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Worx Sep 25, 2025

Should you copy a person's accent when pronouncing their name?

Should you copy a person's accent when pronouncing their name? - Lemmy NSFW

For example, an English person might introduce themselves as “Bob”, whereas an American with the same name might introduce themselves as “Bahb”. (Sorry, don’t know the phonetic alphabet but hopefully you get my gist) Should you pronounce those two people’s names the same, with your own natural accent, or should you copy how the person says their own name?

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corsicanguppy Sep 25, 2025

My birthname is anglicized French. The English form is well-known. I hate it. I cope. No one’s gonna get it right.

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crypto Sep 25, 2025

It’s a French name pronounced the English way?

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corsicanguppy

Yep. It’s like Michel/Michelle/Michael, if the anglo form derived not from the Hebrew but the French form; and badly: Meekul (which isn’t bad by itself, but is just uncanny-valley weird).

To make matters worse, the discordant form is popular in some famous boomer/X vocalists; so I commiserate with Sade, a local clerk, and we get to eye-roll in unison about it.

Bah. It’s not peak-discordant (imagine a ‘Moy-KELLE’ that isn’t a Michaela), so it’s no significant source of stress; just a footnote . But enough about boring me.