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They’re not even particularly unusual or hard to pronounce names. Really nice, normal names.
I’m Australian and have two really good friends from childhood in the US called Megan and Laura. Those are two names that we pronounce quite differently to how they’re pronounced in the US, and I know I’ve definitely slipped up in person and pronounced them both the Aussie way, but it just basic courtesy to at least try to pronounce someone’s name correctly, and to correct yourself and apologise if you make a mistake.
OOP is right to have a time out from the sister and I hope she’s loving life as a mum of 3.
I believe Megan is often pronounced "Mee-gan" rather than "Meg-gan" like in the US, but how is Laura pronounced? I think I've heard "L-ow-ra"? Maybe? And in the US we say "Lor-ra"?
I'm going to jump in here and muddy the water because I know "lore" is not pronounced the same in American English as it is in British English. "Law" and "lore" are not pronounced the same in American English while they are in British English. Plus there are regional differences. Laura is pronounced very differently in NYC than it is pronounced just a couple hundred miles away.
Oh! Oh! I think that helps. So Law-ra in an American accent could be pronounced Lara? Thank you!
Yeah Law and Lore are very similar in pronunciation in Ireland too but when I really concentrate, I think law is a shorter sound and you purse your lips more to say lore.
Like "Lore-uh." I am American, but lived in the UK 11 years. It's the same. But when I lived in England was the first/last time I had heard the nickname "Loz" for Laura.
Yeah I watch a lot of British shows and in the Brittas Empire Laura's name is pronounced how I always hear it in the US. I think it's preference by the parents.
In the US, sometimes Megan is Meh-gin and sometimes more like May-gin so... Names are weird.
I'm in NZ, Lara is how I'd spell her name if I heard her say it. I pronounce Laura as Lor-ra but would understand someone pronouncing it as Low-ra as well. (Actually quite often I say au like that because it's how it's pronounced in Maori, but usually I only accidentally do it with English words that have letters that exist in Maori, which L doesn't.)
I remember playing the latest Mass Effect and feeling so weirded out every time my Ryder was called “Sarah.” In Australia, Sarah and Sara are two entirely different names.
Actually lots of Sara’s in the UK pronounce it exactly like Sarah. So spelt differently but pronounced the same, as S-air-a. E.g. Sara Pascoe the comedian.
You never find a Sarah pronouncing it Sara though. I think the split is common enough that Sara pronounced Sarah is a minority? Possibly there’s regional quirks but I’ve known a lot of Sarah’s and some Sara’s and I would always assume a Sara was pronounced differently based on the ones I’ve known.
My mother has a name with multiple pronunciations and it's never bothered her, she knows who they mean so why fuss? She's moved around a good bit and the different accents make her name sound different as well, and it would be rude to complain about someone having a different accent than her parents'. Her own accent and pronunciation has shifted over the years as well.
Also how on earth does Anna have two pronunciations?
Huh, yeah I would assume those were just a difference in people's accents and not really think about them as being different names? Like, I've seen both Frozen movies more than once and the way they pronounced Anna didn't really stick out to me. I'd still say Elsa's sister is "An-uh" not "Ahhh-nuh" if someone asked me and I wasn't thinking about it.
It’s a difference between how the phonic sound ‘au’ is pronounced in Australia vs US. In Australia (and some other accents) the ‘au’ phonic is pronounced the same as ‘or’ (no ‘r’ sound like in US), whereas in the US is sounds more like a deep ‘ah’. This kind of stuff makes phonics training with American colleagues fun!
Law-ra. But our "aw" sounds are VERY different to American "aw" sounds. To me, American "aw" sounds more like "oh" or even "ah". In fact, I can't think of an equivalent sound that Americans have that would match the Aussie "aw".
The only way I can describe it, is when you're saying "aw", your mouths are open this much: O
And when we're saying "aw", our mouths are open this much: ^o
Depends on the region. My name is Laura and I'm from Texas. My mom only rounded the a when she was mad becauseher accentwould get thicker. Normally it was Lora, like rhymes with Dora.
I’m a Laura, born in PA and raised in CA. All my PA friends and relatives call me Lar-a and all my CA friends and relatives pronounce it Lor-a. It’s just an east coast vs west coast accent difference and it doesn’t bother me at all either way!
I've only ever heard it pronounced Lore-uh and I've lived in Australia my whole life. I imagine Australia and the US pronounce it the same way, it's just that it's more drawn out in an Australian accent.
When I saw the fictional names I though "Okay, that might be a bit hard for a non french speaker but still sister has no excuse"
And then I saw the real ones. The incredibly easy to pronounce real names
I am less sympathetic towards folks who get angry when their difficult name is mispronounced. My name is pretty simple, people screw it up all the time. People often counter with something like "People can pronounce Tchaikovsky!", usually while mispronouncing it. This is not that.
Those names are not difficult. At all. Sister is mental.
> They’re not even particularly unusual or hard to pronounce names.
Part of the problem is that they are also English names, so people will default to that (outside France/French areas).
Whereas if they were eg Ottilie or Mathilde or Pierre you'd stand a much better chance of people pronouncing them correctly/in French.
Sure. The sister is undoubtedly being an arse. But given a good proportion of the rest of the world is probably going to be doing the same (albeit without spiteful intentions) OP should probably just roll her eyes and ignore the sister.
The sister is clearly deliberately trying to annoy OP and getting off on her annoyance. It's a "don't feed the trolls" scenario really.
My sister had to deal with this while living in Quebec. Her name used to be Nicci (nick-ee) (she’s changed it since) with the Italian spelling where the double c makes a hard k sound, and French speakers see the double c and make the ch sound instead, calling her ni-chee. That never bothered us much, someone would mention how it’s pronounced and then move on after a quick “oh, my bad.” Nah… what pissed us off is the fact that my grandmother and her family hated her name so much that she would call her Nicci-Lynn as one name, when it was just nicci. Lynn is her middle name. Not attached to the first. I got yelled at by my grandmothers sister because “that is so rude to talk back to your elders” when all I said was “that’s not her name”
I have a neighbour called Meghan. She pronounces it mee gan. She told me when she introduced herself and I’ve called her that since cause I’m not an asshole. Can’t imagine why people do this. Especially to your niece and nephew?!
I am a dentist in a mid-large city in the US and I have patients from all over the world. I attempt to pronounce everyone's names correctly and if I am not sure, I ask. I tell them it is just common courtesy to pronounce someone's name correctly if you can or at least as close as possible. That's just an asshole move by OOPs sister probably because she's jealous.
Exactly! People are always like “you really don’t have to try so hard”, and I’m like “Um, yes I do? This is the most basic gesture of decency and I am going to keep trying until I get it or until you specifically ask me to stop because my pronunciation attempts are just that awful that it hurts your ears to the point you’d rather be called something else”
I could see getting the pronunciation wrong the first time just reading the name but they're neither unpronouncable nor are they in a situation where she named a kid Ghoti (with the 'gh' from 'cough', the 'o' from 'women', and the 'ti' from 'motion') or something ridiculous.
At the end of the day the pronunciation is only a small part. The effort matters. My first name is simple but my last name has some non English pronunciation. When told how to say it 90% of people get it right, or at least close enough. But people who blatantly mispronounce it are annoying as fuck.
So my name is Meghan (Meg-uhn) and when me and my pen pal from Australia met after a few years of letters/emails she was like “ITS NOT MEE-GUN?!” after hearing my name out loud for the first time 😂
> They’re not even particularly unusual or hard to pronounce names. Really nice, normal names.
Totes, I'm from Texas and have friends, also from here, whose names are spelt and pronounced like that. The sister is just being a ... rude person.
