For the record, it's pronounced Mc-Lock-lin. Say after me, Mc. Lock. Lin.
At Toastmasters, there are a lot of introductions, by different people. "To give us a book review, please make welcome Ben McLaughlin". "To present the awards for tonight, here's Ben McLaughlin". Lot's of stuff like that.
The other night, I was getting a lot of interesting interpretations of my name, the most common being, "Mc-Larf-lin". There was also the odd "Mc-Lollin" and "Mc-lin".
Hey, if you can't work out how to say the middle bit, what the heck, just skip it.
I'm not bitter. I know I have a name that is not pronounced the way it's spelt. I blame the Irish, the Gaelic, the Scottish, and what ever other joker was involved with coming up with it. Thanks, forefathers.
Anyways, just so you know: Mc. Lock. Lin.
Huldra Forsvant (Theodor Kittelsen)
Huldra Forsvant (Theodor Kittelsen)
7 comments:
Lol...good to know...i would have pronounced it mc..loff..lin.
Try 'Cruickshank' on for size before you whinge too hard, Ben. If people see it spelled, they can't say it: if you say it, people can't spell it. And once I was talking to a salesperson on the phone and she got the giggles because I 'have the same name as the cat in Harry Potter.'
I hear you.
Try Laetitia. That's L'T-sha. The first syllable is either a short Le or La - don't go heavy on the vowel.
And do not equate me with a tissue or a sneeze - it's not L'tish-a.
I started work last week. Someone had muffed my name's spelling. Fun and games explaining that yes, there are two t's and two i's but it's TI TI A, not IT IT A. Sigh. Took a few days but it's all sorted out. At least they can all pronounce it correctly. :-)
I have a Scottish father-in-law; I'm good with Scottish names. We're still training my mother that it's M'kI, to rhyme with eye, not Ma-Kay and we're no longer living in Mackay.
Beth- good that I nipped it in the bud then!
Joanna- I do sympathise. I see your name as one that you pronounce correctly if you just look at it quickly and say it, but the longer you look at it, the more you second guess yourself. But assuming it's 'crook', then I think I've always pronounced it right.
Laetitia- Yeah, yours is a bit tricky. I find the spelling harder than the pronunciation. It takes a lot of will power to not leave out the 'e'.
Ben, interesting that you'd be inclined to leave out the 'e' - it's commonly spelt Letitia. However it's actually a Latin name and the a and e can be written back to back as used to often be seen in Caesar.
It may help to remember a town in PNG - Lae - for the beginning spelling. :-)
Yeah, 'crook' is right, Ben! Funnily enough, on Saturday night I was in a bookshop and saw the new print run of the book which won the PM's history prize last year. I'd reviewed it & in the front cover they had included a positive quote from my review. I was totally stoked, but then noticed they had also spelled my name wrong. Left out the second 'c'. Chagrin!!
Jo - bummer man - that's worse than my horror story with newspapers in Lightning Ridge because books linger longer than one week's edition of a paper.
The horror story is that when I was the Lightning Ridge Area Manager (a position with Walgett Shire Council) I was called upon as Council's rep for a good news story about a project we did in LR. I'm there with my official badge on (correct spelling) - not one of the three newspapers could record my name correctly.
And they all differed from each other. I think one even got both my first name and my surname (just Bailey then for those who haven't met me) incorrect.
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