you need to do one of two things:

A) swallow your pride and your annoyance - people who pronounce it 'El' are not wrong, they are just saying it as it is read. Just say when you introduce her 'we call her Ellie'. When she is older, she may prefer the 'El' pronunciation, and if you had called her Ellie, 'El' is a pretty usual nickname that she may have ended up with anyway!

B) Change her name now, officially, to 'Ellie'. No more problem. Or if you hate the letter i for some reason, Ellee would make it clearer.

If you feel badgered now imagine how poor 'No it's Ellie not El' will feel after 10/20/30 years of constantly explaining her name to people.

OK OP, well the problem you have is that in the UK, most people will pronouce it El because of the "that's how the word is pronouced in French and most people have been taught the word for 'she' in French" issue.

If you want to call your DD Ellie, put an 'i' in. It's actually no longer about you, you aren't the one who's going to be trying to explain her parents were from New York/didn't speak French, you aren't the one who'll be calling up call centres and colleagues to explain she's not going to get that email because they've spelt it 'Ellie'. You aren't the one who's going to deal with this.

Ellie is a sweet name, if that's what you want to call your DD, that's fine. Just give her that name then.

Add the 'i' to the official spelling, or accept you've given your DD the name "El" but are trying to call her "Ellie" and that will cause niggles for you for a few years, and her for 80+ years.

(And please don't be offended if she changes it when she's older)

I agree that over here this is going to be a problem now. whole reason I posted this was to see how bad it was going to be.
I dint feel I deserved some of the comments but hey thick skin and all that.
so on a serious note, how easy/difficult is it to get a name change?

It's not 100% wrong but your pronunciation is not the norm by a long chalk so you need to accept that anyone reading it will pronounce it 'wrong' and you'll need to correct it. If you can live with this and your daughter can for the rest of her life then fine but you can't get cross about it.

last time I checked I was in the UK...

Not narrow minded, you asked for an opinion and you got one.
Considering most of the population study French at school and know Elle to be El. I would say like it or lump it.

it can be pronounced both ways actually, I came on here for advice not criticism.

This will be good.

I understand that 90% of people will say el.

And they are. So what's the issue?

You need to change it by deed poll I think.
I would pronounce both names as written as well.
They are totally different.

Your OP said it's making me feel like I have done it wrong people will judge me for it. has anyone been in the same situation or have any advice?

Where you find yourself is inevitable I'm afraid. Your options are change it or spend your life correcting people.

To be fair, I always have to spell my first name as there are 2 common spellings and my surname isn't that common so everybody assumes it is something else. Both perfectly traditional british names.

Once you leave the uk (and most people do these days) there are no rules.

The question is not how Elle is pronounced but how much of a bother it is to correct it.

Are you American living in the UK? Just interested.

Seriously though, you might need to toughen up if you take the gentle rubbing you got in here as a attack

so on a serious note, how easy/difficult is it to get a name change?

What part of the UK are you in?

Sorry, ribbing, not rubbing!

That's a whole other thread...

yes living in North East of the UK

Why did you spell it Elle if you know most people will pronounce it Ellie and then start complaining about it?

Shame, it would be easier in Scotland.

You'd probably need a deed poll.