Using diacritics/graphemes for stylistic reasons?

General Name Discussion
1

I’m not particularly well educated on this subject, so to anyone more knowledgeable - please feel free to correct my usage of any words I may have misunderstood!

From what I understand, a diacritic is “mark” added to a letter to change its sound, for example an umlaut (e.g. ä ë ï ö ü, as in naïve or Chloë) or an accent (e.g accute accents - á é í ó ú, as in café or Esmée). A grapheme, I’m not sure how to explain, but I’m pretty sure the term does refer to letters like œ (as in fœtus or Œdipus) and æ (as in archæology or Cæsar). Again, as I say, correct me if I’m wrong - I’m going from my own basic knowledge and things I’ve picked up online.

Using letters or characters in words they wouldn’t fit in under normal rules isn’t an entirely foreign concept (see: Ke$ha or BΔSTILLE for example), but I’d be interested to know what people think of this idea in names.

For example, from what I know, in English æ is pronounced like “ee” (archæology, pædophilia, encyclopædia etc). I came across the name Maery quite sometime ago, which I imagine is pronounced “mair-ee” or even “may-ree”, and it stuck with me, as has Maera (“mair-ah”/“may-rah”). However, something about the spellings Mæry and Mæra just seem cleaner to me and I have no idea why. Of course, that would really change the pronunciations to something like “meer-ee” and “meer-ah” respectively.

Now, note that I would probably never use either in real life and if I did, I’d almost certainly go for the the non-grapheme spellings, but it has made me wonder what people think of the practice in general.

As one example, I have seen the name Chloé, pronounced “chlo-ee” rather than the expected “chlo-ay” (or something thereabouts, not sure if the true pronunciation can really be conveyed through text!). Likewise, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen [name]Phaedra[/name] spelled Phædra and pronounced “fay-drah” at least once (not certain on what the correct pronunciation is for this name, though).

[name]Do[/name] you think this is acceptable, within the rights of creative licence? Or do you think it is tacky and makes the parent seem uneducated? Have you ever come across this in real life, or heard of anyone doing it before?

2

Augh. This annoys me SO much. x_x

There’s nothing wrong with using an accent mark (if you’re allowed to on forms etc) providing you’re using the correct accent mark. It’s just sheer stupidity not to what with internet access these days. If I saw ‘Chloé’ written like that then I’d pronounce it ‘clo-ay’ and refuse to do otherwise because that’s what it says. Putting the wrong mark is indeed tacky and uneducated.

The thing with ‘ae’ and ‘ӕ’ is interesting. I mean. If I saw ‘ӕ’ I’d instinctively know how it was meant to be pronounced but in general written English it’s not used very often and most of the time I see ‘encylcopaedia’ spelt thusly (<this spell checker doesn’t even recognise that spelling…)

However, sometimes, ‘ae’ can make different sounds like… aerial, aeroplane, antennae etc So you can’t take it for granted that all ‘ae’ is really ‘ӕ’ in disguise.

I think the general rule is that if the word has a root in the Greek -ai- or Latin -ae- and contain an ‘ae’ which makes the ‘ee’ sound then you are allowed to write it as ‘ӕ’. Here’s a list: List of English words that may be spelled with a ligature - Wikipedia

3

I see you’re in [name]London[/name], but here in the US, we cannot use any marks on official forms. Curious to see if you can across the pond or any where else?

4

I imagine you’ll be able to in most European countries where accents are commonly used. It seems we’re allowed to as well. I found this: http://www.deedpoll.org.uk/Forms/PrintableCharacters.pdf

It’s part of the deed poll instructions for changing your name but if they allow accent marks then, I’m pretty sure they must allow them on birth registrations too.

Edit: I remembered that the reason we’re able to is because there might be accent marks in Gaelic and Welsh.

5

We’re allowed accent marks on the birth registration forms.

And I agree with what [name]Ren[/name] said up there, she’s a clever girl.

6

Pretty much my thoughts exactly there. Despite the fact that Chloé may look far fancier than Chloë or [name]Chloe[/name], just as I like the look of the ‘ӕ’ in Maery/Maera, actually using them and then expecting people to follow an incorrect pronunciation just makes the user come across as uneducated and I’d be reluctant to pronounce the name their way.

Interesting that such marks can’t be used in the US! Is there a particular reason for that?

7

I don’t know. Does anyone know why we can’t? As a Spanish speaker, it’s really annoying personally, particularly for last names. For example, Nunez in Spanish would be pronounced very differently than Núñez, but we can’t use the ñ or the ú.

8

I agree with [name]Renny[/name] too :slight_smile:

There probably is a very good reason that one of our American friends can enlighten us with, but I don’t think general American English spellings use the æ or œ symbols anyway. We would spell the following thusly: encyclopaedia, archaeology and foetus. But I think the American spellings are encyclopedia, archeology and fetus. So I wonder what they’d make of Mæry?

