What do you think of "creatively spelled" names?

In My Humble Opinion
41

I applaud you for your maturity and magnamity and such.

I once sent an invitation to a party to a woman who’d been introduced to me as ‘Mary Anderson’ – and that was how I spelled it on the envelope. In return I got an indignant phone call in which she reamed me out for not realizing that her name was actually “Merrie Andersen,” complete with lectures on why her parents had chosen that spelling of Mary AND a discourse on the ‘sen’ being due to Danish ancestry rather than the commonplace ‘son’ of English ancestry and how rude it was to assume you could spell a name and why hadn’t I checked…

I’ve never made a mistake on her name’s spelling again. Of course, I’ve never invited her to anything ever again either.

C’mon. My name is unusual, and hard for most people to spell or pronounce. I accept this, and answer to anything close enough to recognize. They are making natural mistakes, so why not respond with kindness or humor, instead of getting all huffy?

42

Parents who name their kids with such ‘creative’ spellings ought to think about what these will be like years later. (Assuming such parents are doing any ‘thinking’ at all.)

I once worked with a group entering names from precinct caucus sign-in lists. After a while, we got to calling out the name and spelling, and having everyone guess at the age of the person. Oddly enough, we got pretty good at it. Seems like certain names & spellings really date you.

Gertrude, Hazel, Mildred, Hilda – she’s age 60 at least, probably 70’s or 80’s.

named after food or flower or vehicle: Melon, Tulip, Daffodill, Harley, Truk – born late 60’s/70’s, probably to ‘flower child’ parents.

normal name spelled oddly: Cindee, Charitee, Lynda, Mychal, etc. – born 1980’s or early 90’s.

name spelled so wierd you can’t figure out how to pronounce it – Awstynne, Sharitee, Lukeesha, Mykall – born late '90’s - 2000’s.

Also, you could sometimes recognize not only the year a child was born, but even what TV shows his parents were watching at the time – like a whole lot of boys named Dylan are just becoming teenagers now, born to 90210 watching parents.

P.S. to those with a ‘creatively’ spelled name that you don’t like – check with your local Court about legally changing your name. It’s fairly quick, simple, and inexpensive. If you really don’t like it, change it!

43

I have an interesting situation. My name is usually spelled Nathaniel. However, my parents decided to use the “correct” spelling which is in the New Testament - “Nathanael.” It’s a little frustrating - I spell it the right way, yet no one gets it right! I have to spell my name out all the time, but I don’t mind it so much.

By the way - it’s not just my first name that is spelled incorrectly most of the time. My last name is Bjork. It’s actually a good way to weed out telemarters. I hang up if anyone pronounces the ‘j.’

44

For a common law name change, you don’t even need the court. As long as the intent is not to defraud, you can change your name, yourself, to anything you want.

Just change your drivers license first and then use it to change everything else.

I have a slightly odd first name that everyone misspells the first time. I never say it when someone is writing it down. I spell. (It’s Sharla - everyone hears Charlotte. On the up side, everyone reading it pronounces it correctly.)

Of course I married someone with a slightly odd last name that everyone misspells the first time. When I was divorced longer than I had been married, I changed back to my original last name.

45

When I was in Texas, I took up the habit of “collecting” alternative spellings for different, quite common names. I was definitely not prepared for the flood which overtook me.

Jackie.
Jacky.
Jacy.
Jacie.
Jakie.
Jaké.
Ja-Kee.
Jaquie.
Jacqee.

All pronounced the same way.

Browsing through the Bad Baby Names link that Nichol_storm provided, I keep breaking into fits of manic laughter and frantic weeping. “Cyndal”? “Ticely”? “Taybree”?

:eek:

I’m glad that the naming tradition in Finland hasn’t quite yet moved to this level. (Although showly but surely…)

46

Just to repeat a question I raised in the original post, does anybody else wonder if the parents simply were too ignorant to know how the name is supposed to be spelled, or do most people just assume the parents were trying to be “creative”?

Barry

47

I assume ignorance on the parent’s part…but then, spelling errors really aggravate me. I always worry that a lot of people think “lite” is a correctly spelled word, and so on. I’m always hollering out, “They spelled such-and-such wrong!” Very annoying, I’m sure, but spelling’s one of the few things I’m good at. One of the very few things.

48

Dung Beetle: I’m with you! I’m also a very good speller. Unfortunately, I’m a truly attrocious typer…

:wink:

Barry

49

My sister named her daughter Lynnzee. I comes from the middle names of her parents, Lynn, my sisters middle name and Z., her fathers middle initial (he has no middle name, just an initial). Lynnzee hates here name and has said she is going to change it when she turns 18, she is 13 now. I don’t blame her.

