Tuesday 13 January 2009

A schwa by any other name.

January 13th  2009

Ruth has emailed me and made it all clear. It seems that ‘PAD-el’, or ‘Paddle’ was how her Father pronounced their family name and as Ruth writes, “since Kirsty said she wanted to pronounce it that way I thought who am I to say her nay?” 

It strikes me as an act of generosity to allow someone to pronounce one’s own name as they see fit, or at least it did until I read the comment by Palash Dave on the mysteries of the schwa and realised the error of my ways. Thank you Ruth and indeed, Palash. I apologise to Kirsty Young for even questioning her pronunciation.

Yours,

LibraDoodle

1 comment:

Louis Barfe said...

At university, I made the decision not to correct anyone's pronunciation of my name unless it was spectacularly offensive. The result was that some lecturers called me Louie, some called me Lewis, and others called me that slacking piece of shit. Not offensive, just accurate.