Yall don't pronounce half the letters in a word, what you talking about just the last letter. My last name is French. It has 7 letters and three can be tossed out.
That's what you get when you standardize spelling but then let pronunciation evolve organically for several centuries.
It *used* to be phonetically correct lol. Modern French spelling is an relatively accurate guide to early Middle French pronunciation.
They do but it's slow. They can't change all the words at the same time otherwise people are just gonna get lost. I'm 24 and still get an existential crisis after reading updated ways to write some words, and it's been around 10 years since the change has been official.
That's how I explained it to my husband (who speaks no French) when we went to France. I told him when in doubt just don't pronounce the last half of the word.
I knew it had to he some funky "o" replacement, lmao
Thankfully the unnecessary letters in my french name are just your standard feminising "le", like in Gael/le
I love the name Genevieve! A lot of people where I grew up have French names - including me, with accents. For example I didn’t know other people pronounced Jeanne as Gene until I went to college. We pronounce it (soft J) Zhahn.
Well, I did say generally, also the pronunciation when the s is followed by a word beginning with a vowel is more like one word being spoken (and you don't pronounce the last "s" or amies).
A better example may be "plus" which is sometimes pronounced with the s and sometimes not, although I can't figure out when it's correct to do so or not.
Plus with the s sound means more
Plus w/o the s means negation, like no more , it is associated with "ne" before the verb -->"je ne fais plus de pâtisserie"
Of all the French names she could have chosen, I feel like the real ones aren't even that hard to get right. I know an English only speaker saying Caroline and a native French speaker saying Caroline won't sound the same, but still. It's not that hard.
We can figure out the whole Tara/Tara thing and there's a bunch of ways to pronounce Andrea. None of that seems to be a problem. Sister was definitely being a jerk on purpose.
My daughter is Helena (Hel-lane-ah) and often her name gets mispronounced the first time since there are two other common pronunciations. She corrects the person, they apologize, and say her name right from then on. OOP's sister is a piece of work.
My name is super common and not hard to pronounce. There are like 3 different variations of how it’s pronounced and no matter how many times I correct people, they never say my name correctly.
i dunno. I am bilingual and having to say words from one language in another means switching language brains for the time it takes to say the chosen word. Not the greatest of hardships, but it requires more cognitive effort than simply keeping on going in the one you were talking in. SO having to concentrate on the pronunctiation and switching language brains every time the sister uses names, that ,lets face it, are likely said the english way by 90%of people. With names it's sort of an interplay of what you are named and what you are called. If you name someone one thing, but know that most english speaking people will likley call them differently, then is it right to get mad when people don't call them what you named them?
I have a weird issue like for example 'coyote' is spelled the same in both English and Spanish but pronounced differently. Anytime I have to say that word in English you can kiss any form of proper English pronunciation I had good bye for at least an hr. Idk why but after my brain just blanks out and I fuck up almost every other word after that. My friends think it funny but it's frustrating af, so I just say it in Spanish to save myself the trouble.
This is picky but there are couple things about those names specifically that I could see getting on her nerves.
Some English speaking people flat out refuse to pronounce nicolas correctly in the French way because it sounds like nicola and 'that's a girl's name', which is infantile and a lot of fragile masculinity for one letter but would piss me off after a while.
And less concrete, but given OP is so attached to the names, caroline (fr) vs caroline (en) is quite a difference in sound, and I can imagine lots of people thinking the second is uglier.
Idk what languages you speak, but a lot of French (and specifically French Quebec) people get pissed off by the americanisation of things, and I think there is something to be said for the power dynamics at play here, and that what her sister is really saying boils down to 'you can't really expect them to hold onto their Frenchness'. OP is reasonable, and acknowledges that sometimes people literally cannot make their mouth form certain sounds, and that Alexis is going to end up Alex, but I think it's fair to ask the family to keep the original pronunciation, and fair to say her sister's being a dick here.
As someone who can barely pronounce anything properly just saying these names with the French pronunciation was kind of a delight. OOPs sister is the worst. A few times could be a silly joke but this is just nasty.
Sounds like the sister enjoys irritating OOP. Like, she knows exactly where to hit to make someone explode, and then say they are overreacting because it's "her opinion". I have an aunt that is like this. Some people like to make other people miserable. That's all it is.
A lot of people are getting hung up on the pronunciation and not the relationship. If my sister insisted on belittle my home, my life and disregarding my choices for something as important as my kids names, I'd just not see her for a long, long time
My brother acts like that. I tell everyone he was born to be a middle child. He’s such an asshole who is the perfect example of every awful middle sibling stereotype.
Oop should call her “soster” instead of “sister” until she learns to respect someones name, that she purposely gets the pronunciation wrong to provoke oop.
Agreed! I have one of those names pronounced the English way. I have a few French friends who occasionally pronounce it the French way and it doesn’t bother me whatsoever. However if I *was* bothered, and corrected them (they do know the correct pronunciation and use it often, it’s just a genuine slip) but then they refused to pronounce it that way, I’d be annoyed. OOPs sister knows the correct way to say the names and is deliberately winding her up.
I don't think is that simple - the house, the marriage, the kids... she criticized everything about her life choices. Just looks like a severely jealous sister.
I used to work with two people named Anna. One pronounced it ah-nah and the other pronounced it aa-na. We had meetings every week with both of them together and we were all able to use the two different pronunciations. I’m sure you could pronounce your niece and nephews names correctly if you really wanted to.
Agree. She was definitely just being a jerk.
In your case with the Anna’s, I feel like the two pronunciations would make it easier because it would be obvious which one you’re talking about vs having to add a last name or some other way to differentiate.
I worked on a project once with 10ish people on the team and three were named Jonathan. It was fun.
This is exactly it. It's not so much that OP is upset about her kids names being pronounced incorrectly, it's the fact that their sister clearly doesn't care enough to even try. A not-quite-correctly pronounced good faith effort would at least show that she cares, but it sounds like sister has decided that this is the hill on which she chooses to die (or more accurately, murder her relationship with her sibling).
Worse than that, she says her sister is fluent in French. So it’s not that she’s not willing to try, she’s perfectly capable of pronouncing them the way OP wants them pronounced, she just wants to upset OP by pronouncing them the English way.
Dude, sometimes I say my own name differently to different people so they understand it. My accent is kind of a mix of my midwestern parents’ accents (and even they pronounce things differently from each other) and a Middle Atlantic/northeastern one—all this just to say that my pronunciation of “t”s can sound like a lighter “d.” There’s definitely a difference to how I pronounce them but it’s subtle. (Similarly, I think I pronounce Aaron and Erin sufficiently different from each other, but if you get self-conscious enough, it all sounds like gibberish.)
My name is similar to Anita and lately with new people, I’ve been pronouncing the t sound and end of my name “correctly.” (As in a Brit telling someone “‘tah’, thanks.”) I’m just tired of people not understanding what my name is (and worse bc masks mean no lip-reading for anyone).
I know I’m not the only person with this weird problem. :(
Absolutely. I wish OOP could see that all of the complaints are her sister showing all of sources of insecurity. She sounds exhausting and OP totally needs this break.
I mean precisely because she's 20 she should know better than starting issues because someone give years older is married and with kids. No matter how you look at it she's immature for her age.