American English spellings never cease to amaze me! Only the other day I learnt that they spell chilli ‘chili’ :smiley:

9

Well we’re still on your side of the pond, but up here in [name]Canada[/name] we can use accents on official forms. I have an accent aigu in my middle name and it is visible in my printed name in my passport. I get annoyed when it’s not used, because the accent does change the pronunciation.

As to using accents in names, I think it depends. If it’s a name that typically has an accent (e.g., [name]Fran[/name]çois) or that the parents want pronounced in a certain language (e.g., Béatrice vs [name]Beatrice[/name]) than it makes sense, but if they’re in a place like the US, they need to remember that many people won’t necessarily know how to pronounce it. As to using it in unusual names to guide pronunciation (like say, Beyoncé), it doesn’t bother me, but again not everyone will say it properly at first sight, even with the accent. But if you’re just throwing accents in there and not even pronouncing them the way they’re intended (like Chloé), sorry but it does look uneducated.

10

Slightly off topic but I’d always say clow-e rather than clow-a for [name]Chloe[/name].

11

And that would be fine because there’s no accent to tell you any different (even though technically it should say Chloë). But é is pronounced ‘ay’. So Chloé is always going to say ‘clo-ay’ and not ‘clo-ee’

12

I was named after my grandmother’s maiden name, Reiné, but since accents aren’t used on American documents, so my parents had to drop it and name me [name]Reine[/name]- and instead of calling me something on the lines of [name]Renee[/name]/[name]Rain[/name]-ay call me [name]Rainy[/name]. I really, really wish American forms allowed the use of accents, because most Americans know how the ‘é’ is pronounced.
I do think more characters need to be allowed, especially in my heavily Hispanic influenced area.

Note: The only common word in American English that has the ‘ae’ spelling but pronounced ‘ee’ is orthopaedic. Messes me up every time.

13

I think it’s tacky.

14

Hmmm this confuses me because my family is very swedish and my great aunts are named [name]Linn[/name]éa and Cârin pronunced Li-neer and Core-in. So how could we be the only ones allowed to use marks on official papers in the states?

15

Taken from the ssa.gov website:

SSA follows Public [name]Law[/name] 100-235 when printing characters on SSN cards. This law requires all Federal databases to follow standards determined by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and to use the 26 letters of the alphabet without diacritical marks. (A diacritical mark is a mark added to a letter to give it a special phonetic value; e.g., the two dots placed over the letter “u”.)

http://policy.ssa.gov/poms.nsf/lnx/0110205125

16

Oh I believe you but I’m just so confused because I’ve literally seen their birth certificates. My great aunt [name]Linn[/name]éa and uncle [name]Dick[/name] recently had to sell the family house because it’s on a waterfront property in Mystic, CT (like the [name]Julia[/name] [name]Roberts[/name] move, Mystic Pizza) so it has very high taxes that they just couldn’t afford anymore. While we were helping them pack up we found a lot of the old family photo albums and one was just an album with all the important papers and documents and such. There birth certificates had diacritic marks on their names.

Maybe a nurse let it slide? Or it was a long time ago?

17

Mnmemily15- I did a lot of googling to find the above, and some states allow or let it slide on birth certificates. But it’s a no-go on social security cards and passports.

18

Oh I love these fun extra little marks on letters! Americans are generally stupid of other languages. I think it’s out of sheer ignorance that we don’t allow accent marks (ñ and n are extremely different, but that is very very tricky); since we tend to read at a 5th grade level, keeping those marks out really levels the playing field. I’ve studied Hebrew, Spanish, French, and Latin, and I still can’t get all the little marks right (try Hebrew vowels for a real trip).

I love them though, and Søren is 100% cooler than just ol’ [name]Soren[/name]. I honestly have no idea when or how to use æ and œ [name]IRL[/name] with American English, but in a name, they intrigue me greatly.

19

The average reading level of American adults is 7th-8th grade. Not sure where you got your 5th grade stat but it’s wrong. Please stop trying to make Americans look stupid (Americans are generally stupid of other languages.) There’s a difference between ignorance and stupidity. You can claim that Americans are ignorant of other languages and I would not disagree with you about that.

In the UK, nearly half the workforce has a reading level expected of children leaving primary school.

ETA: There’s a mention of diacritics in this paper:

Prohibitions of accent marks and other diacritical marks are common. For example, the California Office of Vital Records provides a handbook to county vital records departments that states birth names can be recorded using only “the 26 alphabetical characters of the English language with appropriate punctuation if necessary.” The handbook further specifies that “no pictographs, ideograms, diacritical marks” (including é, ñ, and ç) are allowed. Hence the prohibition of “Lucía” discussed in the Introduction. Kansas imposes similar restrictions. In Massachusetts, the “characters have to be on the standard American Keyboard. So dashes and apostrophes are fine, but not accent marks and the such.” New Hampshire prohibits all special characters other than an apostrophe or dash. Accordingly, “O’Connor” is a permissible name in New Hampshire, but “Chacón” is not.

20

What have we got to do with this? O_o

[name]Poppy[/name] is an American I believe as she said ‘we’ when referencing the States.