(no subject)

[maine-girl.livejournal.com]

At the grocery store, the cashier's name was  Wanita.  I commented on the unusual spelling, and she said her parents were into South American culture at the time and thought they would give her  a Spanish name and then misspelled it.  Nice.
This happened with my cousin Kaeli, whose mom was into Irish folklore and named her thus, not realizing she should have spelled it Ceilidh. 

What do you think of cultural appropration for names?  Examples please.

Comments

[queen-mab.livejournal.com]

I say if the name just isn't readable in English (or the main language of whatever country the child is going to live in), then don't use it. Like Ceilidh looks like SEAL-lid, not Kaylie. =\ Wanita, people would know how to pronounce, even if it looks weird. I'm sure (or I hope) most people would know how to pronounce Juanita in America, since Spanish is the second most used language here. If that's the case, then use the "correct" spelling. Same goes with names like Sean and Jose - most people know Sean sounds like Shawn and Jose sounds like ho-ZAY. It's the names people just aren't used to and are that strange-looking that people should steer clear of. In my opinion, at least.