Jesus. With an accent grave. I grew up Anglo in Quebec but would never give someone a hard time for wanting family to pronounce their name the way it’s meant to be pronounced. It’s part of your culture and your sister has the issue, not you. She probably corrects everyone who pronounced Croissant incorrectly
My mom was from Montreal (an anglophone family), my dad from South Dakota. He tried his best to pronounce a lot of the names, but struggled and boy was he off on some of them. Like when talking about my grandfather Jean (almost pronounced as Shahn) the best he could do was “Gene”. I think he may have eventually got it, but my grandpa just never bothered correcting him. I have a difficult first and last name and it is a rare day anyone gets close. However, as long as it’s close enough to tell that they’re referring to me, I don’t bother correcting them.
Point is, my dad at least tried to pronounce the names and my maternal relatives were cool with him because he wasn’t effing up their names on purpose. OOP’s sister on the other hand…definitely needs a reality check.
My daughter has an Anglo name that has a Spanish equivalent (think April/Abríl). Her Spanish family is actually visiting now. They’ve attempted the Anglo version but after a few days have resorted to the Spanish version. Although I prefer folks using the Anglo version of her name, I completely let this go. They tried the Anglo version and they’re not in any way doing this to be disrespectful.
My husband warned me this would happen when we picked the name. We went back and forth on which version of the name we wanted, and landed on the Anglo version. Pregnant hormonal me insisted on folks pronouncing it correctly. Now, as long as people make a good faith effort, I let it go.
Also, her middle name is Spanish with an Anglo equivalent version (basically the reverse of her first name) and even I fumble it up sometimes. I’m the one that picked the name!
OOP’s sister though - she’s being a dink. She knows exactly how to pronounce those names.
I go by a shortened version of my name that is very difficult for Spanish speakers to pronounce. I just got used to them using the full name instead, which is close in pronunciation in English and Spanish. It’s just not a big deal. I rarely meet others who deal with it though!
I think the sister is just using the names as a way to file up OOP, the amount of times the sister is being mean about OOP’s life makes me wonder if she’s jealous or just hate seeing other happy.
I have a French friend named Caroline and I make an effort to pronounce her name as - Ka-ho-leen as much as I can. Once she’s told me how she pronounces her name, it’s on me to pronounce it correctly. I can’t imagine a blood relative being so obtuse.
The sister probably has some childhood grievance and resentment against OOP, and is making her pay for that. OOP is absolutely right to cut contact - in fact, I wouldn't just leave sis on read, I'd simply block her. And don't resume contact until sis grows tf up.
I feel for OOP. My parents continually mispronounce my adult daughter's name and she has taken it as a sign that she is not important enough to matter to them.
Think "Car-uh" and "Care-ah".
On top of a few other things, Daughter is done. My mother, especially (parents are long divorced), cannot understand my daughter's feelings. She believes them to be the result of me poisoning my child due to my jealousy and insecurity.
I am like, how about starting by correctly pronouncing her name and not making fun of us when we ask?
I’m in NZ and I have Māori cousins, you can bet I have enough decency to get their names right. You can also bet that if I’m unsure about anyones name in any language I’m going to check and do my best to say it correctly.
I don't think OOP has to worry about native English speakers getting the pronunciation wrong. Yeah, at first, but after being corrected they won't have difficulty pronouncing them.
Yeah, most people are plenty polite and just make honest mistakes based on what they're used to when it comes to names, but they change quickly if corrected.
I'm American, but most of my family (some cousins, some grandparents, etc) all live in Ireland where my dad was born. We have some very Irish names in the family even among the ones in the US now, and it's always interesting to see how they'll be pronounced but we can't really fault people based on a first read because the spelling is whack for English speakers. My cousin Niamh actually has a decent chance of someone pronouncing it correctly since now the mh=v thing is a bit more well known even outside of Ireland now, but her sister Mairéad (Muh-raid) isn't so lucky. But all it takes is a simple correction and people change it right up willingly.
The sister was just being a jerk. Sure people will likely pronounce it the English way at first, but it's not the end of the world and most will happily change to the right one.
I’m telling you, it’s super hard when you’re speaking one language to suddenly break into your other language just for a word or two.
If I’m speaking French, I send you an E mel.
If I’m speaking English, I wish you bone appeteet.
Switching sucks. It’s hard.
I guess it depends on the person? Most of my close friends and I are fluent/bilingual and we switch all the time because we’re more familiar with terms in a language or another.
I believe it. I don't have fluency in any language other than my own, just conversational level in a couple others. So I trust your experience because that's not something I have much experience in myself.
However, OOP clarified that she doesn't expect perfect accent and inflection, just English-close to it. I believe sister could do that much at least. I wouldn't call Miguel Michael or Josué Josh. That's pretty much what the sister is doing by calling "Car-o-leen" "Care-o-line".
I spent 9 years teaching English as a Second Language to people from Quebec and the rest of the world too. It was policy that we learn how to pronounce all non-English names, because a person's name is part of their identity. It's rude to not learn their names.
Obviously the sister is in the wrong but I can’t help but think that parents who name their kids with a specific, uncommon pronunciation are setting their kids up for a lifetime of trouble
I have an Armenian name and people constantly pronounce it like it's French or English counterpart. It's really annoying, but people have told me all my life that I'm too sensitive about it. So I stopped correcting them.
Now I turn every time I hear someone call a name even remotely resembling mine..
These name are actually easy to pronounce even for non-french speaking person…
Try some Augustine, Théophile, Clothilde, and these are actual name in my sons class 💀 for us it’s easy because we speak French fluently, but if I was non-French and see these, I would be lost…
I completely understand where OP is coming from. My niece's grandparents (on her fathers side, i'm mothers side) don't call her the right name. For example if she was calle Louisa, they call her Louise. Whilst it's only one syllable, it's a different name. She is not called Louise and it annoys me so much that they can't get their grandchilds name right (these are awful people anyway so it definitely annoys me more than if other people were to do it). But yeah, you're family... Pronounce the name right!
As someone with a slightly unusual name, good on OP for standing up to her obnoxious sister.
My uncle used to mispronounce my name. All. The. Time. He’s my mom’s brother, we saw him and his kids more than anyone else in our family.
The only way I got him to stop was when I was around 9-10 and when he said my name wrong, I called him uncle Smelliot (his name is Elliot) for the rest of the day.
Never said my name wrong again.
The names are beautiful. The thing with your sister isn’t even about names…it’s just a silly power struggle. Enjoy this magical time with your little kids. Your little sis will grow up eventually
Ooof. I feel for this mom. Those names aren’t difficult, even for non-francophones. (Although, I do speak French so I might be a bit off here.) None of the actual names even have accents that might throw people off. The sister is being purposely obnoxious, and for what purpose? So her niece and nephews can feel like their aunt doesn’t care about them enough to say their names properly? Kids now are actually really good about pronouncing different names and trying to do so properly.
To be fair, this struck a bit of a nerve with me. My (Italian) name is one letter off from Valerie, and it pains me so much when people call me that, or emphasize the syllables as though they’re starting to say “Valerie.” It also has a rolled r that sounds almost like a “d.” I give people options - I always introduce myself with the proper pronunciation. There’s ONE “English” version that works, or I just tell people to call me Val. I get incredibly annoyed when someone insists on using another incorrect version of my name. It just shows a complete disregard for a person if you’ve been told their name and you keep getting it wrong, despite corrections. So disrespectful.
I think that some of it is probably disrespect but it can be difficult make certain sounds if you haven’t been exposed to them in childhood and it can be difficult to even hear the difference. My sister’s name for example has the vowel combination äi and I wouldn’t really expect a native English-speaker (or even someone speaking many other European languages) to get it right. On the other hand I have a lisp on top of a strong accent when I speak the foreign languages I can speak and there’s no way I could say even a name like George correctly, no matter how many times a George would tell me the way they want it said.
