With A Name Like Hamish…
I have the sort of name that always causes problems and misunderstandings in this country (the US). So far, they’re only minor problems, but it’s enough to make me hesitate pretty much any time I have to introduce myself, or someone asks me my name.
Almost no one here ever pronounces it right the first time; the most usual manglings are “HahMEESH”, or “HAM-ish” (rhymes with “spamish”), or even “Amish” (as in the religion and culture). I usually get asked to repeat my name several times. Some people never pronounce it correctly, even after hearing the name multiple times (I’ve had colleagues who couldn’t get it quite right after several years of interacting with me). Almost everyone here seems to assume it’s a Middle-Eastern or Indian name (and it can be, just as it can be Yiddish); but even after explaining that my name’s just not that unusual where I’m from — simplifying a bit, it’s a Scottish variant of “James”, and somewhat cognate with “Seumas” or “Séamas” — the misconceptions and mispronunciations just keep coming. All this in an English-speaking part of the world that sometimes prides itself on (what it thinks of as) its Celtic heritage.
I’ve had to evolve strategies to short-circuit the process. I’ve learned that if I say something like “My name’s ‘Hamish’ — it’s the Scottish version of ‘James’ or ‘Seamus’…”, the chance of my name being pronounced correctly almost doubles (to about 25%), probably mostly because that gives them a rhyming peg to hang their pronunciation on. I speak enough Spanish (and have to speak it enough) that I have the same sort of introduction en español (“… como ‘Jaime’…”), but I usually get fewer problems with my name in Spanish-speaking contexts anyway (I think Spanish-speaking people I’ve just been introduced to are usually more distracted and bemused by their first ever hearing of primitive Australian-accented Spanish than by my name, but never mind…).
There’s a strong regional element in all this, too, of course: I have less trouble with my name in, say, Boston or New York, than here in California. But not much less. And Canadians tend to be more familiar with the name (for obvious reasons).
If someone has heard of my name here, it’s probably thanks to Braveheart (a movie I’ve never actually seen) — or to an acquaintance who once had a Scottie named Hamish or something like that (one person I knew had a pet tortoise named Hamish for some unfathomable reason). And if they’re paying attention, US viewers of Sherlock may also be familiar with my name (I’ve almost never heard my name being used to refer to someone else (or used on TV or radio at all, for that matter) here in the US so it was quite a shock hearing it on TV when Watson blurted it out; American friends actually emailed and texted me to say they’d just heard my name on TV! I’m not sure they believed it was a real name before that…).
It’s a weird experience to grow up in places where my name is as common as muck (well, not quite, but it’s unremarkable), then move to somewhere with similar cultural roots and language, but where it’s exotic or some sort of conversation starter; but that’s my life, I guess.
