(upbeat music)
- Hello everyone, and welcome back
to English with Lucy.
Today, I've got a pronunciation video for you.
I'm going to teach you how to pronounce
ten commonly mispronounced girls' names.
So I've got ten of the most popular names
in the UK that are commonly mispronounced.
So if you have any of these names yourself,
you're going to have to say it a million times
on the phone, spell it out for people,
correct people.
Sometimes you might get so bored of it
that you don't even bother correcting people any more.
So let me know if you have this name
and how you deal with people mispronouncing it all the time.
Now some of these are mispronounced because
there are various different ways of pronouncing them.
So I will go through those and if I miss any out,
comment down below.
So this video is a pronunciation lesson.
If you want to improve your speaking
and pronunciation even further,
a great alternative to reading books
is listening to audiobooks.
And you can read the book at the same time as listening.
And you can hear how the words are pronounced.
You can get 30 days for free on Audible.
That's a whole free audiobook of your choosing.
The link is in the description box
along with some of my audiobook recommendations
if you want to learn the British English accent.
And I've got some recommendations for American as well.
Let's get started with the lesson.
The first one is this one.
So the official pronunciation of this name Siobhan,
but obviously you can name your baby whatever
you want to name it.
So if you want to call it Siobhan, that is absolutely fine.
It's a lovely name as well.
I think I actually had more Siobhans in my year
at school than I did Siobhans.
Yeah, you can call it what you want,
but commonly mispronounced, so be careful.
The next one is a gorgeous name.
I absolutely love this name.
It is this one.
And the S is silent.
And this causes some confusion.
It should be Isla.
Isla.
I think I just love any name with like the I sound in it.
I think it's so beautiful.
Isla.
Now the next one is actually a combination of
two names.
And this is mispronounced purely because
people misread it.
So we've got Kristin and Kirstin.
Kristin, Kirstin.
But yes, a number of times I've emailed
someone called Kristin, and I've greeted them as Kirstin.
And it gets a bit embarrassing.
So yeah, be extra, extra careful over
Kristin and Kirstin.
Number four, there is no right or wrong with this one.
You can Eva, or you can say Eva.
The best thing to do is just ask.
Number five, much like Eva or Eva
is Kyra or Kyra.
With this particular spelling, it could be either or.
It could be either Kyra or Kyra.
But with other spellings,
it could be a little bit more clear.
The next one, another one where you really should just ask.
Is it Mia or is it Mia?
Who knows.
Ask the poor person.
The next one is confusing
purely because it has three vowels in a row.
Oh my God.
I should be pronounced Gaia, Gaia.
But I'm pretty sure there will be someone in the world
that calls it Gaia.
Actually on that line of thought,
one of my school teachers was actually called Gay,
which comes from the meaning happy.
But yeah, bit of a shame, actually.
It's not a name that I hear so frequently nowadays.
Next one.
Anything containing "Lee" spelled like this.
So I could Leigh on its own.
It could be Ashleigh.
People who have this in their name
frequently complain of being called "lay" or Ash "lay",
et cetera.
Next, we have this one.
Now obviously it depends on the parent.
This one should actually be Kaia
like in Mya.
Some people might pronounce it by saying Kaia.
And the last one is this one.
Again it depends on the parent.
It could be Layla, or it could be Layla.
I personally prefer Layla because it's got that
I sound in it, which I think is so beautiful.
Right, guys.
That's it for today's video.
I hope you enjoyed it.
And I hope you learned something.
Those were ten popular girls' names
that are commonly mispronounced.
Comment below if you have a name that is often
said or spelled incorrectly.
Don't forget to connect with me on all of my social media.
I have my Facebook.
I have my Instagram.
And I have my Twitter.
And I will see you soon for another lesson.
(kisses)
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