How would you pronounce Maya

[acrossthebay]

Out of interest? I like the name but hear variations in pronunciation.

FYI. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_(religion)

The quote said Maya rhyming with player.

A rhyme means the endings of the words sound the same!

My-a

I know about five across different countries and languages, and all pronounce the first syllable to rhyme with ‘high’.

My-ah but also know some who say May-a

i would say play ah but I think the meaning was clear enough. I mean, it’s so tedious when you have to justify everything.

As a teacher this is one of those names that drives me mad. I have to make up rhymes to help me remember which pronunciation students prefer because I teach quite a few Maya's in different classes and it can be hard to remember.

My - ah is the one used most internationally so would be my first guess. May-ah is a typically phonetic English pronunciation (since Maia/Maya was the Goddess of May/Spring) but is rarer these days sadly.

My-a to rhyme with higher.

I would always have said May-a until I met someone with this name and it was My-a as in the Mayans.

How do the endings of player and Maya pronounced my-uh not sound the same? Honest question as they sound the same to me when I say them!

Many English people don't (can't?) say r at the end of a word, so player is "playah" and fire is "fie-ah". I used to consider it a speech defect but I have got used to it since coming here from Ireland and being told that water should be pronounced "wauh-tah" (no thank you).

@WhatHoJeeves many accents pronounce Rs. Er and uh are pronounced as they're spelt.

May uh

It probably is accent dependent to a certain extent. It’s horrible though. I can’t think of any other country it would be acceptable to be this scathing about the accent.

It could be a regional/accent thing. I’m Scottish and if I was to say Maya to rhyme with higher or player, it would have a definite r sound at the end. More like My-ur

My-uh, but I also know a child who’s name is pronounced May-uh (May to rhyme with ‘play’. If I chose it for a child, I’d probably consider a subtle spelling change to push people towards the pronunciation I wanted.

I've never heard it pronounced phonetically, like the month. It's always a silent A, so 'My-ah'.
My mates daughter is called that. It's quite cute. I don't think many would mispronounce, but I can see here a lot say it with the A sound.

We have a Maya in the family and she's Maya rhyming with Fire.

May-a, I have a niece called Mya and it's pronounced My-a, they're two different names to me

I'd automatically say My-ah. But if someone introduced themselves (or their parents etc introduced them) as May-ah I'd remember that.

I'd agree with the spelling change. My cousin did this with her daughter's name, was one of those with different pronunciations. She didn't want her DD spending her life correcting people so she tweeked the spelling so there was no ambiguity

Ma-ya (rhymes with fire) not May-a (rhymes with player)

My-a rhyming with fire