(no subject)

[uberta.livejournal.com]

A favorite guilty pleasure name is Coeur, the French word for heart. Just for curiosity's sake, does the name sound more masculine or feminine? How do you think people would react to it in the USA?

Comments

[lilacmermaid.livejournal.com]

I think it's pretty, and would definitely be a girl's name to me.

My reservation (and it's a big one) would be that I'm pretty sure everyone would butcher the pronunciation of this name, and I would start twitching every time.

[arbus.livejournal.com]

definitely feminine

[b-gum.livejournal.com]

is it prounounced "coh-yer"?

it sounds like a boy's name to me.. but a feminine boy's name if that makes sense?

i think it may even be prounced okay by people in the US, but it will be misspelled all the time by people who hear it and try to write it down or something.

[lilacmermaid.livejournal.com]

It's definitely not pronounced like that!

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bc/Fr-c%C5%93ur.ogg
http://www.forvo.com/word/de_tout_mon_coeur/

[b-gum.livejournal.com]

then people may have more problems pronouncing it than i thought ;) because that was my first instinct.
i can't hear anything remotely like Coeur in the link you provided :-S it sounds like "e-tonka" or something like that

[b-gum.livejournal.com]

i googled the pronounciation so i could hear it..
yea - i mispronounced that one all over the place!

[lorienellen.livejournal.com]

He said "de tout mon coeur" but I can see how you heard e tonka haha. I studied french but if we were talking about a word from any other language I'd probably have the same reaction to it that you're having!

[b-gum.livejournal.com]

lol ;)
i'm starting to be glad that i didn't choose to study french in high school - heh

[uberta.livejournal.com]

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cœur

[b-gum.livejournal.com]

it won't let me play this for some reason :-S

[stormqueen280.livejournal.com]

I don't know, it doesn't sound like a name at all... no idea why, since Corazón sounds like a name to me, but Coeur for me is just a noun, not a name.

[doxerssoldout.livejournal.com]

the name doesn't look particularly masculine or feminine to me - i think it could be used for any gender.

i'm from the US and don't speak french, and my main reaction is that i have no clue how to pronounce it. the closest i can guess is "KOO-err," which i don't think is right.

[uberta.livejournal.com]

Here you go:

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cœur

[waitingonsunday.livejournal.com]

It's very pretty in theory, and feminine, I think. The only problems I can see with it in any English-speaking country is that it will be constantly misspelled and mispronounced. Also, it sounds an awful lot like the English word "cur," which is another word for "mutt."

[hwar.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's what I think too. People will pronounce it "core" or "cur"...it's really hard for Americans to make that sound. I think it would be best suited to a middle name for that reason.

[lorienellen.livejournal.com]

I agree with everything you said!

[frost.livejournal.com]

This.

[velkoria.livejournal.com]

I speak French so to me it's Masculine and the pronunciation would get BUTCHERED and the kid would have to explain it/spell it a LOT.

[th3-unicorn.livejournal.com]

this!!
How would it even be pronounced in English? o.O
Like Kerr ? Kurr? Not really functional anyway.

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

Agreed, and it could get extremely wearing after 20, 30 years, let alone a lifetime (if the poor kid didn't deed poll it away the moment they were legally able to)

[solitudete.livejournal.com]

I speak French as well and I agree. I would hate to see someone use this on a child of either sex in an English-speaking country... it would be butchered and the pronunciation would sound like "cur" aka a dog.

[penguiny7.livejournal.com]

I think it sounds more masculine, but I could see it on either. It would be one that you'd have to pronounce/spell for people all the time, though, but I think it would be a really sweet middle name.

[thellamaqueen.livejournal.com]

It's definitely masculine to me, but that's probably because I used to have a very close male friend whose last name is Coeur.

[rubytitania.livejournal.com]

Although it is a nice-sounding word in French, I think it would get pronounced "cur", and that puts me off a lot:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/cur

[duckduckcaboose.livejournal.com]

My thoughts exactly.

[http://users.livejournal.com/___heyvanity/]

I think it kind of sounds like Kerr... like Miranda Kerr the models last name. I don't know, I see it as more masculine I guess.

Anyway, I think it would be a great name for an animal or something... but for a child in the US? It would be hell. And it's hard to say even when you do know how to pronounce it... if you don't know French or have a French accent.

[pixietangerine.livejournal.com]

i think it's a nice idea, but only for a middle name. it's just too weird and probably will be pronounced incorrectly on a daily basis. i could see it as a really cool middle name for a boy or a girl, though i think i'm leaning towards girl, maybe with a longer, elegant but sweet first name. :)

[cybeleadam.livejournal.com]

The word is masculine but as a name, it could be used for a girl. It seems very hard to pronounced for a non-French speaking person, though.

[kort-ni.livejournal.com]

I live in St. Louis and we have a suburb called Creve Coeur. And everyone pronounces it "Core". I think it sounds more like a feminine name (maybe because of its meaning) but that it would never be pronounced or spelled correctly.

[daydream11.livejournal.com]

Perhaps it's my five years of French, but that name is all boy to me. The man's man kind at that, despite the English translation.

[freezemyazaleas.livejournal.com]

It seems masculine to me, and not really like a name. It makes me think of Coeur D'Alene, Idaho.

[bluedano.livejournal.com]

Ditto to this.