Candace Ashley Mott Thabiti Enuma Budziszewski
by Ted Slater on 04/12/2007 at 3:58 PM
It doesn't take much to misspell someone's name.
It's pretty common, for example, for people to misspell Candice's name with an extra "a" and my wife Ashleigh's name with a "y" and Motte's name without the "e."
It's even harder to correctly spell (let alone pronounce) the names of Boundless authors Thabiti Anyabwile and Enuma Okoro and J. Budziszewski.
There's really no point to this post. I'm just competing for the distinction of having written this week's oddest Line post.
1. Rana W. said the following at 4:28 PM on Apr 12:
Are those all their real names? Or pen names?
2. xeres said the following at 4:29 PM on Apr 12:
I can't tell you how many people always get my name wrong. When someone tries to read my name, it's interesting.... When people try to spell my name, it's always off. I mean, my name is spelled with a X although it was originally spelled with a C so I am very used to having my name be mispronounced or misspelled, not that I like it. The good side is that no one shares my name so there's no confusion of who's who.
3. Holly said the following at 4:37 PM on Apr 12:
Some names are just hard (like Dr. B's). Other aspects of this rash of incorrect spelling can be blamed on parents giving their kids such ridiculously spelled names that no one is sure about spelling anymore. In my job, I see thirty or forty names a day for various reasons. The younger the person, the more bizarre the spelling of their name. Today's grandparents are Caroline, Andrew, Terry, Catherine, or Charles. Today's gradeschoolers are -- well, I'll take just a few from the last couple of weeks. Madysun, Jeramy, Teighler, Kathirynne, McKinzie, Mychol, Tyffanee, Leagh, Linn, Rian, and I could go on and on....now I make everyone spell their name for me. Even an "Al." LOL.
4. Ted Slater said the following at 4:53 PM on Apr 12:
Rana -- those are all real names. Pretty cool, hm? :-)
5. Mike Theemling said the following at 5:08 PM on Apr 12:
One thing that native English speakers take for granted is that our spelling and pronunciation is so much more inconsistent than with other languages. Sure, many others have exceptions but English in my opinion is nortiously the worst of those I've encountered thusfar
For example:
- "Bow" is pronounced either as "bowtie" or "bow to the audience"
- "Bough" is pronounced like "bowtie"
- "Cough" however is pronounced like "coff" as in "coffee"
- Speaking of cough, the letter "c" is either hard or soft with no real patterns. Same with "g".
- One might spell "fish" p-h-y-t-i. Because "ph" is used in "phone", "y" is pronounced like "i" many times, and "ti" sounds like "sh" because with words like "mo-tion" the "ti" sounds like "sh"
So don't EVER complain when learning a foreign language that it does many things inconsistently.
6. Rebekah said the following at 5:10 PM on Apr 12:
You wouldn't believe how many people spell my name wrong....instead of Rebekah, I often get Rebeckah, Rebeka, Rebbekah, Rebeccka....and of course the more common spelling, Rebecca.(Which, of all the spellings is the most understandable). I never really thought my name was that hard.
7. Shoeless said the following at 5:29 PM on Apr 12:
I've got a Polish name -- despite it being one of the easier-to-spell Polish names, people rarely spell it right. It's fun to laugh at the many corruptions of my name I see!
8. Lee said the following at 5:59 PM on Apr 12:
I'm thankful for such an easy name as Lee.
Then again, my last name is one of those that people tend to massacre. Guess that's what this laddie gets for being a Scot. :)
Oh, and I totally agree that English is messed up, hehe. Is there a single rule in English grammar that doesn't get broken at least once? "'I' before 'E' except after 'C.' Except in..."
9. Beth L. said the following at 6:12 PM on Apr 12:
Something that is fun to do, is put names (esp. last names) in to spell check & see what comes up.
10. Abram said the following at 6:15 PM on Apr 12:
Don't forget George Bernard Shaw's spelling of "fish" as "ghoti" (later appropriated by the band "ghoti hook"). The gh from "tough", the o from "women" the ti from "motion" as mentioned above. English makes no sense when written...
11. Liz said the following at 6:21 PM on Apr 12:
My DD is Zoe. We didn't put an accent on it, because most people don't these days and simply for ease of use (since accents on letters aren't standard here, all official stuff including birth certificate would be accent-less). But you wouldn't believe the number of people who want to say it "Zoh". And my son is Reuben. The number of people who spell it Ruben or Rueben is unbelieveable! And we spelled it the "standard" way! Can you imagine these poor children who are going to be spelling their names for everyone, every time, for the rest of their lives.
