3 ms·

As a Swede in London, it's annoying that IKEA staff don't understand you when you pronounce the names correctly. You have to change letters (e.g. å is not a wi

As a Swede in London, it's annoying that IKEA staff don't understand you when you pronounce the names correctly. You have to change letters (e.g. å is not a with an accent. It's a different letter) and read it like you don't know the language.

lostlogin 2mo ago
> As a Swede in London At least you’re definitely right. Try speaking or writing English English to US English natives.
- ErroneousBosh 2mo ago
  By extension from Chinese, you could call it "English (Standard)" and "English (Simplified)".
necovek 2mo ago
I'd suggest you look at it as funny and not annoying: IKEA in London, being a very multicultural place, likely has many non-native English speakers as well! When all else fails, you can always go back to the basic international language of gesturing, pointing and acting out the use of something to get to your point. (Or more boringly, point at the name on your phone) You could also try adapting pronounciation to what they might expect first, and then if you establish a friendly conversation, offer the real Swedish pronounciation next. It sounds like that would be very much what use of Swedish names in a global brand should invite, and not annoyance for Swedes :)
- thomashabets2 2mo ago
  > you can always go back to the basic international language of gesturing, Doesn't really work for the kind of products they sell. E.g. going to the spare parts place and asking for a replacement part for Mörbylånga or Nackanäs. And I don't know the international gesture for a table. Besides, they have many tables. I don't think saying "Bläddra", and signing that you're flipping through a book, helps at all either. > You could also try adapting pronounciation to what they might expect Right. This is what one has to do. But it feels like if you were to go to Russia and slowly and loudly say "I-ski want-ski a-ski table-ski". Except, you know, not offensive because I have the objectively right way to say it and the staff doesn't. I'm not saying it's hard to do, but since once you know a language you pretty much cannot go back to hearing and reading it as noise, I stand by that it's a bit annoying to need to simulate how someone else would mispronounce it. And this is unlike someone experiencing their names constantly mispronounced, because the people who get it wrong literally work for IKEA. For comparison, say there was an English store in Netherlands, and you would have to look at the spelling every time in order to "simulate" which "s" should become "sch" to make the staff understand you. Saying it the dutch way may, to you, become a tongue twister. > It sounds like that would be very much what use of Swedish names in a global brand should invite, and not annoyance for Swedes :) You'd think so, but while a great brand, it causes practical annoyances sometimes. They have a great selection of products. You could say they have a smörgåsbord of products. Or as you'd have to say in English to be understood, a schmoargoesboard.
  - jabron 2mo ago
    > But it feels like if you were to go to Russia and slowly and loudly say "I-ski want-ski a-ski table-ski". As much as it may feel that way sometimes, I don't think IKEAs in foreign countries are sovereign Swedish territory.
    - thomashabets2 2mo ago
      Sure. Hence my Netherlands example.
  - necovek 2mo ago
    I think Netherlands is a bad example, because all locals I've met there speak perfect English, and a visitor learns that fast!
    - thomashabets2 2mo ago
      Yes, it's called a hypothetical.
- soco 2mo ago
  As a related anecdote, I found it surprising when I moved to Switzerland decades ago, that speaking high German wouldn't really work with foreign-looking shop assistants - they'd only speak and even understand Swiss German.
rypskar 2mo ago
I was surprised at a Jysk in Spain where I used the dialect pronunciation of a Norwegian city (saying Læknes for Leknes) when buying chairs with that name, and the girl not only understood me but used close to the same pronunciation when asking someone to get them from storage
- hobo123 2mo ago
  I once mentioned a street name to a Dane, who didn't understand me, and when I showed her the written name she pronounced it the same way. Maybe sometimes people have weird assumptions how foreigners are supposed to sound.
amiga386 2mo ago
This is the mutley crueh story all over again https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal_umlaut https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal_umlaut > When Mötley Crüe visited Germany, singer Vince Neil said the band could not figure out why "the crowds were chanting, 'Mutley Cruh! Mutley Cruh!'" But like those German speakers assumed German orthography, English speakers will assume English orthography when presented with Swedish words. Only foreign words learned by sound have a chance of getting pronounced correctly, e.g. croissant or Djokovic... maybe even Smörgåsbord? If there were a British furniture shop operating globally and using placenames for products, British people would have trouble asking the locals for HAWICK (hoik), LOUGHBOROUGH (luffburra), FROME (froom) or YNYSYBWL (anissabul)
- ahartmetz 2mo ago
  They didn't assume German pronunciation without reason. The umlaut dots aren't for decoration in German and ä, ö, ü only sound one way - including in Swedish, which has ä and ö, too. There is no ü in Swedish maybe because the Swedish u sounds like the German ü already (and shifting it further would just make it sound something like an i).
ragazzina 2mo ago
Do you find ABBA's English pronunciation/phrasing annoying?
- thomashabets2 2mo ago
  Not quite what I said. In this case you would understand me if I pronounced "ABBA" the Swedish way, so the IKEA scenario doesn't happen. Not that I do say it that way when speaking English, just like I don't say my own name in the Swedish way. But if "ABBA" had been named "ÄBBA"[1] (to be clear, that's not "A with an accent", that's a completely different letter) then I would pronounce it "ÄBBA". And it would be annoying. But at least other music fans are not employed by ABBA, so shrug, Mötley Crüe. I would imagine that a Chinese person would be annoyed if they had to refer to their president as "Eks Eye" when speaking English. Or do you mean the accents in the ABBA songs? [1] which would be confusing, all else equal, because it would be pronounced like Ebba in Ebba Grön, another band.
  - ragazzina 2mo ago
    I mean the errors and awkward grammar / pronunciation in songs by ABBA.
    - thomashabets2 2mo ago
      Comes with the territory, no? "If I was a rich man", "I feel good", "we don't need no education", the repetition of "and their bombs" in Zombie, "Me and Bobby McGee", the weird "this" pronunciation in "Sweet Dreams", making people mishear it as "these", etc… (just off the top of my head) The (deliberate) almost nonsense in Nirvana songs, too. It is funny (heh) that the "funny" in ABBA's "Money, Money, Money" and "Does Your Mother Know" is a misuse of the word that my mum makes all the time when speaking English. Other than that, non-native English speakers having an accent is not really something to have an opinion about. I think most Swedes probably don't hear it, and think that the Skarsgårds don't have a Swedish accent, whereas I can almost always spot a Swedish accent immediately. What would you say would set ABBA apart, here?

