Everyone is getting my baby's name wrong

[Laura3091]

So my baby girls name is Emila - It is pronounced as Em-ee-la.

Everyone keeps calling her Amelia and can’t get their head around Emila. Don’t think it’s that hard to grasp tbh but I know she is going to have trouble as she grows up with people mispronouncing her name.

Do we just shorten it to Mila? (Mee-La) to make it easier for everyone?

not always, you might have to travel to another country to get that community of people, for instance my child’s name is popular in the levant, not many Levantine Arabs around where we live, but that’s by the by..

I just feel like OP hasn’t plucked a name out of thin air, from googling Emila is a name in its own right with its own etymology, she’s not gone with truleigh or some made up name. It’s not that deep, people can and should learn. Being corrected once should be enough for anyone, mis pronouncing after that is a choice

Me too, like Emily but with an ‘a’

It is unusual everywhere, not just in the UK.

It’s not that deep, people can and should learn.
Some people can't. They will forget. You can't enforce it.
From experience, all sorts of names get mixed up and for various reasons.

I doubt there are many communities in the UK with no members or even people who are familiar with them other than one family. Obviously yes some groups have more representatives than others, but there's not going to be nobody. Its not even just about immediate area when the child is growing up, it's places they might move to, people they might work or study with as they grow older.

Emila is a name in its own right, that's true, but OP isnt pronouncing it in the Croatian way. So she's not going to get that community recognition even.

Which is not to say don't use it, but it isn't like giving one's child an ethnic or cultural minority name.

Yeah you can’t enforce anything, so that’s a weird comment.

but most people of sound mind can learn, and it’s a choice not to. My children are young and have made friends with a Sri lanken young girl with quite a long name, that is unusual for us, they’ve learned her name fine. I’m confident that people can learn and if they repeatedly mis pronounce a name, well then it’s a firm ‘you keep mispronouncing xyz, her name is pronounced xyz, please pronounce it the way it is intended’

I read it as Amelia when I first saw it. But when my brain actually looks at the letters, I read it the proper way.

mila could also be said Mill-a so I don’t think that’ll help.

I don’t want to derail with personal anecdotes but my kids have names uncommon South Asia but very common in the levant but we’re from South Asia, so does happen.

my point was rather the rhetoric and responding to a poster who said IF someone is from a cultural background they should change their child’s name if it’s too similar to a British name to make it easier for white brits

But in this case, there is no cultural reference or history. It is a made up name, which looks like a typo of a popular name with missing I. In your case, unusual name makes sense because of cultural reference.

Tbh my daughter is Lyla (very "normal' common name) and she gets called different names like Layla, Isla 😂

Don’t be ridiculous! Everyone knows Mila is pronounced MeeLa 🙄

Mine was only about whether its comparable to someone using an ethnic minority name. It's not really.

We’re going to have to agree to disagree

@Panicpanicpanicpanik , My Sri Lankan colleague has a long surname but fortunately the first name is unusual enough.

Some people struggle with names. I've seen it many times, and it so often isn't the names you'd expect people to find difficult. It's usually a name that has a sort of similar name, maybe like constantly calling Shashi Sasha or Janice Janet.

Looks like it.

I don't! If I saw Mila written down my brain would pronounce it as Miller or M-eye-ler.

“People should learn “

i think there are lots of things people should learn from basic maths / ratios / probability & risk ( PLEASE ) but I accept that sone just can’t

people also don’t learn that people’s minds are different

they alsp can take decades to learn that you can’t change a bad man

It’s quite a well known name.
Mila Kunis? Mila Jovovich?

Milla Jovovich isn't Mila

Genuine question, why would you think Mila would be pronounced as Miller!? Or M-eye-ler?

To rhyme with Camilla. It's not a huge difference between Mi-la and Mee-la. The double l would usually shorten the vowel but not universally.

Maybe this is a rhotic/non-rhotic element of confusion I've introduced. Milla and Miller are the same to me.

And Milo is is pronounced with the first syllable rhyming with eye so no reason Mila couldn't be

Ok, English is not my first languange and I know quite a few children called Mila (pronounced with Scandinavian i, so not even Meela). I don’t think I’ve even heard the name Miller tbh.

@notahappycabbage I’ve actually come across a little girl Miller. Did wonder why the parents had made that particular choice, we live in Wales so have non-rhotic accents, it would sound exactly the same as Milla (which everyone assumes it is initially).

I can see that when you say Miller and Milla out loud it does sound the same.