Office phone rings.
Me: Yes, hello.
Voice: Can I speak with Professor. . . erm. . . Professor. . . I have no idea how to pronounce this. . . erm. . .
Me: Yes, that would be me.
11 responses to “Professor Erm”
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I had a friend in my homeroom and several classes in high school whose last name was nearly un-pronouncable (though I can both spell and pronounce it, with a bit of coaching and some practice.) Anyway, whenever substitute teachers would take attendance, they would come to her, and go “Olga… Olga Gr..eeee… Olga G.”.
My lat name is only 6 letters and very simple to pronounce if you ever learned English reading rules (vowel-consenent-vowel means that the first vowel is long…) but about 1 in 8 gets it right. (I did an experiment one year, and kept a tally)
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This is the story of my life. Random person: “Ashley (long pause)” Me: “Yes, that’s me!”
Thank God my parents let me change my first name when I was a child!
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Was the caller a parent worried that his/her child might fail your class?
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Your last name doesn’t seem that hard. Though that doesn’t mean I know how to pronounce it correctly. Maybe the H throws people off.
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People keep accenting the penultimate syllable when the tonic accent should fall on the 3rd syllable from the end.
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People keep accenting the penultimate syllable when the tonic accent should fall on the 3rd syllable from the end.
Interesting. In Polish, it is always, except in monosyllabic words, the penultimate syllabel that is accented. I had no idea it was different in other Slavic languages.
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Sorry for the typo. “syllable”
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🙂 🙂
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A conservative literary critic and college professor
Clarissa's Blog 
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