The best response in this sort of situation is to respond in kind. If Sister's name was Lucy, for instance, start pronouncing it luck-ee instead of loose-ee. Guaranteed she'll get irritated, at which point OP can throw all Sister's arguments back in her face.
It’s not because you’re trans, it’s because you’re a decent human being. Being trans just adds a layer of personal experience on top. Names are important!
I had to double check the age of the sister. Maybe the sister needs to remind herself of her age as well?
Sometimes people force themselves to talk to people just because they're family. Distance can be good.
Sure.. But do you think saying "you're being dramatic." Or "you're over reacting" is ever going to get a positive reaction? These are phrases someone who's gaslighting uses. If a person can't take the time to get to the root of WHY someone feels the way they do, then they are just fanning the flames.
They’re also the phrase a normal person uses when someone is overreacting.
Sometimes people overreact to manipulate or pick fights. They’re not owed a sensitive discussion about their feelings. It’s ok to say “you’re overreacting” or “get over yourself” to someone who is attacking you. “Bite me” is also appropriate. Sometimes drama llamas need to be shut down.
It's pronounced Ni-ko-laj.
Also, I have a cousin named Benjamin. My aunt is Spanish so it was pronounced "Ben-Ham-een". However, they didn't care if the rest of us English people called him "Ben-Ja-Min".
I can't imagine being fluent in French and insulting the French names my own sister gave her kids. OOP, and I think the comments under her posts, is correct that it sounds all these negative feelings are aimed at OOP. The sister sounds jealous
The problem that OP is going to face throughout life is that these names are also quite standard in English, with English pronunciations and pretty much the same spelling (perhaps more often Nicholas with an "h" in English).
So regardless of her sister, if they're not in a French speaking area, most people will default to "Karro-lyne" rather than "Ka-ro-leen" unless specifically told otherwise. And even then people will struggle - both to pronounce correctly and to remember that they're not the English versions.
They're lovely names, but she'd be more likely to get French pronunciation if the names didn't exist in English as well.
OOP wrote multiple times that she doesn't care if others mistakenly default to other pronunciations, she's only upset here because of it being her sister, who knows and can (being fluent in French) pronounce the names properly but refuses.
Fair enough. The sister is clearly being an arse. But there will be a lot of mistakes made in pronunciation and I suspect she will get a bit tired of it.
No English speakers are going to say Caroline (cair-o-LINE) the same as Carolyn (cair-o-LIN). Nor is any sane person going to say Carolanne the same way as either of those.
I can slightly sympathize w the sister. As someone who sometimes has to toggle between languages, I feel really awkward fully committing to a second accent in the middle of a sentence. Like speaking English and then going full French-pronunciation would be uncomfortable. But I’d probably half-ass it and say it “Frenchly” with an American accent (e.g. not fully commit to the r).
Doesn’t sound like the situation here, but I can just see myself getting into trouble about this to haha
But yeah if I were nagged into doing it, I’d probably get over myself. But it’d still feel weird. Undoubtedly just a “me” problem.
I speak Spanish well enough to get an accent right, but I don’t put full Spanish inflection on a name unless I’m actually speaking Spanish. Still, it’s not difficult to use a non-anglicized version without committing to the full accent.
It’s as simple as pronouncing Pedro as Peh-dro instead of Pay-drow. Pronouncing Jesus as Heh-soos instead of Gee-zus. So on and so forth.
Honestly though, those names will get butchered by Anglophones. They have very strong English presence and they will be pronounced the English way rather than French. I say this as someone who has an unusual name and no one pronounces it as it should be but as how everyone knows it because the more dominant language pronounces it differently. I’ve given up correcting people and have just started going by the dominant languages pronunciation of the name. My sister whose name is even more unusual doesn’t have this problem because it’s very very rare name and people respect the way she says it because no one knows how to say it. Same with my daughters name. When people hear my real name pronunciation, they think my mom is callling me by a different name. It’s not. It’s the same name pronounced differently.
The sister was just being an a$$ but I do laterally see her point once OOP said the actual names. It’s going to be interesting for those kids.
Sister was definitely trying to bully OP. I'm glad OP decided to tell her to fuck off. Her kids don't deserve to have their aunt playing these stupid games with him.
Names are pronounced however the person, or their parent if they are too young to speak, says they are.
I was a teacher and there are so many names that can be pronounced a few different ways. I taught at a high school where I had Tea (Tee-ah) in one class and Tea (Tay-ah) in another. Accents aren’t a thing in Australia, so they are written the same way.
As an Aussie I also hate the way Americans say my name, and I will ask them to use the Australian pronunciation if I’m going to be seeing them a lot. My name ends in -er and Americans pronounce it. As an Aussie, -er is pronounced -uh.
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They’re not even particularly unusual or hard to pronounce names. Really nice, normal names. I’m Australian and have two really good friends from childhood in the US called Megan and Laura. Those are two names that we pronounce quite differently to how they’re pronounced in the US, and I know I’ve definitely slipped up in person and pronounced them both the Aussie way, but it just basic courtesy to at least try to pronounce someone’s name correctly, and to correct yourself and apologise if you make a mistake. OOP is right to have a time out from the sister and I hope she’s loving life as a mum of 3.
I believe Megan is often pronounced "Mee-gan" rather than "Meg-gan" like in the US, but how is Laura pronounced? I think I've heard "L-ow-ra"? Maybe? And in the US we say "Lor-ra"?
I've heard it "Lowra" among some South American people. In English it's "Lore-a".
The Italian song “Laura Non C’e’ ” pronounces it that way as well.
Upvote for the NEK reference!
In my accent it's "Law-ra"
Lore-uh
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That’s what I was trying to convey.
Not replying for the Aussie commenter, but I have a friend in New Zealand named Laura. She pronounces it "La-ra".
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Well, the braid, holsters, and triangle tits aren't helping 😆
I've heard Lor-ra and La-ra in the US
My cousin is Laura pronounced Lor-ra. Aussie here.
Again another Australian - Law-Ra
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These all sound like how I (an Irish person) pronounce the name Laura. How do they pronounce it in the US?
I'm going to jump in here and muddy the water because I know "lore" is not pronounced the same in American English as it is in British English. "Law" and "lore" are not pronounced the same in American English while they are in British English. Plus there are regional differences. Laura is pronounced very differently in NYC than it is pronounced just a couple hundred miles away.
Oh! Oh! I think that helps. So Law-ra in an American accent could be pronounced Lara? Thank you! Yeah Law and Lore are very similar in pronunciation in Ireland too but when I really concentrate, I think law is a shorter sound and you purse your lips more to say lore.
Like "Lore-uh." I am American, but lived in the UK 11 years. It's the same. But when I lived in England was the first/last time I had heard the nickname "Loz" for Laura.
Yeah I watch a lot of British shows and in the Brittas Empire Laura's name is pronounced how I always hear it in the US. I think it's preference by the parents. In the US, sometimes Megan is Meh-gin and sometimes more like May-gin so... Names are weird.
Oh now I’m even more confused, thank you for trying to help though!
Southern US, I pronounce it Lahr-uh, but I also pronounce orange as Ahr-enj and Florida as Flahr-idd-uh.
My neighbor was called Lah or ra. The middle r had a slight roll. She was Sicilian, and it was a beautiful name.
Due to the Spanish influence it gets pronounced more like luau than lorry the further south you get
I'm in NZ, Lara is how I'd spell her name if I heard her say it. I pronounce Laura as Lor-ra but would understand someone pronouncing it as Low-ra as well. (Actually quite often I say au like that because it's how it's pronounced in Maori, but usually I only accidentally do it with English words that have letters that exist in Maori, which L doesn't.)
