# Khreatyve name spellings, again **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 19, 2016, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680 "2016-04-19T21:54:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/41 "2016-04-28T16:29:25Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > My cite is my father-in-law giving me the name of a client he said he met with earlier that day. He’s not really the sort to make shit up, so I have no objective reason to doubt him (or his wife, who was also present with the client), but you don’t know him so you have no objective reason not to be skeptical. And this is how urban legends spread. Your father-in-law may have been teased, tricked, or duped; he may have misunderstood something in the context. But suggesting any of that will probably be taken as an insult to your father-in-law (though I hope not: it’s not my intention), and dismissed out of hand. Plus, that way you get to believe a fun story. Any challenge to the truth of a story you believe just entrenches it further. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/42 "2016-04-28T16:59:00Z")
> [@gigi](#): > > Remnds me of the James Herriot book where he’s talking about working with folks out in the country who have strong accents, and how he is advised to ask them to spell their names when he can’t understand. One guy spells “S-M-I-T-H” accompanied by a :dubious: A friend of mine worked in the music industry, and when she was hanging out with a country-western music icon she asked him to autograph an 8x10 for me. She told him my name was Mark. As he began writing, he asked how I spelled it. She said, very slowly and carefully, “M . . . A . . .R”, and he interrupted, with a scowl, “with a “k” or a “c”?” ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/43 "2016-04-28T17:07:29Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > I also know a kindergarten teacher who, one year got saddled with an am class that had a Brittany, a Britney, a Brittni, and a Bretagne, also a Brianna pronounced “Bree Anna,” and a Breyona. In the pm class, she had a Britney, a Britnee, a Brittnie a Brianna pronounced “Bree Ahna,” and just for added fun, a Bretta, and a boy named Brian. > > She was supposed to remember all these spellings, and which one went with which child. Parents got very irate when notes came home with the wrong spelling. > > This really isn’t just a matter of personal choice. It does affect other people. Reminds me of an old New Yorker cartoon showing a class picture. The caption was: Jessica, Scott, Scott, Jessica, Jessica, Scott, Jessica, Scott, Scott, Jessica, Jessica, Scott. ---
**Author:** ![Jennshark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Jennshark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jennshark)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/44 "2016-04-28T17:34:55Z")
I’ll be celebrating the day when the current generation of college-aged girls with every damn permutation possible of McKenzie, Kaitlyn and Brittany all graduate. Thank God, there seems to be an uptick in classic, pronounceable names of incoming freshmen: Anna, Sarah, Jennifer, and so on . . . ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/45 "2016-04-28T18:35:35Z")
Of course, Jennifer was the too-trendy name of its day. In the 1970s the name was absurdly overused; in grade school I never had fewer than three in my class, and one year had five. ---
**Author:** ![Jennshark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Jennshark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jennshark)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/46 "2016-04-28T18:54:28Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Of course, Jennifer was the too-trendy name of its day. In the 1970s the name was absurdly overused; in grade school I never had fewer than three in my class, and one year had five. True 'nuff: I’m a vintage 1967 Jennifer 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/47 "2016-04-28T20:09:21Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Of course, Jennifer was the too-trendy name of its day. In the 1970s the name was absurdly overused; in grade school I never had fewer than three in my class, and one year had five. Some names come in-and-out of fashion. This is one. When I was in elementary school (late 1950’s - early 1960’s) we read the obligatory stories about Colonial America and the Pioneers. Jennifer was extremely common for the little girl’s name in those stories. I guess it was a really common name in those days. I had never heard of anyone named that in contemporary America. It was just an archaic colonial-era name. Then, around the late 1960’s - early 1980’s, it suddenly became super-common again. ---
**Author:** ![Flamsterette\_X](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/41988e/32.png) [@Flamsterette\_X](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flamsterette_X)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/48 "2016-04-28T20:36:19Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > And this is how urban legends spread. Your father-in-law may have been teased, tricked, or duped; he may have misunderstood something in the context. But suggesting any of that will probably be taken as an insult to your father-in-law (though I hope not: it’s not my intention), and dismissed out of hand. Plus, that way you get to believe a fun story. Any challenge to the truth of a story you believe just entrenches it further. Exactly. I had someone just recently try to convince me that their doctor knew a Meconium, Lemonjello, and Orangejello. I don’t think so. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/49 "2016-04-28T20:53:16Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > And this is how urban legends spread. Your father-in-law may have been teased, tricked, or duped; he may have misunderstood something in the context. But suggesting any of that will probably be taken as an insult to your father-in-law (though I hope not: it’s not my intention), and dismissed out of hand. Plus, that way you get to believe a fun story. Any challenge to the truth of a story you believe just entrenches it further. [No insult taken.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxK_nA2iVXw) I could actually come up with a few different scenarios that don’t make my FIL the jackass. His brothers, who work in the same business, are racist assholes who enjoy fucking with people. I’m not a particularly stupid person but I am extremely gullible, which sometimes results in people confusing me for stupid. ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2016, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/50 "2016-04-28T23:45:00Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > I get called “Rachel” a lot. Also Deborah. “Rivkah” jut registers as “Jewish woman’s name” with some people. What surprises me is that I get called Deborah more often than I get called Rebecca. Maybe because it ends in “H.” > > Oddly, I had a gym teacher in high school who called me Elizabeth for a full semester. After two weeks, I gave up correcting him. How should Rivkah be pronounced? ---
**Author:** ![psychobunny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/54ee81/32.png) [@psychobunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychobunny)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2016, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/51 "2016-04-29T00:12:36Z")
I have an employee with a superfluous apostrophe. (Think something akin to Gabr’iela, with her explanation that her mother added it because “[the name] is Spanish”), while completely ignoring the facts that: -Spanish names don’t have apostrophes -She may have meant to give it an accent but an apostrophe is not the same as an accent mark -The placement appears to be random and has no relationship to the pronounciation This is one of those things where I didn’t want to hire her because of the headaches I foresaw in the paperwork but I decided it was unfair to punish her for her mother’s misdeeds. I wish parents would think about things like that when they kreate these knames. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2016, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/52 "2016-04-29T01:12:47Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > I don’t know what’s wrong with that though. If you speak English, and expect the child to largely intereact with people who speak English, “ACE-linn” or perhaps “AIZ-linn” are the ways that name can be pronounced. I realize that to a Gaelic speaker it’s pronounced “Azkaban” or something, but nobody will ever get it right. I can’t find in myself criticism for a person pronouncing a name in a manner consistent with its spelling in the language they and their child speaks. Why name a kid Aislinn just to mispronounce it, if it’s not your ethnicity? It seems silly to me. > [@Isamu](#): > > How should Rivkah be pronounced? “Ball peen hammer.” Seriously, most people pronounce it pretty much like it looks: “RIV-ka.” Israelis tend to say something more like “REEV-kah.” Yiddish speakers say “RIF-ka.” Most of my family calls me Rivkele, but there are a few people who call me Rifkie, and a lot of people who really do call me Rivkah Chaya. When I was little, the rabbi at our synagogue had a daughter named Rivkah, so I got called Rivkah Chaya, because she was already plain Rivkah. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2016, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/53 "2016-04-29T02:34:54Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > I don’t know what’s wrong with that though. If you speak English, and expect the child to largely intereact with people who speak English, “ACE-linn” or perhaps “AIZ-linn” are the ways that name can be pronounced. I realize that to a Gaelic speaker it’s pronounced “Azkaban” or something, but nobody will ever get it right. I can’t find in myself criticism for a person pronouncing a name in a manner consistent with its spelling in the language they and their child speaks. I didn’t see this post earlier. I have an ethnic name which is part of my heritage. It was re-spelled according to English spelling rules, so that anyone with a first-grade education ought to be able to get it right. You know what? Almost no one ever does; I’d say about one in twenty people who see it written first, and about one in ten who hear it from my lips. ---
**Author:** ![Channing\_Idaho\_Banks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/channing_idaho_banks/32/250_2.png) [@Channing\_Idaho\_Banks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Channing_Idaho_Banks)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2016, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/54 "2016-04-29T02:50:27Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Of course, Jennifer was the too-trendy name of its day. In the 1970s the name was absurdly overused; in grade school I never had fewer than three in my class, and one year had five. One of ours went by the nickname ‘Neffer’, like Neffertiti. I liked her the best. ---
**Author:** ![Rhiannon8404](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rhiannon8404/32/17929_2.png) [@Rhiannon8404](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhiannon8404)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2016, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/55 "2016-04-29T04:38:45Z")
As of yesterday, I now know two women who have named their daughter Krystyna. I suspect there are more of them out there. how disappointed these parents will be to find out their daughter’s unique name is commonplace. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2016, 6:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/56 "2016-04-29T06:34:13Z")
> [@psychobunny](#): > > -Spanish names don’t have apostrophes Hell, Spanish doesn’t have apostrophes, period. They’re one of the details that lots of ESL learners have problems with, precisely because they’re relatively rare as a grammatical feature; not so much learning to use them once you understand what they are, but understanding what they are. ---
**Author:** ![california\_jobcase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@california\_jobcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/california_jobcase)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2016, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/57 "2016-04-30T04:26:45Z")
I have posted these before, but they’re good’uns. I am a retired science teacher. Others were posting about too-common names. One year I had four Jessicas in the same class. Occasionally, I’d say _Jessica!_ in an accusatory tone just to watch four startled heads look up. There was a girl at the local Food Lion with a name tag reading Maleria. I asked her how she pronounced it, and she said “Mallory.” Another girl’s name was pronounced sha-MARE-uh. Unfortunately, she spelled it Chimera. There were two brothers, Travoris and Lavoris. Didn’t the mother know of Lavoris, the mouthwash? ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2016, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/58 "2016-04-30T12:02:56Z")
> [@california\_jobcase](#): > > Another girl’s name was pronounced sha-MARE-uh. Unfortunately, she spelled it Chimera. Is this a joke, or do you really not know [that’s a thing](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Chimera_(mythology))? ---
**Author:** ![Pai325](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c68b51/32.png) [@Pai325](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pai325)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2016, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/59 "2016-04-30T13:25:15Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > Is this a joke, or do you really not know [that’s a thing](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Chimera_(mythology))? I think it’s the incorrect pronunciation that’s bothersome. The ch is pronounced like k, not sh. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2016, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680/60 "2016-04-30T14:07:29Z")
I met a cute, polite, sweet little 2 1/2 year old boy named Michael the other day. His mother said he has a brother and sister named Thomas and Elizabeth. I really wanted to shake her hand and congratulate her on her good sense. Not to mention that in a room full of Braedons, Aidens, Jaydens, Haydens, Caydens, Hunters, Connors, Fletchers, Masons, Chandlers, Brewsters, Scribes, Apothercarys, and Witchfinders, Michael actually stands out. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/khreatyve-name-spellings-again/752680.md?page=4)