Irish spellings for names

[SeanChailleach]

All these Irish spellings make me wonder, if you use an Irish spelling for your child's name, do you speak Irish? If not, do you hope to learn, and would you have your child learn?
Ar an lámh eile, má tá Gaeilge agat, agus thug tú ainm de Bhéarla, nó de theanga eile do do pháiste, cén fáth?
(Otoh, if you have Irish but gave your child a name from English or from some other language, why?)

And of course Devoré

Devoré is fabulous! They all sound like 1940s showgirls.

I will attempt to think of Siobhan pronounced Chiffonne as part of a girl band consisting of Chenille, Georgette, Satine and Devoré.

How should Siobhan be pronounced? It sounds like Chiffone in my accent! (SE England, Irish parents!)

Somewhere between ShivAUN and ShuvAUN. The first syllable is a schwa.

@TuesdayBluesday
forvo.com/word/siobh%c3%a1n/

Afaik the Shiv-awn pronunciation is better known - both in Ireland and worldwide - than the Shoo-awn pronunciation also used in this link. Both are correct though, they're just dialectal variants.

I am half English, half Irish, born in the states, but lived for a long time in NI. Now living in Merry Olde England.

My Irish language knowledge is crap! What I do know, I more or less taught myself, as I love languages, and wanted to learn.

We gave our dd a name of German origin, but well known worldwide. Ds has a name from the Irish part of my family. It is an anglicised old Irish name. I have never met anyone in my life with the old Irish spelling! So he has the anglicised version...although I think it was also the original version in Scotland... Anyway, the old Irish version would have felt wrong, especially as it is an old family name and they were always the anglicised version too.

Anyway, I would feel a bit strange maybe, using something like Blathnaid or Ciarán and insisting he be called kee-RAWN. Because I am not a native Irish speaker. I don't care if anyone else does this, but it wouldn't feel right to me.

My Irish parent speaks Irish almost fluently btw. I have no idea why they never thought I'd like to speak it too! But there you are. They love my DS name.

The only thing which annoys me a little bit, and it isn't a big thing or a rage or anything, just a "hmmm why?", is when names are touted as being Irish when they aren't. I blame baby name sites!

Thanks for clarification. I pronounce Chiffone and ShivAUN almost identically so maybe my London accent is really showing me up!

Op I’m Irish, married to a Gaeilgoir, living in the UK. Our kids have Irish names with Irish spellings (ones that according to mumsnet nobody will ever be able to manage). Ta coupla focal agum - which matter a lot to me, but I acknowledge my written irish and spelling/grammar are poor. We try to speak (non fluent) Irish at least one day a week.

I am also one of the posters that sometimes comments on anglicized names. I think I do so because it’s often not clear if posters are choosing something or if they are not aware and my experience as a non fluent speaker is that I wanted to know! People can choose, and do choose, whatever they want. But I do find it difficult that often it’s an acceptable response to say that 90% of the time that kids will “suffer” if their name isn’t traditionally English and easy to pronounce. It doesn’t align with my experience of working in a multidisciplinary field at all.

Professionally colleagues from all over the world - if they want to - simply include a tag line on their email signature or name badge that phonetically explains how to pronounce their name.

As someone with a very common name, I don’t see how it’s any more difficult than being one of four Xxx’s to respond when asked a question.

Irish names
Some Gaeilge in the home, kids at Gaelscoil.

I don't see the big deal. You don't have to be Irish to figure out that a bh is a v sound. As is an mh

It's fairly consistent isn't it?
Like Caoimhe, you can learn a few rules there that apply to other names.

aoi = ee
That works for Aoife. eefa

I don't speak Irish at all but I just notice where the same letters produce the same sound in different names so I can have a decent crack at pronouncing it.

My name is very English (I guess). Like say Claire Smith, along those lines. The sort of name that sounds like you'd have no problems with it ever but yet then, you might get Clare Smyth and that'd be right for somebody else but still contain two mistakes in an Easy English name.

So I don't think it's possible to have a name that everybody always gets right.

I don't get challenged on my English name! So I feel a bit brought up short (or something) when English people agonize over using an Irish name when they're not Irish.
I was going to use Paloma for my daughter right up until the last minute when I chose an English name.

