Joden
Kenneth Allen Hyde
kenny at UDel.Edu
Mon Sep 9 14:36:27 UTC 2002
On Mon, 9 Sep 2002, Annette Karmiloff-Smith wrote:
> If there are psychotherapists out there, should I tell the parents or
> not?
I'm not a psychotherapist, but as someone who has suffered an inordinate
amount of teasing because of my name ("Hyde"), I would personally vote for
warning the parents that it may become an issue years down the line. At
least that way, when/if it happens, the parents can't turn to you and say
"You're a linguist! You could have warned us!" Besides, if the child in
question is a boy, he's going to have enough of a burden being called Jody
(which despite a few exceptions is predominantly a feminine name). I
doubt if the possibility of multi-lingual playground teasing is ever going
to equal that particular burden (assuming that he/she has playmates that
are linguistically sophisticated enough to make the cross-language
connections).
Ken *gulp* Hyde
Kenneth Allen Hyde | No matter how subtle the wizard, a knife
Univ. of Delaware | between the shoulder blades will seriously
Dept. of Linguistics | cramp his style -- Old Jhereg proverb
kenny at Udel.Edu | A mind is a terrible toy to waste! -- Me
//www.ling.udel.edu/hyde/prof/
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