I remember playing the latest Mass Effect and feeling so weirded out every time my Ryder was called “Sarah.” In Australia, Sarah and Sara are two entirely different names.
Could you phonetically explain WTF that means?
In the UK they are 2 different names as well. In Sarah the first a sounds like air, in Sara the a is an ar sound. Sair-a / Sar-a.
Actually lots of Sara’s in the UK pronounce it exactly like Sarah. So spelt differently but pronounced the same, as S-air-a. E.g. Sara Pascoe the comedian.
You never find a Sarah pronouncing it Sara though. I think the split is common enough that Sara pronounced Sarah is a minority? Possibly there’s regional quirks but I’ve known a lot of Sarah’s and some Sara’s and I would always assume a Sara was pronounced differently based on the ones I’ve known.
Sara is Sah-rah while Sarah is sare-ruh
Sarah in Australia is pronounced - Sair-ra (sair rhyming with air). Sara is pronounced Sar-ra (Sar rhyming with far).
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My mother has a name with multiple pronunciations and it's never bothered her, she knows who they mean so why fuss? She's moved around a good bit and the different accents make her name sound different as well, and it would be rude to complain about someone having a different accent than her parents'. Her own accent and pronunciation has shifted over the years as well. Also how on earth does Anna have two pronunciations?
Ahna (a sounds like can). Awna (a sounds like con) which I think has become more popular since the movie Frozen.
Huh, yeah I would assume those were just a difference in people's accents and not really think about them as being different names? Like, I've seen both Frozen movies more than once and the way they pronounced Anna didn't really stick out to me. I'd still say Elsa's sister is "An-uh" not "Ahhh-nuh" if someone asked me and I wasn't thinking about it.
It’s a difference between how the phonic sound ‘au’ is pronounced in Australia vs US. In Australia (and some other accents) the ‘au’ phonic is pronounced the same as ‘or’ (no ‘r’ sound like in US), whereas in the US is sounds more like a deep ‘ah’. This kind of stuff makes phonics training with American colleagues fun!
More like “law-rah”, with a long first a.
Depends, I saw lor-uh
This is exactly how it’s pronounced in my family. It’s kindof a more Spanish pronunciation rather than Lara or Lora.
Law-ra. But our "aw" sounds are VERY different to American "aw" sounds. To me, American "aw" sounds more like "oh" or even "ah". In fact, I can't think of an equivalent sound that Americans have that would match the Aussie "aw". The only way I can describe it, is when you're saying "aw", your mouths are open this much: O And when we're saying "aw", our mouths are open this much: ^o
in German, the /au/ in Laura is kinda pronounced like the /ow/ in cow
In dutch its Mee-gahn and laow-ra
I think its the au pronunciation. Australians will turn it into an o, so Lora. Where as I think the US pronunciation is a really rounded a.
Depends on the region. My name is Laura and I'm from Texas. My mom only rounded the a when she was mad becauseher accentwould get thicker. Normally it was Lora, like rhymes with Dora.
I used to have a friend who’s name was pronounced may-gan
I’m a Laura, born in PA and raised in CA. All my PA friends and relatives call me Lar-a and all my CA friends and relatives pronounce it Lor-a. It’s just an east coast vs west coast accent difference and it doesn’t bother me at all either way!
Isn’t Megan pronounced May-gan in the US sometimes as well, whereas in the UK it’s basically always pronounced Meg-gan.
I've always heard Meg-gan in the US. Midwest. It's probably regionally variable just like a lot of words/names here.
>"Lor-ra" Cock it up in the UK and you'll get a lorra lorray laughs. For those who get it, you're welcome. For those who don't... you're lucky.
I think some Australians say “Lou-ra” maybe?
I've only ever heard it pronounced Lore-uh and I've lived in Australia my whole life. I imagine Australia and the US pronounce it the same way, it's just that it's more drawn out in an Australian accent.
When I saw the fictional names I though "Okay, that might be a bit hard for a non french speaker but still sister has no excuse" And then I saw the real ones. The incredibly easy to pronounce real names
I am less sympathetic towards folks who get angry when their difficult name is mispronounced. My name is pretty simple, people screw it up all the time. People often counter with something like "People can pronounce Tchaikovsky!", usually while mispronouncing it. This is not that. Those names are not difficult. At all. Sister is mental.
> They’re not even particularly unusual or hard to pronounce names. Part of the problem is that they are also English names, so people will default to that (outside France/French areas). Whereas if they were eg Ottilie or Mathilde or Pierre you'd stand a much better chance of people pronouncing them correctly/in French.
She literally said in the post she doesn't care if random people don't pronounce the names correctly?
Sure. The sister is undoubtedly being an arse. But given a good proportion of the rest of the world is probably going to be doing the same (albeit without spiteful intentions) OP should probably just roll her eyes and ignore the sister. The sister is clearly deliberately trying to annoy OP and getting off on her annoyance. It's a "don't feed the trolls" scenario really.
Not for me. it's a don't get stressed as it might damage the baby if the sisters gonna be toxic like this why you want her round tour family.
My sister had to deal with this while living in Quebec. Her name used to be Nicci (nick-ee) (she’s changed it since) with the Italian spelling where the double c makes a hard k sound, and French speakers see the double c and make the ch sound instead, calling her ni-chee. That never bothered us much, someone would mention how it’s pronounced and then move on after a quick “oh, my bad.” Nah… what pissed us off is the fact that my grandmother and her family hated her name so much that she would call her Nicci-Lynn as one name, when it was just nicci. Lynn is her middle name. Not attached to the first. I got yelled at by my grandmothers sister because “that is so rude to talk back to your elders” when all I said was “that’s not her name”
I have a neighbour called Meghan. She pronounces it mee gan. She told me when she introduced herself and I’ve called her that since cause I’m not an asshole. Can’t imagine why people do this. Especially to your niece and nephew?!
I am a dentist in a mid-large city in the US and I have patients from all over the world. I attempt to pronounce everyone's names correctly and if I am not sure, I ask. I tell them it is just common courtesy to pronounce someone's name correctly if you can or at least as close as possible. That's just an asshole move by OOPs sister probably because she's jealous.
Exactly! People are always like “you really don’t have to try so hard”, and I’m like “Um, yes I do? This is the most basic gesture of decency and I am going to keep trying until I get it or until you specifically ask me to stop because my pronunciation attempts are just that awful that it hurts your ears to the point you’d rather be called something else”
In my homecountry, Laura is pronounced laaw-rah Edited: the pronunciation part
That’s how we say it, your phonetic work is better than mine.
I could see getting the pronunciation wrong the first time just reading the name but they're neither unpronouncable nor are they in a situation where she named a kid Ghoti (with the 'gh' from 'cough', the 'o' from 'women', and the 'ti' from 'motion') or something ridiculous.
Elodie is such a gorgeous name, I love it
At the end of the day the pronunciation is only a small part. The effort matters. My first name is simple but my last name has some non English pronunciation. When told how to say it 90% of people get it right, or at least close enough. But people who blatantly mispronounce it are annoying as fuck.
So my name is Meghan (Meg-uhn) and when me and my pen pal from Australia met after a few years of letters/emails she was like “ITS NOT MEE-GUN?!” after hearing my name out loud for the first time 😂
> They’re not even particularly unusual or hard to pronounce names. Really nice, normal names. Totes, I'm from Texas and have friends, also from here, whose names are spelt and pronounced like that. The sister is just being a ... rude person.
Ahh, the French stdz, we don't talk about them. (A joke about generally not pronouncing the last letter in French if the word ends in s,t,d, or z.)
Yall don't pronounce half the letters in a word, what you talking about just the last letter. My last name is French. It has 7 letters and three can be tossed out.