Liz
12. Leah said the following at 7:40 PM on Apr 12:
Mike- you said "- "Bough" is pronounced like "bowtie"".
Is this just an American thing? Because I think you'll find in Aus and England that "Bough" is pronounced like "bow to the audience". Or you're just wrong :P But I totally agree that English is very inconsistent. It tends to have rules that dictate the inconsistencies, but they are weird rules- and it's not always the case.
My name gets misspelled a lot. People write Lia, Lea, Leha, Leaha. And it gets mispronounced too- people say it "Lee" instead of "Lee-ah".
13. Savannah said the following at 7:43 PM on Apr 12:
Rebekah--I have always had a hard time spelling your name! I know three girls with that name and they all spell it differently. Consequently, I call them Reb, Becky and Beckah.
People always spell my name wrong unless I say, "Like the city." Otherwise it's only one "n" or no "h."
14. Joshua said the following at 8:03 PM on Apr 12:
My first name, Joshua, isn't too hard, I would guess since it's been around for a long time (being the traditional spelling as far as I know), and it's pretty common among people in their late teens/early twenties these days (a friend from high school, and my current roommate here at college both are Joshes). People have a problem with my last name. It's Scottish, and when my surname-sake ancestors came to America, they downplayed that by changing the pronunciation. "Keirn." It's pronounced like "Kern," but often gets (mis)pronounced as "Karen" or "Kerns." It didn't help that in my small hometown, there was also a "Kerins" and a "Kerns" family, either!
15. Leigh said the following at 8:05 PM on Apr 12:
While my name is not as confusing as some of those listed above (the last three in particular), I am among the many that have to spell their name every time to everyone. However, I actually have fun with the fact that no one can spell my name correctly on their first try. All three of my names (first, middle, last) have many different variations and no one has ever guessed the right one on the first try. Add to that the fact that my first name is usually not pronounced how it technically should be by everyone (myself included) making it even more confusing for strangers. Admittedly, one does get rather fast at spelling one's name when no one else seems to know how!
16. Laura said the following at 8:11 PM on Apr 12:
I'm a receptionist, so I'm used to people getting my name wrong. I often get Lauren, Leah, Lara, Lacey. I've also been called Margaret, Maureen, Moira, Flora and a host of other names......keeps me laughing!!! I guess it just goes to show we all suffer from an identity crisis at some point!!!
17. Jonathan from Canada said the following at 9:07 PM on Apr 12:
The Line still resists an obligatory Don Imus post. I'm impressed!
18. Kewil said the following at 9:22 PM on Apr 12:
Don't get me started...
19. Joshua Pettett said the following at 9:47 PM on Apr 12:
(I'm trying to win the distinction of having written this week's most off-topic comment. :-))
We can put broken HTML into our comments??? Interesting...
20. KJ said the following at 10:13 PM on Apr 12:
HA! My name is constantly misspelled, due to its being one of those with 27 or so variations kicking around (though I contend my parents gave me the correct one and everyone else was trying too hard to be original.)
It has made me a lot more sensitive to the spelling of my students' names, to the point where I frequently hear a student say, "Nobody but you ever gets my name right."
21. lisa said the following at 10:19 PM on Apr 12:
Yes well that I would have to say has to be the most random blogpost so far :)
Speaking as a teacher some names you come across are just down right weird and you really have to wonder what on earth people were wondering. I am not talking about names form different ethnic groups, as the country where I am from as a large propotion of different ethinic groups and ethinic names are just all in a days work.
What are really frustrating are wacky spellings of names like Jennifer spelt Jenepher and there is even a child in our region called V8Ford (after a car) and yes it is spelt with the number.
22. Chris Krycho said the following at 12:31 AM on Apr 13:
"Krycho" is a fun last name. I get a lot of "Cry-ko," mostly, but I've gotten things as odd as "Kreech-ko" before, and not terribly rarely at that. "Kree-cho" is common, as well, along with "Kree-ko." What's really funny is the number of credit card offers sent my family's way... with our last name misspelled as Kryscho, Krysko, Krysco, Krychko, etc. It's not that hard... especially in comparison to the original transliterated spelling (something like Kraejco, only the c was a modified character, I believe, and the a or e may have been as well. People definitely didn't get it right then, which is why it was changed a few generations ago. (It's pronounced "Cry-cho," for the record, the ch- as in church.)
