Am I the only one that gets the feeling this woman has a hard time saying her own name? Please tell me I’m not imagining this.
Every time it’s "Hello, I’m (long pause, deep breath, eyes widen in look of fear) … *Uma Pemmaraju! *
I don’t get it. People of different ethnic backgrounds are funny?
Name looks pretty easy to pronounce to me.
I have to admit, I should know better than to be annoyed by this, but it annoys me. My name is not much easier to white people than hers but I think it’s easy.
I do the same thing, even though I have an English name. There’s about a dozen different ways to misspell my last name. When I tell somebody my name, I slow it down and hit the consonants hard. If the listener is writing it down, I automatically spell it out.
When I order from a certain local ethnic restaurant, I even shorten it; N-O-T-T.
I wonder about Soledad O’Brien. Was she named after the prison? What was the prison named after?
Soledad is a fairly common Hispanic name. It means “loneliness” or “solitude”. I’m assuming the prison name means largely the same thing.
No, it’s funny (interesting funny) when someone seems to pause each they say their name. When someone like Paul Harvey does it, it’s an obvious affectation; I don’t think that’s the case here, but I notice it nonetheless and was wondering if anyone else did. Race has nothing to do with it.
Try to catch FOX at the top of the hour on weekdays, and tell me if I’m imagining things.
You’re just a shill for FOX News, aren’t you, furt? How do you live with yourself?
After re-reading my OP, I see where some people may have misunderstood me; my comment is not on her name per se. It’s on the fact that when she says it, she looks (to me) like she’s afraid she’s going to mispronounce it.
There’s local NPR announcer here that can’t pronounce his own name, or at least has a different idea of how to pronounce it than everyone who speaks to him. The name is “Bud,” which he chooses to rhyme with “good.”
Believe me, if I was gonna shill for FOX, it wouldn’t be on the basis of their afternoon shows. I like Brit Hume, and usually flick the tube off after the midnight news. I turn it on the next day, and there’s our girl.
Okay, gotcha ya. I didn’t realise it was how she said it herself.
we’re cool 
Mee-chelle (Michelle) Norris (NPR); Su-zahnne (Suzanne) Malveaux (CNN).
I thought it was Me’Shell Norris, based on her pronunciation. Like the poet and singer songwriter Me’Shell Ndege Ocello. Radio means only hearing names, not seeing them, so I make up my own spellings for their names.
You need to get up earlier … Kiran Chetry … yeeeeoooowww!!!