[name_m]How[/name_m] would you pronounce this? I volunteer at my church’s nursery and, my last ‘rotation’, we had a new little one: a toddler named Arrietta. I was busy helping several other toddlers with a craft and the parents plopped her down and left. The kiddos have to wear little name tags, so I called her what was written on it: Arrietta. Well, when mom came to pick her up, I told her that Arrietta had been very well-behaved and seemed to adjust really quickly to being in there. Mom absolutely flipped out and screamed at me that I was ignorant and uncultured. I was confused. Later, I brought it up to the woman in charge of the nursery-aspect of the church and she rolled her eyes and said, “She did the name thing to me. The issue is the girl’s name is pronounced “Ar-yett-ah” in the mom’s opinion and the dad calls her “Are-rita”. That’s all.”
Am I missing something here? Is it maybe pronounced differently overseas or something. I pronounced it “Airy-etta”.
Wow, some people can be so rude 
I’m sorry that happened to you!
I live in the US, and I would pronounce it the same way you would, so I guess that makes us both ignorant and uncultured 
Seriously though, if she’s so sensitive about the way her daughter’s name is pronounced, then maybe have the grace to introduce the kid to people? [name_m]How[/name_m] can she expect other people to read her mind when apparently she and the father can’t even agree on a pronunciation?
@vestigesofsummer, lol I guess so! I’m relieved I’m not the only one pronouncing it that way, at least. And I agree about her introducing her but, unfortunately, we didn’t get the chance to interact since I was tending to the other kids at that moment and my helper was talking with another parent. Situations like this are why we are striving to name our kids something that isn’t too hard to figure out the pronunciation for. People make mistakes, but there is no reason to get so nasty about it.
I’m responding without reading your post first. Initially I was going to say air-ree-etta, but then I saw those double R’s and said okay it’s R-®ee-etta.
Okay just read it, I still stand by what I said. There’s is no way, without being told that I would ever pronounce it the way mom or dad does. Btw, they don’t seem to agree either! :-). I’m sorry that happened to you, but that’s a good indication that you shouldn’t be too upset. Keep in mind that the parents aren’t even on the same page, so how can you be expected to know!
I’m in the east coast, US.
Wow she sounds like some of my customers at work! I would pronounce it ‘ari-etta’.
What an unpleasant woman!
To me it looks like an adaptation of ‘[name_f]Harriet[/name_f]’ so going from that I’d pronounce it ah-ree-et-ah