23. Jethro said the following at 1:05 AM on Apr 13:
Part of my honours thesis involved testing the reading and spelling abilities of university students - it's frankly rather scary to think that such people will one day be turned out into the world and labeled as 'educated'.
24. Amelia said the following at 1:59 AM on Apr 13:
Not many people get my name wrong (except for the occasional Emily, Amanda or Amy, or the spelling Ameila), but so many people spell my brother's name wrong! It is not spelled Issac, Issak, Isaaac, Isaak or even Izak. It's weird, but he actually uses the convential spelling. The same as in the bible! How about that.
25. Ellie said the following at 3:06 AM on Apr 13:
Mike -- The rule for pronouncing hard 'c' and 'k' is: "'K' before 'i' and 'e,' 'c' before the other three: 'a,' 'o,' 'u.'" Consider 'cake' and 'kite' or 'Kent' and 'cent.' 'C' became soft in a word like 'ice' because it comes from the old Anglo-Saxon 'is' (ees) which is still the word for 'ice' in Denmark, Germany, etc, and we only have a new word because English invented the 'long' 'i.' Continentally 'long i' is still pronounced 'ee.'
'G' follows a similar rule, and is generally only soft in words derived from French, although it is complicated by the shifts in Germanic pronunciation of 'j' and 'd' that occured as Low German devoled into Anglo-Saxon and then Middle and Modern English.
Bough is pronounced 'bau' (technically with dot over 'u') as in "bow to the audience." This is 'mispronounced' in some areas of the U.S. South and Canada.
'Ph' only says f when the English word derived from a Greek word. 'Y' is pronounced as a short 'i' only (as far as I know) when preceded by the letters 's,' 'm,' or 'ph' and also only in words derived from Greek. 'Ti' only says 'sh' when followed by 'o' because 'io' is a dipthong. Also, 'Phyt' is a combinative form that derives from a Greek word (phyton meaning plant) that usually ends in 'o' or e'e and has a long 'i,' except when the 't' is followed by 'ic' or in the rare case of the chemical phytoalexin. Therefore, 'phyti' would be most likely pronounced 'fi-ti,' which is a long way from 'fish.'
In point of fact English pronunciation follows very consistant rules, albeit there exist multiple sets of rules that came from each language that English words derive from, causing pronunciation to appear random to people who do not stop to consider etymology. (Please forgive me for not being able to accurately follow the phonetic alphabet).
26. Leah said the following at 3:27 AM on Apr 13:
Others here familiar with the Christian parody band ApologetiX? One APX member, Keith (I think) has been called the wrong name more than 50 times or something- the band keeps a tally ;)
27. Dan H said the following at 7:27 AM on Apr 13:
Well Ted, so far, you win!
28. V said the following at 7:35 AM on Apr 13:
My parent's gave me the best name in the world. I'm eternally grateful. I've always said however, I wanted to give my kids really odd and embarrasing middle names so that when anyone asked them, "hey, what's the middle initial for", they would have to blush. ;-) (just kidding, I won't do it to them).
29. plumeriaflower said the following at 8:41 AM on Apr 13:
i have the same problem any time people try to read my name, spell it or pronounce it. i go by jo because 1. that's what my family has always called me and 2. i figured that it wouldn't be too hard for people to spell. was i ever wrong on that account! you couldn't believe how many times i'm asked if jo is spelled with an "e"...last time i checked i've never heard of any female called jo who spells her name with an "e" at the end. i always assumed that the "e" was the male form of the name. so even in shortening my name in order to make it easier for people, i still can't avoid misspellings -although it does keep me from mispronounciations!
you wouldn't beleive how people pronounce my name- it's jonea. sounds like jo-neigh (kinda like renee with a jo instead.)my last name is not difficult to pronounce but because it is so long i usually get comments on it too. it's all such a funny business. i love it though because i've never met anyone with my exact name and i've pretty much always been the only one with my name (but i did have a friend in high school named janee pronounced in a similar way as my name, but because i'd never had anyone around with the same name it was pretty cool to have that experience.)
30. Justin said the following at 8:58 AM on Apr 13:
Heh. Good post.
