There are some people who are blessed with names that are easy and obvious to pronounce. Kim Smith. John Lee. Ronald McDonald.
And then you have the rest of us.
Take me, for example. Both my maiden and married names are pronounced exactly as they’re spelled. However they’re both relatively unusual names and geez, if I had a nickel for every time someone pronounced them incorrectly.
But that’s nothing. A friend of mine has a first name that’s easy to pronounce but can be spelled in a variety of ways (think like JoAnn, Joanne, Jo-Ann, Joann, etc.). She also has a “very Polish” last name that’s 10 letters long, and has multiple consonants next to each other, which tend to mess with the minds of some native English speakers. She also lives on Staten Island, a borough that had a lot of Dutch influence in its history, on a block called Woehrle St.
She’s always sworn that in her next life she’ll be Ann Jones who lives on Pine Street. 😉
And then there are companies that people mispronounce
Early last year, Mental Floss wrote a post about 20 of the most commonly mispronounced brand names. They include the likes of Givenchy (properly pronounced as Jhee-VON-shee), Nutella (New-TELL-uh), and IKEA (Ee-KEH-yah – but company headquarters says that if we call it Eye-KEE-Yah locally, it’s OK).
And while I was perusing other websites that tell you how to pronounce certain brand names correctly, I came across one we’d all be interested in: Marriott.
How to pronounce “Marriott”
Apparently the “proper” way to pronounce it has been a topic of discussion for years. Is it MAH-ree-ott, or MAH-ree-it (that latter one rhymes with “carry it,” “chariot” etc.).
Anyway, back in 2022, Marriott family member and Global Cultural Ambassador Emeritus at Marriott International, Debbie Marriott Harrison, made it clear how the hotel name is supposed to be said. In a short clip she appeared in on The Points Guy’s TikTok account, Marriott is pronounced “MAH-ree-it,” not “MAH-ree-ott”.
@thepointsguy
Despite this, it turns out that a LOT of people (*cough* including me *cough*) have lived our lives pronouncing it incorrectly and saying “MAH-ree-ott.” One person on that list included, until recently, Marriott Bonvoy “fanbassador” Jason Kelce.
Whoopsie!
How about you?
So, do you pronounce Marriott the “right” way, and rhyme it with “chariot?” Or are you an uneducated heathen like me who’s pronounced it “MAH-ree-ott” for your whole life? 😉
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