lostlogin 2mo ago

> As a Swede in London At least you’re definitely right. Try speaking or writing English English to US English natives.

ErroneousBosh 2mo ago
By extension from Chinese, you could call it "English (Standard)" and "English (Simplified)".

necovek 2mo ago

I'd suggest you look at it as funny and not annoying: IKEA in London, being a very multicultural place, likely has many non-native English speakers as well! When all else fails, you can always go back to the basic international language of gesturing, pointing and acting out the use of something to get to your point. (Or more boringly, point at the name on your phone) You could also try adapting pronounciation to what they might expect first, and then if you establish a friendly conversation, offer the real Swedish pronounciation next. It sounds like that would be very much what use of Swedish names in a global brand should invite, and not annoyance for Swedes :)

thomashabets2 2mo ago
> you can always go back to the basic international language of gesturing, Doesn't really work for the kind of products they sell. E.g. going to the spare parts place and asking for a replacement part for Mörbylånga or Nackanäs. And I don't know the international gesture for a table. Besides, they have many tables. I don't think saying "Bläddra", and signing that you're flipping through a book, helps at all either. > You could also try adapting pronounciation to what they might expect Right. This is what one has to do. But it feels like if you were to go to Russia and slowly and loudly say "I-ski want-ski a-ski table-ski". Except, you know, not offensive because I have the objectively right way to say it and the staff doesn't. I'm not saying it's hard to do, but since once you know a language you pretty much cannot go back to hearing and reading it as noise, I stand by that it's a bit annoying to need to simulate how someone else would mispronounce it. And this is unlike someone experiencing their names constantly mispronounced, because the people who get it wrong literally work for IKEA. For comparison, say there was an English store in Netherlands, and you would have to look at the spelling every time in order to "simulate" which "s" should become "sch" to make the staff understand you. Saying it the dutch way may, to you, become a tongue twister. > It sounds like that would be very much what use of Swedish names in a global brand should invite, and not annoyance for Swedes :) You'd think so, but while a great brand, it causes practical annoyances sometimes. They have a great selection of products. You could say they have a smörgåsbord of products. Or as you'd have to say in English to be understood, a schmoargoesboard.
- jabron 2mo ago
  > But it feels like if you were to go to Russia and slowly and loudly say "I-ski want-ski a-ski table-ski". As much as it may feel that way sometimes, I don't think IKEAs in foreign countries are sovereign Swedish territory.
  - thomashabets2 2mo ago
    Sure. Hence my Netherlands example.
- necovek 2mo ago
  I think Netherlands is a bad example, because all locals I've met there speak perfect English, and a visitor learns that fast!
  - thomashabets2 2mo ago
    Yes, it's called a hypothetical.
soco 2mo ago
As a related anecdote, I found it surprising when I moved to Switzerland decades ago, that speaking high German wouldn't really work with foreign-looking shop assistants - they'd only speak and even understand Swiss German.

