Say my name!

July 22 is the feast of St Mary Magdalene, the most loyal of Jesus followers, said to have been the first to witness his resurrection. It is also said that she had been carrying a basket of cooked eggs and they turned red, but that’s story of miracles for Easter.

Being brought up with Church, Magdalene has always been pronounced phonetically for me, St Mary Mag-dal-ene. So when I first started going to Cambridge School of Art, despite consulting my map, I had no idea where ‘Mawdlyn’ bridge was – but it sounded somewhere really sad, and no one could tell me where Magdalene College was… same place, different pronunciation.

If you’ve invested in your brand, or just have an unusual name, it’s good for you to hear it properly, and whoever is saying it, not to find out later that they’ve just spent an hour mis-pronouncing it and feel a bit foolish. It’s PORSH-AA not PORSH, NAI-Key not NAIK… Here are some brand names and the correct way to pronounce them compiled by Scoopwhoop…

If you’re on LinkedIn – and if you’re in business why wouldn’t you be – you can now record the pronunciation of your name – only on the phone App just now. Here’s how:
Go to your LinkedIn Profile
[click on] the pencil icon to edit your ‘Intro‘
[click on] ‘+Add name pronunciation’

It gives you a 10 second audio clip, so you could make it a personal message too (I did). It won’t help with spelling – my name gets spelt all the ways you can phonetically think of… Moyse, Moise, Moys, Moyers … it’s MOYES… Thank you

20+ years – thank you for keeping me independent

If you live in a remote location, with bad wifi – check out the services from my client Air Broadband
If you’re looking for a gift of jewellery – check out the fab collections from my client Catherine Jones of Cambridge

 

Illustration from a painting by Carlo Dolci