Crazy Baby Names

I would never associate those names with being classically Catholic school, considering that as far as I know many Welsh people are not even Catholic! They are simply traditional Welsh and Irish names.

Rhys for anyone who may not know is pronounced Reese although the proper Welsh pronuciation sounds very different and is incredibly difficult to get across.

Geraint is pronounced Gare - int (with the G pronounced like in the word Gate and the i pronounced like in the word iron)

Naoise is Irish and pronounced Nee - sha

Donncha is pronounced Don - a - ka (but again the Irish inflections on letters will make it sound totally different)

Fionn is a difficult one to explain. Best I can come up with is F-yun

antmanb said:

I think Madonna's kids are schooled in Britain aren't they? "Lardass" is a very American insult and not very prevalent here...not least because "***" isn't used as much as "arse" here!

Ant

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I didn't know that. I agree. This may not sound to "American" of me to say, but I believe the ignorance factor is on a much greater scale here in the states then in the UK from my impression / experience. As well a better / more proper use of the english language there than here. I thought she was "schooling" them here.

SeaniBu said:

I didn't know that. I agree. This may not sound to "American" of me to say, but I believe the ignorance factor is on a much greater scale here in the states then in the UK from my impression / experience. As well a better / more proper use of the english language there than here. I thought she was "schooling" them here.

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I would think that you are probably right mostly because American popular culture tends to be pretty universal because of the film industry and because so many American TV programs make it all over the world (not just int he UK). While most turns of phrase will be understood by Brits, only some are adopted and used...the difference like I say between "***" and "arse" is just one. I'm sure going the other way with school playground insults or phrases many more americans would be left scratching their heads on the basis that UK popular culture doesn't case it's net as far as US popular culture. One example i'm thinking of is "ming" or "minging" which you hear everywhere in the UK (especially amongst kids...but it really does spread through the ages!) to be a fairly harsh put-down of something not very nice...kids will often use it in reference to food they don't like!

Ant

As for hard to pronounce or pretentious sounding names, I have read that this is more common for parents that are poor and don't feel they have a lot to offer their child. They think that giving them this kind of name will give them an advantage.

Lourdes is named Lourdes, France a very sacred place for Roman Catholics. This is where St. Bernadette saw the Blessed Virgin Mary and the most sightings of her have appeared, also many miracles. IIRC Lourdes (Madonna's daughter) goes by Lola.

I completely forgot about the guy that used to put up my grandparents' Christmas lights until I read the "rules" of naming..............his name was Seymour Blink!