Mercedes is a real name. It was the car that was named after the engineers daughter…[/quote]Right. It’s a perfectly normal Spanish name.
Try telling this Mercedes she was named after a car!
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes_Sosa
[quote=“bismarck”]
My favourite is still Satan… 
[quote]
Yup I knew a kid named Diablo his mom didn’t know what it meant in Spanish she just thought it sounded cool.
Mercedes is a real name. It was the car that was named after the engineers daughter…[/quote]
Well then I think I am going to name my first car after my kid mustang oh wait nevermind.
My favorite of all time was a mother of a kid … Sharon Cox. Somebody was not thinking on this one. When she introduced herself, there was a teacher standing behind me and he was just smiling away and I had to take all I had to not laugh at her and be professional.
Mercedes is a real name. It was the car that was named after the engineers daughter…[/quote]Right. It’s a perfectly normal Spanish name.
Try telling this Mercedes she was named after a car!
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes_Sosa[/quote]
Incorrect.It was named after the daughter of one Count Emil Jellinek who was a rich European dude who agreed to help Wilhelm Maybach to finance the development of an ENGINE,which was to be called a Mercedes.
Nothing much can compare to the zany names given to the late great Frank Zappa’s kids,boy being Dweezil & girl,I believe is Moon Unit,yes-MOON UNIT!
Ok, it’s not so bizarre, but I just learned there’s a guy in our company named Willie Wang. Shouldn’t someone tell him that sounds like a pet name for his ding dong? Shouldn’t he at least go by William?
Then again, Taiwan’s largest law firm employs/ed a lawyer by the name of Peter Pan.
Silly boys.
In my daughter’s new Year 3 class
Hyena
Abner (maybe Elmer Fudd was late?)
Doris (sad)
Also a policeman I’ve met named - Robin Hood
[quote=“Mother Theresa”]Ok, it’s not so bizarre, but I just learned there’s a guy in our company named Willie Wang. Shouldn’t someone tell him that sounds like a pet name for his ding dong? Shouldn’t he at least go by William?
Then again, Taiwan’s largest law firm employs/ed a lawyer by the name of Peter Pan.
Silly boys.[/quote]In one company I worked in, someone intentionally called himself Jackie Chen, and someone else James Pong (or something similar), knowing full well it sounded a little like James Bond.
What’s wrong with “Doris”?
The father of one of my students’ English name is “Fun”. Yet another, “Devil”.
Nothing other than my instant mental image of a character from “Coronation Street”, late sixties, hair in rollers, fag in mouth and 'aitches dropped all over the floor. IMHO Miffy, Bam-Bam etc. sound like names for kids at buxiban, but not Doris.
Three kids I know are called Cinnamon, Ginger (both girls), and Sage (a boy). But they’re in Australia, and they have standard middle class Anglo Saxon parents.
Then there is the urban legend (or is it?) of the Pig family parents who named their twins, Ima and Urra.
Wow, it’s been a while, eh?
Came across a doozie the other day:
The person’s name is “DKNY”.
No idea how it’s supposed to be pronounced.
[quote=“Chris”]Wow, it’s been a while, eh?
Came across a doozie the other day:
The person’s name is “DKNY”.
No idea how it’s supposed to be pronounced.[/quote]
Chinese characters are a pain in the rear for naming students.
In Korea, I could easily look up the name myself and find out what it means. Then by using an etymology dictionary of names, I would give the kid an English name that meant the same thing as the Korean name. It also had the benefit of not being insulting and the parents didn’t seem to mind.
And, of course, most of the Korean kids hated the names.
If readers like the idea and want to try it, here are a few sites.
This one is good, all the names on one page (though it doesn’t have every name in existence) and is searchable by word:
cyberspacei.com/englishwiz/l … _names.htm
This one is a general word etymology dictionary, but it does have a fair number of names:
etymonline.com/index.php
This one is useless for matching meanings to names, but it’s worth a look anyway:
yeahbaby.com/
DKNY is an acronym, so pronounce each letter individually.
It stands for Donna Karan New York, its actually a fashion label. Maybe you should recommend that they simply call themselves Donna, or maybe Kar(e)n instead of the whole acronym. In fact, using DKNY as a name may qualify as a trademark violation.
[quote=“cmdjing”]DKNY is an acronym, so pronounce each letter individually[/quote]Excuse me? You missed out the word “not”.
[quote=“Chris”]Wow, it’s been a while, eh?
Came across a doozie the other day:
The person’s name is “DKNY”.
No idea how it’s supposed to be pronounced.[/quote]Dickney?
The names I like best are the ones that are nearly right. I remember a kid called Bred, and there are lots of others I’ve forgotten. It makes me think of the characters in The Borrowers - Homily and Arrietty. They borrowed everything including their names.
Your right, it’s not an acronym. What is the proper term for an abbreviated phrase that consists of the first letters of whole words that forms a new term? For example, DUI.