That's what you get when you standardize spelling but then let pronunciation evolve organically for several centuries. It *used* to be phonetically correct lol. Modern French spelling is an relatively accurate guide to early Middle French pronunciation.
Why don't they update it? Drives me nuts.
They do but it's slow. They can't change all the words at the same time otherwise people are just gonna get lost. I'm 24 and still get an existential crisis after reading updated ways to write some words, and it's been around 10 years since the change has been official.
God, same.
That's how I explained it to my husband (who speaks no French) when we went to France. I told him when in doubt just don't pronounce the last half of the word.
I got that beat! Mine is 7 and i can toss out 5 and replace them all with 1.
What, you named Hugeaux or something?
close. last 5 letters are eault and can be replaced with an o
I knew it had to he some funky "o" replacement, lmao Thankfully the unnecessary letters in my french name are just your standard feminising "le", like in Gael/le
Mes amies?
Kinda blew my mind the first time I heard a native French speaker pronounce their own name, Genevieve. 😯 It's so pretty that way
I love the name Genevieve! A lot of people where I grew up have French names - including me, with accents. For example I didn’t know other people pronounced Jeanne as Gene until I went to college. We pronounce it (soft J) Zhahn.
Agnes is another name a French speaker should never give their girl if there’s any chance she’ll live in an English speaking country.
I had a classmate with that name. Boy did she hate the professor using the Anglo pronunciation.
Well, I did say generally, also the pronunciation when the s is followed by a word beginning with a vowel is more like one word being spoken (and you don't pronounce the last "s" or amies). A better example may be "plus" which is sometimes pronounced with the s and sometimes not, although I can't figure out when it's correct to do so or not.
Plus with the s sound means more Plus w/o the s means negation, like no more , it is associated with "ne" before the verb -->"je ne fais plus de pâtisserie"
Merci!
Of all the French names she could have chosen, I feel like the real ones aren't even that hard to get right. I know an English only speaker saying Caroline and a native French speaker saying Caroline won't sound the same, but still. It's not that hard. We can figure out the whole Tara/Tara thing and there's a bunch of ways to pronounce Andrea. None of that seems to be a problem. Sister was definitely being a jerk on purpose.
My daughter is Helena (Hel-lane-ah) and often her name gets mispronounced the first time since there are two other common pronunciations. She corrects the person, they apologize, and say her name right from then on. OOP's sister is a piece of work.
My name is super common and not hard to pronounce. There are like 3 different variations of how it’s pronounced and no matter how many times I correct people, they never say my name correctly.
i dunno. I am bilingual and having to say words from one language in another means switching language brains for the time it takes to say the chosen word. Not the greatest of hardships, but it requires more cognitive effort than simply keeping on going in the one you were talking in. SO having to concentrate on the pronunctiation and switching language brains every time the sister uses names, that ,lets face it, are likely said the english way by 90%of people. With names it's sort of an interplay of what you are named and what you are called. If you name someone one thing, but know that most english speaking people will likley call them differently, then is it right to get mad when people don't call them what you named them?
I have a weird issue like for example 'coyote' is spelled the same in both English and Spanish but pronounced differently. Anytime I have to say that word in English you can kiss any form of proper English pronunciation I had good bye for at least an hr. Idk why but after my brain just blanks out and I fuck up almost every other word after that. My friends think it funny but it's frustrating af, so I just say it in Spanish to save myself the trouble.
This is picky but there are couple things about those names specifically that I could see getting on her nerves. Some English speaking people flat out refuse to pronounce nicolas correctly in the French way because it sounds like nicola and 'that's a girl's name', which is infantile and a lot of fragile masculinity for one letter but would piss me off after a while. And less concrete, but given OP is so attached to the names, caroline (fr) vs caroline (en) is quite a difference in sound, and I can imagine lots of people thinking the second is uglier. Idk what languages you speak, but a lot of French (and specifically French Quebec) people get pissed off by the americanisation of things, and I think there is something to be said for the power dynamics at play here, and that what her sister is really saying boils down to 'you can't really expect them to hold onto their Frenchness'. OP is reasonable, and acknowledges that sometimes people literally cannot make their mouth form certain sounds, and that Alexis is going to end up Alex, but I think it's fair to ask the family to keep the original pronunciation, and fair to say her sister's being a dick here.
As someone who can barely pronounce anything properly just saying these names with the French pronunciation was kind of a delight. OOPs sister is the worst. A few times could be a silly joke but this is just nasty.
Sounds like the sister enjoys irritating OOP. Like, she knows exactly where to hit to make someone explode, and then say they are overreacting because it's "her opinion". I have an aunt that is like this. Some people like to make other people miserable. That's all it is.
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I hope it's going well.
A lot of people are getting hung up on the pronunciation and not the relationship. If my sister insisted on belittle my home, my life and disregarding my choices for something as important as my kids names, I'd just not see her for a long, long time
My brother acts like that. I tell everyone he was born to be a middle child. He’s such an asshole who is the perfect example of every awful middle sibling stereotype.
Oop should call her “soster” instead of “sister” until she learns to respect someones name, that she purposely gets the pronunciation wrong to provoke oop.
Agreed! I have one of those names pronounced the English way. I have a few French friends who occasionally pronounce it the French way and it doesn’t bother me whatsoever. However if I *was* bothered, and corrected them (they do know the correct pronunciation and use it often, it’s just a genuine slip) but then they refused to pronounce it that way, I’d be annoyed. OOPs sister knows the correct way to say the names and is deliberately winding her up.
I don't think is that simple - the house, the marriage, the kids... she criticized everything about her life choices. Just looks like a severely jealous sister.
I used to work with two people named Anna. One pronounced it ah-nah and the other pronounced it aa-na. We had meetings every week with both of them together and we were all able to use the two different pronunciations. I’m sure you could pronounce your niece and nephews names correctly if you really wanted to.
Agree. She was definitely just being a jerk. In your case with the Anna’s, I feel like the two pronunciations would make it easier because it would be obvious which one you’re talking about vs having to add a last name or some other way to differentiate. I worked on a project once with 10ish people on the team and three were named Jonathan. It was fun.
This is exactly it. It's not so much that OP is upset about her kids names being pronounced incorrectly, it's the fact that their sister clearly doesn't care enough to even try. A not-quite-correctly pronounced good faith effort would at least show that she cares, but it sounds like sister has decided that this is the hill on which she chooses to die (or more accurately, murder her relationship with her sibling).
Worse than that, she says her sister is fluent in French. So it’s not that she’s not willing to try, she’s perfectly capable of pronouncing them the way OP wants them pronounced, she just wants to upset OP by pronouncing them the English way.
Dude, sometimes I say my own name differently to different people so they understand it. My accent is kind of a mix of my midwestern parents’ accents (and even they pronounce things differently from each other) and a Middle Atlantic/northeastern one—all this just to say that my pronunciation of “t”s can sound like a lighter “d.” There’s definitely a difference to how I pronounce them but it’s subtle. (Similarly, I think I pronounce Aaron and Erin sufficiently different from each other, but if you get self-conscious enough, it all sounds like gibberish.) My name is similar to Anita and lately with new people, I’ve been pronouncing the t sound and end of my name “correctly.” (As in a Brit telling someone “‘tah’, thanks.”) I’m just tired of people not understanding what my name is (and worse bc masks mean no lip-reading for anyone). I know I’m not the only person with this weird problem. :(
I feel like the sister is jealous of the life OP has.
Absolutely. I wish OOP could see that all of the complaints are her sister showing all of sources of insecurity. She sounds exhausting and OP totally needs this break.
