[Lingtyp] IPA for linguists' names

Sun Sep 6 07:05:37 UTC 2026

I always hoped that someone would take the initiative to do something 
like this, after Maria Koptjevskaja-Tamm started requiring IPA for 
authors' names for "Linguistic Typology".

There's a lot that could be said about pronunciation norms, or the 
potential primacy of written (or perhaps even signed?) versions of names 
– but it's a fact that we often pronounce names, and that we have 
expectations about pronunciations.

I think that by making pronounciations public, we make our field more 
inclusive: People who haven't attended many conferences (and haven't 
heard names pronounced often) will have a way of quickly getting 
relevant information, and people whose names may present pronunciation 
difficulties will feel more included if their names are pronounced 
correctly (or pronounced at all, rather than avoided).

Maybe someone would like to do something similar for language names? I 
feel that the invisibility of small languages is exacerbated if we don't 
know how to pronounce their names (I wrote about this quite a while ago: 
https://dlc.hypotheses.org/993).

Martin

On 06.09.26 07:25, Yuri Koryakov via Lingtyp wrote:
>
> Dear Jocelyn,
> thank you for your detailed letter. Below are the points.
>
> On 05.09.2026 23:25, Jocelyn Aznar via Lingtyp wrote:
>> Dear all,
>>
>> I think the initiative is interesting but, here are some comments and 
>> reservations:
>>
>> - Having a list like this without the agreement of the people 
>> concerned is not the nicest move, especially on Google doc. Yes, some 
>> of those information are public, but some of the people in the list 
>> could have some reservations/concerns about the purpose of the 
>> document or might not even adhere to its purpose.
> On the one hand, all information not added by people themselves is 
> taken from public online sources; people add further information 
> voluntarily. On the other hand, this table does not contain any 
> sensitive personal information – no emails, place of residence, place 
> of work, position, etc.
>> - There isn't only one valid pronunciation of my name.
>
> The IPA column allows you to specify multiple pronunciation variants, 
> both equivalent and language-specific.
>
>>
>> - I'm ok with people having difficulties pronouncing my name (at the 
>> end of the day, no one can master the pronunciation of the many 
>> phonologies we work with in our profession).
>> - Pushing people to pronounce your name following your expectations 
>> can cause situations in which they feel really ill at ease because 
>> they cannot pronounce your name.
> Well, we don't force people to pronounce the names exactly this way, 
> but we do give them a reference point. For example, when I just see 
> the name Jocelyn, I don't even know what the first sound might be – [ʤ 
> / ʒ / x / j] or something else.
>> - I'm also ok with people adapting my name if it is too hard to 
>> pronounce, that's usually what happens in practice.
>> - From a more technical angle,it would make more sense if the IPA 
>> transcription follows the same order of the first name + other name.
> Okay, maybe. But this way one can show the order in which a person 
> prefers to pronounce their name. (By the way, the most common order in 
> this column is: first name + other name.)
>>
>> Except the first point, all of my reservations are, I think, 
>> addressable with some more columns to the spreadsheet.
>>
>> That being written, I also understand that when you come from an 
>> oppressed background, like systematic oppression of your culture or 
>> identity by the State or the people around you, having your named 
>> acknowledged properly is an important topic. But the points I raised 
>> are not in contradiction with this issue in the end, just nuances.
>>
>> Best,
>> aka Jocelyn, Joce, Jos, Jo, Jojo, George, Josiu, Joselinas,
> Yours,
> Yuri
>>
>> Le 05/09/2026 à 19:35, Hartmut Haberland via Lingtyp a écrit :