50

Maybe just because my name is clearly a creative spelling and not a mis-spelling, I assume that most odd names are the result of creativity, not ignorance. That, and the fact that some spellings are becoming more commonplace.

The one thing I used to like about my name is that I thought I was the only one. Thanks to the net, I now know that is wrong. I googled my first name once and got several hits, including one to “Women Behind Bars.” Yikes!

plain_jane, it is pronounced Bren-da (or as I say, ignore the spelling). I don’t get huffy when people try for Brin-da, though. The only pronunciation that gets promptly corrected is Brine-da. Yuck.

51

I don’t see it as ignorance of correct spelling on the part of the parents. I would certainly hope that they could at least look up the real spelling of a name. (Maybe I’m overestimating some people, though.) Rather, it’s just that they’re often misguided in trying to make their child stand out.

Lynnzee? Really? Wow. I am speechless.

52

Brynda, I hope I didn’t offend you. I do realize that most parents (I hope) are doing it on purpose. What can I say? I wish they hadn’t. At least your name is still understandable. I’m surprised that people mispronounce it.

53

I love the way this looks. That is such a neat spelling. :slight_smile:

My mother’s name is Michele. She doesn’t seem to care that everyone writes it as Michelle- it’s just an extra letter, and Michele with one L is rare.

54

No worries, you didn’t offend me at all. You would think my name isn’t that hard, but when I was younger and teachers called roll, I got lots of …pause…Lastname… I would just say “Brenda” and let 'em off the hook. Luckily, I thought it was mildly amusing rather than embarassing. And fortunately my name, although creative, isn’t that darn creative. I think if I had a name like Awystnn, I would have changed it by now.

As for the typical parent’s motivation, I dunno. Helping the child stand out? Trying for something meaningful (as in honoring Mariah Carey, however misguided that seems to me)? Showing off their own cleverness? There are probably as many different motivations as there are spellings of Jackie. :slight_smile:

55

Well, I have a very obvious Jewish last name, and my wife is Chinese. If we really wanted to mess up our children’s lives, we wouldn’t have to put all that effort into coming up with “creative” or “unique” name – all we would have to do is give them inappropriately ethnic names like “Seamus” or “Juanita.”

I would never do that, of course, but I still get a chuckle thinking about a little Chinese-American boy with the name “Seamus Goldberg”…

:wink:

56

Oh, that’s funny, godzilla. My husband’s cousin’s kid, while not Chinese-American, is still saddled with an incredibly Irish first name and a Jewish last name so outrageous that makes Goldberg sound waspy. To me, it sounds absolutely ridiculous. I always refer to him as “Seamus Horowitz,” but his real name is worse.

Brynda: I always thought of you as “Brin-da.” :slight_smile:

As far as the parent’s motivation…I usually assume that it was a misguided effort to be “creative,” although sometimes I think that it may have been ignorance. I would think ignorant if I saw a name that is spelled phonetically, like “Antwon,” and creative if I saw a name that is not the most obvious phonetic spelling, like “Jessyca.” I usually think “creative,” though, because I assume that the name was mentioned to friends, relatives, and baby nurses before the birth certificate was signed, and that someone probably told them the correct spelling and they chose not to use it.

57

My mom used to work in a hospital filling out birth certificates, and she says more than once, some lady would tell her what she wanted to name the kid, then ask Mom how to spell it!

58

Ah, we who were raised Irish (or at least partly Irish) Catholic had long come across a solution for that: In my neighborhood we had Mary Ruth, Mary Margaret, Mary Anne, etc.

59

Ah yes, dogface, I considered that, as well. But I HATED my middle name (I’ve since changed it to my maiden name when I got married - yay!). I mean, I loathed it. Not as a name by itself – as a first name it’s not bad at all. But combined with my first name, it’s easy to “twang” it and it sounds sooooo hickish.

I tried to get people to call me by my initials – J.D. – but no one could ever remember to do it. So, since I had to be Jill (which, again, I didn’t mind), I simply decided to do the “creative” spelling thing to differentiate myself.

It’s still amazing to me how many people don’t seem to know how to spell Jill, even the standard way. I’ve had to correct so many people all my life that I finally learned the easiest way to make sure they get it right is to say, “Jill, as in ‘Jack and Jill went up the hill’.” When I say it that way, they never get it wrong. If I don’t, I get Gil, Gill or Jewel more often than I get Jill. It’s really stunning.

60

Waal Heckafahr! Why on earth would she wanna do that? A fahn an’ lovely name like Lynnzee would get her inta the fahnest of double-wide-only trailer parks!