31. Ted Slater said the following at 9:01 AM on Apr 13:
Ellie -- a fellow language lover! I take your laying out rules as a challenge to find exceptions! :-)
The rule for pronouncing hard 'c' and 'k' is: "'K' before 'i' and 'e,' 'c' before the other three: 'a,' 'o,' 'u.'"
"Celtic" breaks this rule.
'Y' is pronounced as a short 'i' only (as far as I know) when preceded by the letters 's,' 'm,' or 'ph' and also only in words derived from Greek.
"Hymn" and "cymbal" break this rule.
'Ti' only says 'sh' when followed by 'o' because 'io' is a dipthong.
"Haitian" breaks this rule.
You know I'm just playing with you, not meaning to dismiss your contention that there are rules in English grammar and spelling and pronunciation. It does get difficult, as you point out, when our language has been influenced by so many other languages.
Did you split an infinitive in the last sentence? :-)
32. M said the following at 9:16 AM on Apr 13:
Ellie - Not to be nitpicky, but actually the German word for "ice" is Eis, and is pronounced very similarly to the English, with a long "i" sound. (Rule of thumb for German in case anyone is interested: "ei" is pronounced like a the English letter "i", "ie" is pronounced like the English letter "e". And the nice thing is that German pronuncation is pretty much standard 99.5% of the time and normally varies only with foreign words--ah, if you can't tell, I love German!)
With regards to names and misspellings/mispronunciation, a lot has to do with where you are. I have a somewhat common French last name, but when I was growing up in southern Ontario, I was *always* asked to spell it (despite the fact that 5-8 years of French is mandatory in schools). Since I moved to Ottawa, where French is more prevalent, I never have a problem, even from English speakers; interestingly, I also never had an issue when I lived in Germany. However, my favourite reaction was that of an American friend who saw my driver's licence. It went something like: "Whoah?! How in the world do you say your name?!" (FYI: her last name is Wilson).
33. Becky F. said the following at 9:26 AM on Apr 13:
"Krycho" is a fun last name. I get a lot of "Cry-ko," mostly, but I've gotten things as odd as "Kreech-ko" before, and not terribly rarely at that. (It's pronounced "Cry-cho," for the record, the ch- as in church.)
Chris, the first time I saw your name on the line I didn't pay attention to how it was spelled and I thought it said "Chy-ko" lol! Once I actually looked at it, I figured out the correct pronunciation.
My maiden surname is Wesche, which is German. It's pronounced "Weh-she", but we've gotten "Wesh", "Wesh-key", even "Welsh". It's surprising when people actually get it right and don't say "Wesh".
My married name is either Bohemian or Polish, they weren't very good about keeping track of ancestry, though! It's spelled phonetically (Filipek), but people rarely get it right, and it's spelled with an F, but people assume it's going to be a Ph. Also, they assume it's a ck at the end instead of just a k. I'm glad to not have a common name, though. Growing up with a name that people had trouble pronouncing, I'm used to it. It would be weird if I went the rest of my life with a name that was easy! :)
34. Becky F. said the following at 9:32 AM on Apr 13:
My brother-in-law's name is Aaron. He was a drummer/music major in college. He was playing some show, or in some sort of competition or whatever, and the announcer asked him his name, Aaron told him, and when the guy actually announced it he called him Keith Phillips. What a riot...
I mean, from our last name, I can see where you'd get Phillips, but where did the Keith come from? lol
35. Elisabeth said the following at 9:47 AM on Apr 13:
What an interesting post! I thought I was the only one that got her name constantly misspelled.
I was talking with my mom about how people who know how its spelled still misspell it and she said it was because people were just spelling Elizabeth and not my name. That put a whole new perspecitve on it for me!
36. LA said the following at 9:49 AM on Apr 13:
This is fun. I love languages and spelling variations - guess I'm just weird that way.
Want to name my first daughter Kerygma (it's Greek and I happen to think it is a beautiful word) - but maybe that's why I'm not married yet... hmm...
37. Mike Theemling said the following at 9:52 AM on Apr 13:
A bit off topic, but my Polish friend's last name is 'Niemjyski'.
I found out what it meant only because another Polish lady went up to him and said, "Do you know what your name means?" Then we hounded him until he 'fessed up.
Poor fellow.
38. April L. said the following at 10:38 AM on Apr 13:
Fun post!
My last name, LaLande, has been misspelled and mispronounced so often it's not even funny anymore. Luh-lawnd is the proper pronounciation, and the only person that I can think of who got it right the first time was a hotel owner/manager in Rome, Italy. He not only pronounced it correctly, but correctly guessed that it is French. (He, by the way, was originally from India...)