I'm Irish, living in Dublin, LC level Irish. DD has an Irish name where the fada makes all the difference to the pronunciation. No fada, fada over the e or fada over the a are all different names. Recently had a hospital visit and their computer system doesn't allow any fadas so spent the entire visit correcting people.
Tbh I can't get worked up about people using/misspelling names when even our own national systems don't allow for correct Irish spellings.

@RubysArms, true! and funny. Lasairfhiona! Is there no biro with Lasairfhiona on it in Dealz? Can't believe it.

@31RooCambon I'm glad you find it easy to learn the Irish names. I hope you didn't think I was suggesting that anyone has to have any amount of Irish to spell their kids' names in Irish.
I was just wondering how much love there is for the language. Whether people would like to have Irish language nursery rhymes and lullabies, and posters with phrases on.
For parents who are giving their kids the Irish names as it's a part of their heritage, there are easy ways to pick up a hundred or so words, and why wouldn't you? Although my DD has an English name, I use a bunch of Irish phrases for the important stuff like "oíche mhaith a chuisle", and "go dtí tú slán".

@RubysArms I totally agree. I have a Cillian and I was put off Killian by people saying it wasn't authentic and not properly Irish etc, yet Ireland is full of Killians and it's a spelling that goes back centuries.
I hope my little Sillian doesn't hate me for it one day

I wouldn't think so.
It is amazing how the language comes back to when the DC start school in NI most of the Catholic DC have Irish names I learnt more of them living up there than years in the Republic.
I don't like the Irish name for Richard Risteárd a boy was bullied relentlessly for his name.

@Drunkenmonkey
I guess it depends whether people are looking for an Irish name or an Irish language name - there's a difference imo. Killian/Kilian I'd consider an Irish name derived from the Irish language name Cillian. Both are lovely names. Killian has been used for centuries as you mention (St. Kilian), but much of that use has been outside Ireland. It is popular in Ireland today but quite a bit less so than Cillian. Cillian could cause spelling or pronunciation confusion outside Ireland, while I'd say it's more the default spelling within Ireland. From my point of view (as a contributor to babyname threads) I'm just trying to give people information - it's then up to parents to make their own decisions on what's most important to them in choosing a name or it's spelling. Opinions can often be quite critical on Mumsnet though I know!

@LizzieAnt your posts are really helpful. I'm sure the information you give is very welcomed and you're right, it gives people the opportunity to make an informed choice. It's more the harsher responses I'm referring to.
Despite the pronunciation issues I'm glad I stuck with Cillian, it is the most common spelling in the UK too so hopefully people will get used to it eventually.
I do also really like the spelling Kilian though and I think if the pronunciation issues continue (and bother him) I will use that spelling instead for school, doctors etc.

Thanks @Drunkenmonkey .

I love hearing Irish names in the UK. We're dual heritage and decided on neutral names with a nod to our religion. It was practicality really, spelling and also didn't come across the perfect as Gaeilge name.
I've always loved Irish but I'm not a fluent speaker. I would like the kids to learn some though, it's such a beautiful language and it's really special.

Just to add to add to my post OP, my kids feel quite an affinity with their Irish culture so I'm definitely going to make the language part of that.

DH is Irish, born in Ireland and learned it at school. We have never lived in Ireland as a couple and probably never will.

DCs 1 &2 have Irish names and we have a very irish surname, although we use the Anglacised version of our last name .

It was important to DH but although we stuck to the traditional irish spellings, we also went for names which weren't too unknown outside Ireland as we knew we would be raising the kids abroad. DC 3 doesn't have an Irish name. Ithink by the time she came along, we had run out of easier names and it had become less of a priority for DH.

Kids are bilingual English and German and now we are living in France so haven't pushed the Irish much but DH has lots of little things he says to them in Irish. I don't use Irish so it is their private thing which I think is really special.

I was pretty good at Irish on school and although that was 25 years ago (eep!) I still remember a fair bit. I love following @TheIrishFor on Twitter for lots of entertaining language content. And I use a fair few words and phrases in my everyday life, seems a shame not to. I'd always 'múch an solas' rather than switch off a light and words like plamás, flaithulach and ufásach convey so much more than their English equivalents. And then there are the prosaic words that sound so much cuter to me in Irish, like nóiníní, ispíní, bumbóg and smig.

And a phrase all Irish women should know: ní saoirse go saoirse na mban