Member Nicknames

[Teldurn]

But is it "Bahk" like Johann Sebastian Bach?

You do know that it really isn't pronounced Bahk, right? It's Bach. I know Americans can't make the ch sound very well, but it's not Bahk.

And Sjeng is indeed pronounced as Sheng in English. Not S-"dzjeng".

My mind did say Eye-ven-bach (with an actual German bach) and Teemoo (only shorter, not like a cow's moo).

Torilen to me is Toh-Ree-Len.

And Say-jung-zach.

Yes, I am aware it's not a straight k-sound. There's more of a soft, throat-clearing khhh sound.

[IvenBach]

I myself have always wanted to be somewhere where they give you those paper name tags saying Hello, My name is: put on there Bob. When people come up to me and say 'Hello Bob' simply correct them and say with a straight face and dead serious tone Excuse me it's pronounced Phillip. Came about on the random ways people try to uniquefy names nowadays.

[sajungzak]

And yeah, -ch is not -k. The J- in Juan is also correctly pronounced like the German -ch-, maybe a teensy tad softer.
There are many sounds, vowels and consonants and diphthongs, that Americans think they can't pronounce. Just try, it's not hard. I mean, at all.

It's my respect (and curiosity) of different languages that actually made me open this thread.

It may be a German thing, (I know very little of any language other than English and Spanish, and I know barely any Spanish.) Juan (Spanish) is pronounced wh-awn like yawn. Is Juan a German name too?

[knightkrawler]

No, it's a Spanish name, and exclusively by English speaking people is it pronounced like yawn or jooen or worst of all who-awn or who-ahn.
Which is what I'm talking about. It is a beautiful name when pronounced (almost and/or attemptedly) correctly. When pronounced in the North American way(s)... I won't even comment on that. The thing is, a German speaker or a Finnish speaker or a Portugese Speaker or a Greek speaker or whoever (you get my meaning) will even try to pronounce it close to the Spanish sound because it really really isn't difficult. At all.

/xwan/ cf. IPA

The English version of Juan would be John, the German Johann(es), abbreviated Hans, the Dutch/Scandinavian version is Jan, the French is Jean.

My last name is Hassler. The closest pronunciation to that when spoken by an American would be Hustler (British ending without rhotism) if I had to transcribe it for an American audience, by the way. You don't have that -a- sound it takes here. But that would not be impossible to say for you. That being said, I wouldn't wanna be called Hessler which is how you'd instinctively pronounce it having the word written in front of you. And it is just wrong. It is not my name. There is a meaning in every word which is also carried by pronunciation, not only by orthography, so when I borrow a word (especially a name - because of respect for the person) into my language I'll try to carry over the full meaning including pronunciation to the best of my knowledge and vocal organs.

Juan's name is not Yawn.

Back to topic, my heart is racing.

[TMU]

TMU I got the suspicion he wants to have it pronounced like when an American says his real first name Teemu, right?

Actually, all Americans I've talked to, say it as Timo, isn't it a German name as well?

[chaoticprime]

TMU I got the suspicion he wants to have it pronounced like when an American says his real first name Teemu, right?

Actually, all Americans I've talked to, say it as Timo, isn't it a German name as well?

I actually speak your name by pronouncing each letter.

[knightkrawler]

TMU I got the suspicion he wants to have it pronounced like when an American says his real first name Teemu, right?

Actually, all Americans I've talked to, say it as Timo, isn't it a German name as well?

Timo is a German first name, yes. It was popular some 25 or 35 years ago and then again a few years back. It has no relation with the Finnish Teemu or Estonian derivatives.

[TMU]

TMU I got the suspicion he wants to have it pronounced like when an American says his real first name Teemu, right?

Actually, all Americans I've talked to, say it as Timo, isn't it a German name as well?

Timo is a German first name, yes. It was popular some 25 or 35 years ago and then again a few years back. It has no relation with the Finnish Teemu or Estonian derivatives.

But Timo is a Finnish first name too My father is Timo

[knightkrawler]

Is it an old Finnish name? If so, it has nothing to do with the German version. The spelling AND pronunciation congruency would be completely coincidental, I'd wager, because of the cultural and historical distance of the two languages that, as we know, belong to completely unrelated language families. The German version is derived from Timotheus (like Tim), the Finnish version is probably at least as old as that and completely unrelated.

Many names and words that have a vowel-consonant-vowel-consonant-... pattern developed convergently in several languages.

[sajungzak]

I don't want to get you blood pressure up kk, but I am genuinely interested. In Spanish class the teacher, being from Spain, lamented that she had to teach us Mexican Spanish per state requirements. She preferred her native pronounciation and shared it with us on many occasions. I wonder if that contributes to North Americans Spanish pronunciation issues. I can only remember a few. Z is either like c (s) or th. I think. Aaarrrg I can't remember. I only took that class because I had to and I didn't get an A, that's for sure.