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 Wed Apr 11, 2007 0:35 am Have you ever thought of drawing a genealogy table? |
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Maybe it means something beautiful in another language! Still, it must be traumatic for the poor girl. Especially since there are different ways of pronouncing proper names.
I had a teacher in primary school (I was in Switzerland at the time) who pronounced my name as if it was French -- it sounded dreadful, let me tell you (especially the first syllable!). |
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Conchita
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| Wed Apr 11, 2007 0:55 am Have you ever thought of drawing a genealogy table? |
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Hi Tom
There really ought to be a law against giving babies names like that. Poor kid.
I think I may have told this story in the forum once already, but I went to school with a guy named Theodore Baer. Naturally his nickname was Teddy. He also had a younger sister named Panda. Honest!
Hi Conchita
I've often had the feeling that there are an inexplicably large number of French teachers out there who do odd things to words. One of my French professors at university was really ... errr... unusual. It was amazing what she could do even to simple French words. To this day I remember the way she said "oui". Her pronunciation always involved quite a bit of slurping and a slight whistle, as I recall. Even back in the days before I'd ever visited France, I had my doubts that the French actually slurped and whistled their words so much -- at least not without a glass of wine and a couple of missing teeth. 
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ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English |
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Yankee
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| Wed Apr 11, 2007 10:40 am Have you ever thought of drawing a genealogy table? |
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| Yankee wrote: | | To this day I remember the way she said "oui". Her pronunciation always involved quite a bit of slurping and a slight whistle, as I recall. |
It's just as well nobody can see (or hear) me right now, as you've had me performing a series of funny things with my mouth for a while!
Well, it's true that some people do let out a kind of whistling sound after the word 'oui' when it stands alone or isn't followed by another word. The same applies to other words ending in 'i'. It's a kind of blowing through the tongue and is similar to the German 'ch' in 'ich'. It's certainly not a general phenomenon, though, and is uncommon in Swiss French, for example. |
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Conchita
Language Coach
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Location: Madrid, Spain
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| Wed Apr 11, 2007 14:38 pm Have you ever thought of drawing a genealogy table? |
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Conchita, I bet you wanted to smack that teacher. hehe
I suppose I would be "Tome" in France, unless they went with the full-length "To-MAH".
I greatly prefer the Spanish rendering of my name (to that of the French): "To-MAS".
In France, Amy would be "ah-MEE", or "friend". 
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prezbucky
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| Wed Apr 11, 2007 23:20 pm Have you ever thought of drawing a genealogy table? |
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| prezbucky wrote: | | I suppose I would be "Tome" in France, unless they went with the full-length "To-MAH". |
Yes, you'd be 'To-MAH' in French ('tomme' is a delicious soft or semi-soft cheese similar to camembert). |
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Conchita
Language Coach
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Location: Madrid, Spain
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