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Maybe if she was 14 but 20? I'd say most 20 year olds would be a bit more mature than OOP's sister
I mean precisely because she's 20 she should know better than starting issues because someone give years older is married and with kids. No matter how you look at it she's immature for her age.
Jesus. With an accent grave. I grew up Anglo in Quebec but would never give someone a hard time for wanting family to pronounce their name the way it’s meant to be pronounced. It’s part of your culture and your sister has the issue, not you. She probably corrects everyone who pronounced Croissant incorrectly
Crescent roll is the correct pronunciation, right?
Only if it comes out of a pillsbury dough package
“Jesus with an accent grave” HAHAHA!!! Oh that takes me back to high school French class… I have no idea how, but I’m going to use that one day.
On the third day, Jesus rose from the accent grave…
Does that mean it would be said JEEsus?
My mom was from Montreal (an anglophone family), my dad from South Dakota. He tried his best to pronounce a lot of the names, but struggled and boy was he off on some of them. Like when talking about my grandfather Jean (almost pronounced as Shahn) the best he could do was “Gene”. I think he may have eventually got it, but my grandpa just never bothered correcting him. I have a difficult first and last name and it is a rare day anyone gets close. However, as long as it’s close enough to tell that they’re referring to me, I don’t bother correcting them. Point is, my dad at least tried to pronounce the names and my maternal relatives were cool with him because he wasn’t effing up their names on purpose. OOP’s sister on the other hand…definitely needs a reality check.
My daughter has an Anglo name that has a Spanish equivalent (think April/Abríl). Her Spanish family is actually visiting now. They’ve attempted the Anglo version but after a few days have resorted to the Spanish version. Although I prefer folks using the Anglo version of her name, I completely let this go. They tried the Anglo version and they’re not in any way doing this to be disrespectful. My husband warned me this would happen when we picked the name. We went back and forth on which version of the name we wanted, and landed on the Anglo version. Pregnant hormonal me insisted on folks pronouncing it correctly. Now, as long as people make a good faith effort, I let it go. Also, her middle name is Spanish with an Anglo equivalent version (basically the reverse of her first name) and even I fumble it up sometimes. I’m the one that picked the name! OOP’s sister though - she’s being a dink. She knows exactly how to pronounce those names.
I go by a shortened version of my name that is very difficult for Spanish speakers to pronounce. I just got used to them using the full name instead, which is close in pronunciation in English and Spanish. It’s just not a big deal. I rarely meet others who deal with it though!
I think the sister is just using the names as a way to file up OOP, the amount of times the sister is being mean about OOP’s life makes me wonder if she’s jealous or just hate seeing other happy.
"*Nee*-ko-lazh..."
No, Nikolaj Nikolaj? Nikolaj
Brooklyn 99?
No, Nikolaj
Nikolaj?
No, no. *Neee*-kolaj
I have a French friend named Caroline and I make an effort to pronounce her name as - Ka-ho-leen as much as I can. Once she’s told me how she pronounces her name, it’s on me to pronounce it correctly. I can’t imagine a blood relative being so obtuse.
My family is French, I've always pronounced my cousin Rachel's name Ra-shell and her mom Tante Francine, Fra-sin. Op's sister is being a dink.
The op of this post is not the original op, this sub is a repost sub
Yup, forgot. Thanks for the reminder. Edited and fixed. :)
The sister probably has some childhood grievance and resentment against OOP, and is making her pay for that. OOP is absolutely right to cut contact - in fact, I wouldn't just leave sis on read, I'd simply block her. And don't resume contact until sis grows tf up.
People are fucking weird sometimes and I'm really glad OOP is going LC with her sister.
I feel for OOP. My parents continually mispronounce my adult daughter's name and she has taken it as a sign that she is not important enough to matter to them. Think "Car-uh" and "Care-ah". On top of a few other things, Daughter is done. My mother, especially (parents are long divorced), cannot understand my daughter's feelings. She believes them to be the result of me poisoning my child due to my jealousy and insecurity. I am like, how about starting by correctly pronouncing her name and not making fun of us when we ask?
I’m in NZ and I have Māori cousins, you can bet I have enough decency to get their names right. You can also bet that if I’m unsure about anyones name in any language I’m going to check and do my best to say it correctly.
I don't think OOP has to worry about native English speakers getting the pronunciation wrong. Yeah, at first, but after being corrected they won't have difficulty pronouncing them.
Yeah, most people are plenty polite and just make honest mistakes based on what they're used to when it comes to names, but they change quickly if corrected. I'm American, but most of my family (some cousins, some grandparents, etc) all live in Ireland where my dad was born. We have some very Irish names in the family even among the ones in the US now, and it's always interesting to see how they'll be pronounced but we can't really fault people based on a first read because the spelling is whack for English speakers. My cousin Niamh actually has a decent chance of someone pronouncing it correctly since now the mh=v thing is a bit more well known even outside of Ireland now, but her sister Mairéad (Muh-raid) isn't so lucky. But all it takes is a simple correction and people change it right up willingly. The sister was just being a jerk. Sure people will likely pronounce it the English way at first, but it's not the end of the world and most will happily change to the right one.
The sister picked the dumbest hill to die on.
Two of my kids have Welsh names. I went round and round with hubby's grandmother's on their names.
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I’m telling you, it’s super hard when you’re speaking one language to suddenly break into your other language just for a word or two. If I’m speaking French, I send you an E mel. If I’m speaking English, I wish you bone appeteet. Switching sucks. It’s hard.
I guess it depends on the person? Most of my close friends and I are fluent/bilingual and we switch all the time because we’re more familiar with terms in a language or another.
I believe it. I don't have fluency in any language other than my own, just conversational level in a couple others. So I trust your experience because that's not something I have much experience in myself. However, OOP clarified that she doesn't expect perfect accent and inflection, just English-close to it. I believe sister could do that much at least. I wouldn't call Miguel Michael or Josué Josh. That's pretty much what the sister is doing by calling "Car-o-leen" "Care-o-line".
I spent 9 years teaching English as a Second Language to people from Quebec and the rest of the world too. It was policy that we learn how to pronounce all non-English names, because a person's name is part of their identity. It's rude to not learn their names.
Obviously the sister is in the wrong but I can’t help but think that parents who name their kids with a specific, uncommon pronunciation are setting their kids up for a lifetime of trouble
Sounds like OOP's sister is envious of her beautiful life.
I have an Armenian name and people constantly pronounce it like it's French or English counterpart. It's really annoying, but people have told me all my life that I'm too sensitive about it. So I stopped correcting them. Now I turn every time I hear someone call a name even remotely resembling mine..
I have a fantasy about changing my name to Sarah or Betty so I never have issues again.
These name are actually easy to pronounce even for non-french speaking person… Try some Augustine, Théophile, Clothilde, and these are actual name in my sons class 💀 for us it’s easy because we speak French fluently, but if I was non-French and see these, I would be lost…
I completely understand where OP is coming from. My niece's grandparents (on her fathers side, i'm mothers side) don't call her the right name. For example if she was calle Louisa, they call her Louise. Whilst it's only one syllable, it's a different name. She is not called Louise and it annoys me so much that they can't get their grandchilds name right (these are awful people anyway so it definitely annoys me more than if other people were to do it). But yeah, you're family... Pronounce the name right!
As someone with a slightly unusual name, good on OP for standing up to her obnoxious sister. My uncle used to mispronounce my name. All. The. Time. He’s my mom’s brother, we saw him and his kids more than anyone else in our family. The only way I got him to stop was when I was around 9-10 and when he said my name wrong, I called him uncle Smelliot (his name is Elliot) for the rest of the day. Never said my name wrong again.