>>> This is a great initiative. Some of my publications have been 
>>> translated into Japanese, and I have given lectures in Japan where 
>>> my name was given on posters and websites in /katakana/, with a 
>>> number of variations, in part based on spelling rather than 
>>> pronunciation. I would go for ハートムート・ハーバーランド, since it is 
>>> closest to the way I pronounce my name (Northern German, grown up in 
>>> Hanover) and not least because ハーバーランドis also the name of a 
>>> shopping mall in Kobe (Harborland, of course) 😊. 
>>> (ハートムット・ハバーランドis OK, too, of course, and one could indeed 
>>> discuss if ムットis not more adequate by focussing on the unstressed 
>>> vowel indeed being short while its tenseness is better expressed by 
>>> ムート; ハーバーランドis definitely the better solution.)
>>>
>>> *Hartmut Haberland*
>>>
>>> [haɐ̯tmu:t hɑ:bεɐ̯lant]
>>> Professor (mso) emeritus
>>>
>>> KORAL_GRAA_300KORAL_GRAA_300
>>> *Roskilde Universitet*
>>> Institut for Kommunikation og Humanistisk Videnskab
>>>
>>> Universitetsvej 1
>>> DK-4000 Roskilde
>>> Telefon: +45 46742841
>>>
>>> *Fra:*Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> *På vegne 
>>> af *Yuri Koryakov via Lingtyp
>>> *Sendt:* 5. september 2026 17:58
>>> *Til:* lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
>>> *Emne:* [Lingtyp] IPA for linguists' names
>>>
>>> Dear colleagues,
>>>
>>> Many of us have encountered a situation where we need to pronounce 
>>> the name of a linguist, but we don’t know how. Or we need to write 
>>> down someone’s name in another script (Cyrillic, Arabic, Japanese, 
>>> Chinese, etc.), and this again requires correct pronunciation.
>>>
>>> As a result, you have to look for pronunciation instructions on 
>>> personal webpages, listen to recordings on YouTube, ask friends, and 
>>> so on, but it is much more convenient when such information is 
>>> collected in one place.
>>>
>>> To do this, I created the editable list of names and their 
>>> transcriptions here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/ 
>>> d/1zFKZp2e6dvfw_JQqX7904xY1GnqOwaopD2gnb3ytilA/edit?gid=0#gid=0 
>>> <https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/ 
>>> d/1zFKZp2e6dvfw_JQqX7904xY1GnqOwaopD2gnb3ytilA/edit?gid=0#gid=0>
>>>
>>> The *General Guide* “How to add your name to the list” is available 
>>> in the Info tab ( https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/ 
>>> d/1zFKZp2e6dvfw_JQqX7904xY1GnqOwaopD2gnb3ytilA/edit? 
>>> gid=863783271#gid=863783271 <https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/ 
>>> d/1zFKZp2e6dvfw_JQqX7904xY1GnqOwaopD2gnb3ytilA/edit? 
>>> gid=863783271#gid=863783271>  ).
>>>
>>> Additional difficulties that this project allows to solve:
>>>
>>> a) distinguishing the surname from other names (necessary for the 
>>> correct compilation of bibliographies and especially relevant for 
>>> languages with a different order of components in the name or for 
>>> names consisting of more than two words)
>>>
>>> b) indicating gender pronouns – he / she / they – useful in many 
>>> languages when you need to, for example, refer to the author.
>>>
>>> If you are in doubt whether you should indicate yourself, you can 
>>> use the following criterion as a working one: if you have published 
>>> at least one article or had one presentation at a conference, you 
>>> can safely provide your name. Also if people pronounce your name 
>>> differently from how you’d like it to be pronounced, or if you’ve 
>>> ever been asked how to pronounce your name, that’s a hint that you 
>>> should provide that information.
>>>
>>> If you can’t/don’t want to add your data to the sheet yourself, you 
>>> can send it to me by email . Also write if you have any 
>>> questions/comments/ suggestions etc.
>>>
>>> Yours,
>>> Yuri Koryakov 

-- 
Martin Haspelmath
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
Deutscher Platz 6
D-04103 Leipzig
https://www.eva.mpg.de/linguistic-and-cultural-evolution/staff/martin-haspelmath/
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