I’m one of these types of people, if I am around an accent enough, I pick it up very quickly, I cannot help it.

I’d likely pronounce a name the same as the person speaks it to me. Really depends on the accent/language and my correlating familiarity with it though.

You might have a fair point but who the fuck in the US pronounces it “Bahb”.

Lmao I don’t know why I find it funny.

Just said “hi bahb” to my grandfather bob and he told me he was going to disinherit me. But I digress I don’t know the phonetic symbols either.

My neighbor introduced himself and his wife to me, and he says “Maritza,” very flat, and I say, oh maRITza" with a little flourish and tongue roll and he’s like “no, Maritza.”

They’re both Mexican and her name is pronounced the full way with their extended families, so I think the point was, don’t accent up the word I just told you. And I haven’t since.

I try to say it exactly like they say it.

I had a coworker named Mahmoud, and all my native-English-speaking coworkers heavily anglicized the pronunciation, removing the throat-clearing sound of the h, and changing the first vowel to like the a in “math” rather than like the a in “mall”. Whenever I spoke to him, I tried to copy his inflection as best I could, and and he seemed delighted, but I never clarified if it was about my pronunciation.

American Bobs are Bohbs not Bahbs that’s Babs

No. Even if it’s foreign, I don’t put on an accent. I Anglicise the name.

I have also a sinicised version of my name for the Chinese. I even introduce myself with it. I don’t expect any foreigner to use my English name.

Wild thought: this could’ve saved the Mitsubishi Pajero in Latin America.

As a classroom teacher for students who are >80% immigrants from non-anglophone countries, I can actually speak with some authority on the subject. I have many students who have traditional names in other languages, as well as students whose parents 100% just made up something they thought sounded nice. I am one of the few teachers who emphasises correctly pronouncing students’ names. If they put stress on the second syllable, I put stress on the second syllable. If they have a non-english phoneme, you bet I’m learning how to do the clicks in Xhosa, or the “ng” in Vietnamese or Maori. I work very hard to make sure I’m pronouncing their names exactly how they do.

I have had three students in the last month alone remark on how I am the only teacher they’ve ever had who pronounced their name “right”. I have a student named Djibril who had extremely poor relationships with most of the teachers in the building, but who always does my work, and he straight up told me last year that it was because I am the only person in the entire school who actually pronounces his name correctly. Everyone else just calls him “juh-BRILL”, when he says it should be pronounced closer to “JEE-breel” (with a lilted r).

Making sure you pronounce someone’s name how they pronounce their name can be extremely important to social relationships, and having an anglicised name attached to them against their will is often mentioned among memoirs of immigrants as one of the first and most alienating things to happen to them when they enter an anglophone country. It’s not about expecting others to cater to your weird name. It’s about people having a basic modicum of respect for the humanity of non-dominant cultures. In america, at least, this respect has never been a thing. From Ellis island literally changing people’s names because they thought they would be hard for “real” Americans to pronounce, to interning anyone with a japanese name regardless of how long their family was in the US, to the new fascist roundups of anyone with a name that sounds plausibly nonwhite.

So, even with different “accents”, I’d say that pronouncing it exactly how they say it can be important. If someone in Germany went to the trouble of pronouncing the ‘w’ in my name with an american “w”, I’d appreciate it, at the least, but it would probably also make me remember them fondly every time someone else pronounced it incorrectly accented.

IMO, yes. Proper nouns should be pronounced properly. I recognize that this has implications, such as: Mazda Matsuda! But that’s what i believe.

When i had a French friend named Marion, i didn’t call them “Mare-ee-uhn”.

If you get the chance, don’t be afraid to ask. People are usually pretty clear on what they will respond to, if asked. If the accent or name is too hard, you can work with them on a compromise nickname that’s easier for you and that they agree to.

I mean I’ll.try but I am not confident in myself here

My name is unpronounceable for most non-native French speakers. I tell them to not even try, as there are sounds in French that don’t exist in English. Instead, I introduce myself by butchering my own name, or by using the English equivalent to my name.

So, no, I don’t think people should use an accent of the origin language of a name. You can try, and I’ll even rate you on a scale of 10, but I don’t expect you to not butcher my name anyway.

depends on name, but probably not, don’t mock people’s voices

Accent is not pronunciation, I try to get as close as possible as the originally intended pronunciation the person cast of their name, not mimic the stereotypical changes in the common sounds the person makes on the transcribed text of their name… I believe there is a difference

I will attempt to say a person’s name how they say it. If they say “call me [simple anglicized name]” then I will do that.

Most people seem to appreciate the effort. I’m sure my American vocals butcher some pronouciations, but I don’t make a big deal out of it and my work gives me a lot of chances to practice. I will always make a good faith attempt at last names.

I live in Texas and will pronounce food names of Mexican origin with a Mexican accent. Burrito, taco, chalupa.