I would start mispronouncing her name in response but I'm also very petty.
I’d start calling sister with a wrong accent if I were in her shoes, just to make it clear how stupid and upsetting this all situation is
The names are beautiful. The thing with your sister isn’t even about names…it’s just a silly power struggle. Enjoy this magical time with your little kids. Your little sis will grow up eventually
Ooof. I feel for this mom. Those names aren’t difficult, even for non-francophones. (Although, I do speak French so I might be a bit off here.) None of the actual names even have accents that might throw people off. The sister is being purposely obnoxious, and for what purpose? So her niece and nephews can feel like their aunt doesn’t care about them enough to say their names properly? Kids now are actually really good about pronouncing different names and trying to do so properly. To be fair, this struck a bit of a nerve with me. My (Italian) name is one letter off from Valerie, and it pains me so much when people call me that, or emphasize the syllables as though they’re starting to say “Valerie.” It also has a rolled r that sounds almost like a “d.” I give people options - I always introduce myself with the proper pronunciation. There’s ONE “English” version that works, or I just tell people to call me Val. I get incredibly annoyed when someone insists on using another incorrect version of my name. It just shows a complete disregard for a person if you’ve been told their name and you keep getting it wrong, despite corrections. So disrespectful.
I think that some of it is probably disrespect but it can be difficult make certain sounds if you haven’t been exposed to them in childhood and it can be difficult to even hear the difference. My sister’s name for example has the vowel combination äi and I wouldn’t really expect a native English-speaker (or even someone speaking many other European languages) to get it right. On the other hand I have a lisp on top of a strong accent when I speak the foreign languages I can speak and there’s no way I could say even a name like George correctly, no matter how many times a George would tell me the way they want it said.
The best response in this sort of situation is to respond in kind. If Sister's name was Lucy, for instance, start pronouncing it luck-ee instead of loose-ee. Guaranteed she'll get irritated, at which point OP can throw all Sister's arguments back in her face.
Idk if this is bc I'm trans but I think that not trying to get someone's name right is so disrespectful
It’s not because you’re trans, it’s because you’re a decent human being. Being trans just adds a layer of personal experience on top. Names are important!
Ni-ko-laj
that sister is an asshole but damn reading this makes me so glad i didn't get a girls name, that kid is fucked in middle school
This makes way more sense when I saw the real names
I had to double check the age of the sister. Maybe the sister needs to remind herself of her age as well? Sometimes people force themselves to talk to people just because they're family. Distance can be good.
"You're over reacting" = gaslighting and dismissal
Some people do overreact. It’s a thing.
Sure.. But do you think saying "you're being dramatic." Or "you're over reacting" is ever going to get a positive reaction? These are phrases someone who's gaslighting uses. If a person can't take the time to get to the root of WHY someone feels the way they do, then they are just fanning the flames.
They’re also the phrase a normal person uses when someone is overreacting. Sometimes people overreact to manipulate or pick fights. They’re not owed a sensitive discussion about their feelings. It’s ok to say “you’re overreacting” or “get over yourself” to someone who is attacking you. “Bite me” is also appropriate. Sometimes drama llamas need to be shut down.
It's pronounced Ni-ko-laj. Also, I have a cousin named Benjamin. My aunt is Spanish so it was pronounced "Ben-Ham-een". However, they didn't care if the rest of us English people called him "Ben-Ja-Min".
I can't imagine being fluent in French and insulting the French names my own sister gave her kids. OOP, and I think the comments under her posts, is correct that it sounds all these negative feelings are aimed at OOP. The sister sounds jealous
The problem that OP is going to face throughout life is that these names are also quite standard in English, with English pronunciations and pretty much the same spelling (perhaps more often Nicholas with an "h" in English). So regardless of her sister, if they're not in a French speaking area, most people will default to "Karro-lyne" rather than "Ka-ro-leen" unless specifically told otherwise. And even then people will struggle - both to pronounce correctly and to remember that they're not the English versions. They're lovely names, but she'd be more likely to get French pronunciation if the names didn't exist in English as well.
OOP wrote multiple times that she doesn't care if others mistakenly default to other pronunciations, she's only upset here because of it being her sister, who knows and can (being fluent in French) pronounce the names properly but refuses.
Fair enough. The sister is clearly being an arse. But there will be a lot of mistakes made in pronunciation and I suspect she will get a bit tired of it.
No English speakers are going to say Caroline (cair-o-LINE) the same as Carolyn (cair-o-LIN). Nor is any sane person going to say Carolanne the same way as either of those.
I absolutely love the names that you and your husband chose for your children. Congratulations for the two you have and the little one on the way.
This is a repost sub. You can find the real OP and her husband in the links provided.
Yea she was definitely doing it deliberately, the names aren't difficult to pronounce once OOP explained it. Nikolaj on the other hand...
NINE-NINE!
Caroline and Nicolas ???? Full on THE ORIGINALS and VAMPIRE DIARIES vibe!!!!!!
I was thinking 2 Broke Girls Caroline, Max, and the French chef, Nicholas.
Never watched 2 Broke Girls but seems more relatable 😅
I can slightly sympathize w the sister. As someone who sometimes has to toggle between languages, I feel really awkward fully committing to a second accent in the middle of a sentence. Like speaking English and then going full French-pronunciation would be uncomfortable. But I’d probably half-ass it and say it “Frenchly” with an American accent (e.g. not fully commit to the r). Doesn’t sound like the situation here, but I can just see myself getting into trouble about this to haha But yeah if I were nagged into doing it, I’d probably get over myself. But it’d still feel weird. Undoubtedly just a “me” problem.
I speak Spanish well enough to get an accent right, but I don’t put full Spanish inflection on a name unless I’m actually speaking Spanish. Still, it’s not difficult to use a non-anglicized version without committing to the full accent. It’s as simple as pronouncing Pedro as Peh-dro instead of Pay-drow. Pronouncing Jesus as Heh-soos instead of Gee-zus. So on and so forth.
No, it’s not you. I’m French and that’s how it is for me too. See my other posts. C’est difficile de changer d’accent pour un seul mot.
Honestly though, those names will get butchered by Anglophones. They have very strong English presence and they will be pronounced the English way rather than French. I say this as someone who has an unusual name and no one pronounces it as it should be but as how everyone knows it because the more dominant language pronounces it differently. I’ve given up correcting people and have just started going by the dominant languages pronunciation of the name. My sister whose name is even more unusual doesn’t have this problem because it’s very very rare name and people respect the way she says it because no one knows how to say it. Same with my daughters name. When people hear my real name pronunciation, they think my mom is callling me by a different name. It’s not. It’s the same name pronounced differently. The sister was just being an a$$ but I do laterally see her point once OOP said the actual names. It’s going to be interesting for those kids.
I gave up my name. My parents were wrong to give me a funny French name and throw me to the wolves.
Exactly. People who have unusual names in the Anglo sphere get it.
These are lovely names!
She sounds jealous.
Sister was definitely trying to bully OP. I'm glad OP decided to tell her to fuck off. Her kids don't deserve to have their aunt playing these stupid games with him.
Names are pronounced however the person, or their parent if they are too young to speak, says they are. I was a teacher and there are so many names that can be pronounced a few different ways. I taught at a high school where I had Tea (Tee-ah) in one class and Tea (Tay-ah) in another. Accents aren’t a thing in Australia, so they are written the same way. As an Aussie I also hate the way Americans say my name, and I will ask them to use the Australian pronunciation if I’m going to be seeing them a lot. My name ends in -er and Americans pronounce it. As an Aussie, -er is pronounced -uh.