Never had a problem with my first name for some reason... :)
39. Michele said the following at 10:56 AM on Apr 13:
With only one "L", my first name isn't even the proper feminine version, and people frequently spell it with two "L"s. I don't worry too much, but occasionally people pronounce it "Michael" (very confusing, as that's my dad).
My last name is an Americanized Gaelic name that's not very widely used - most Irish from the same clan use "Connolly" or some variation thereof. But I'm amazed by the number of people who pronounce it like an Italian dessert ("canoli") and who also think I'm Italian (believe me, I couldn't look less Italian!!).
40. Aranel Alasse said the following at 2:28 PM on Apr 13:
Ellie, Ted, and others: Your posts are fun! I find phonology, orthography, and etymology (and all other thing concerning linguistics) all so fascinating! :)
I blame Tolkien's appendices from The Lord Of The Rings (and his made-up languages, therein) for my initial fascination with phonetics (and perhaps phonology). :) Then I did some work with the Wycliffe Bible Translators, where I needed to learn various things about linguistics. How fun! :) I wish I had a good excuse these days to continue learning those types of things. *sigh*
Granted, I have a terrible memory, so I forget the things I learn... But then it's just as fun to relearn them again later, right?! :D I've never been formally trained in linguistics (aside from a one-week session, when I was at Wycliffe), but maybe if I were more formally trained, it might take some of the fun out of it.
But I love looking up things on the internet about how people pronounce things differently depending on region and such. :)
Anyways, Yay! What a fun thread. :)
41. Ted Slater said the following at 2:40 PM on Apr 13:
Aranel -- SIL? I had considered attending SIL after I took a class in grad school on phonology. I spent about a year in central Mexico at a school that was partly founded by Wycliffe, so I've got a great deal of appreciation for that organization!
42. Aranel Alasse said the following at 4:52 PM on Apr 13:
Yeah, I thought about the idea of going to SIL, too. :) But I decided that getting a masters would be a little too much studying for me to handle at that point... I needed to get away from the academic scene for a while, after college. Maybe someday, though... Who knows? :)
I was actually at JAARS, working on some linguistic software.
If you're ever in Waxhaw, NC, you should check out the Alphabet Museum at JAARS. It's really interesting! :) Some people can walk through it in an hour, but I think I spent several Saturdays at that place, just analyzing everything. Very fun! :)
43. Leah said the following at 9:11 PM on Apr 13:
Ellie- thanks for the explanation- that's pretty much what I said (or meant) earlier- while English does seem to be very inconsistent, there are usually rules that govern those 'inconsistencies'! (*Most* of the time! ;P).
44. Leah said the following at 11:02 PM on Apr 13:
Ted, just in relation to all your "point out where Ellie's rules fall through"- this is English, after all ;) While many rules do dictate the 'inconsistencies' in our language, there are still things that break THOSE rules!!
45. Tomi said the following at 9:30 PM on Apr 15:
Anuoluwapo Oluwatomisin Okuyemi. Beat that!
46. Thabiti said the following at 8:47 AM on Apr 16:
Wow! I'm really thankful for this post--mostly because of the valuable English grammar lessons that emerged!
Two positive things about unusual names:
1. When people learn to say Thabiti Anyabwile or J. Budziszewski, they usually never forget it. The trauma of learning guarantees retention :-)
2. If you're a knucklehead like Thabiti Anyabwile, you get listed together with class scholars like J. Budziszewski. Thanks Ted! :-)
47. Tinuviel said the following at 10:14 AM on Apr 16:
Aranel you don't have to get your masters if you attend SIL...I'm actually going this summer and have no plans to get a masters (let's hope that plan sticks).
Thanks for the post about JAARS and the Alphabet Museum. I am familiar with SIL and Wycliffe, but know very little about JAARS. Maybe I'll be able to visit it on my way out to North Dakota for SIL!
48. Becky F. said the following at 12:11 PM on Apr 16:
Thabiti, you are very right about once you learn to say a difficult name you do not forget it. We had a Polish exchange student my senior year of highschool. We were at graduation practice the last day of the school year and were sitting alphabetically, so he was sitting to my left. I had him tell me how to say his Polish name, since we had all just been calling him P.K. for the whole year. I can still say it a few years later, but I'd never be able to spell it!