rypskar 2mo ago

I was surprised at a Jysk in Spain where I used the dialect pronunciation of a Norwegian city (saying Læknes for Leknes) when buying chairs with that name, and the girl not only understood me but used close to the same pronunciation when asking someone to get them from storage

hobo123 2mo ago
I once mentioned a street name to a Dane, who didn't understand me, and when I showed her the written name she pronounced it the same way. Maybe sometimes people have weird assumptions how foreigners are supposed to sound.

amiga386 2mo ago

This is the mutley crueh story all over again https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal_umlaut https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal_umlaut > When Mötley Crüe visited Germany, singer Vince Neil said the band could not figure out why "the crowds were chanting, 'Mutley Cruh! Mutley Cruh!'" But like those German speakers assumed German orthography, English speakers will assume English orthography when presented with Swedish words. Only foreign words learned by sound have a chance of getting pronounced correctly, e.g. croissant or Djokovic... maybe even Smörgåsbord? If there were a British furniture shop operating globally and using placenames for products, British people would have trouble asking the locals for HAWICK (hoik), LOUGHBOROUGH (luffburra), FROME (froom) or YNYSYBWL (anissabul)

ahartmetz 2mo ago
They didn't assume German pronunciation without reason. The umlaut dots aren't for decoration in German and ä, ö, ü only sound one way - including in Swedish, which has ä and ö, too. There is no ü in Swedish maybe because the Swedish u sounds like the German ü already (and shifting it further would just make it sound something like an i).

ragazzina 2mo ago

Do you find ABBA's English pronunciation/phrasing annoying?

thomashabets2 2mo ago
Not quite what I said. In this case you would understand me if I pronounced "ABBA" the Swedish way, so the IKEA scenario doesn't happen. Not that I do say it that way when speaking English, just like I don't say my own name in the Swedish way. But if "ABBA" had been named "ÄBBA"[1] (to be clear, that's not "A with an accent", that's a completely different letter) then I would pronounce it "ÄBBA". And it would be annoying. But at least other music fans are not employed by ABBA, so shrug, Mötley Crüe. I would imagine that a Chinese person would be annoyed if they had to refer to their president as "Eks Eye" when speaking English. Or do you mean the accents in the ABBA songs? [1] which would be confusing, all else equal, because it would be pronounced like Ebba in Ebba Grön, another band.
- ragazzina 2mo ago
  I mean the errors and awkward grammar / pronunciation in songs by ABBA.
  - thomashabets2 2mo ago
    Comes with the territory, no? "If I was a rich man", "I feel good", "we don't need no education", the repetition of "and their bombs" in Zombie, "Me and Bobby McGee", the weird "this" pronunciation in "Sweet Dreams", making people mishear it as "these", etc… (just off the top of my head) The (deliberate) almost nonsense in Nirvana songs, too. It is funny (heh) that the "funny" in ABBA's "Money, Money, Money" and "Does Your Mother Know" is a misuse of the word that my mum makes all the time when speaking English. Other than that, non-native English speakers having an accent is not really something to have an opinion about. I think most Swedes probably don't hear it, and think that the Skarsgårds don't have a Swedish accent, whereas I can almost always spot a Swedish accent immediately. What would you say would set ABBA apart, here?