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Wednesday 13th, May, 2020

Cruinniú na nÓg 2020 What’s Your Name

What’s your name? What is the story behind your name? Do people know how
to spell it and pronounce it? Join us on an adventure to discover the stories behind some of our young friends’ names and engage in some “language science” too!

This project is a collaboration between Mother Tongues and Italian photographer Enzo Testa. Enzo Testa photographed families and children in Tallaght Library and in Rua Red, and worked with linguist Alexandra Lukes to write names with the spelling in the language of origin and with the phonetic transcription to allow people who are unfamiliar with the names to pronounce it properly. The goal of this project is to use an artistic medium (photography) to highlight the importance of pronouncing names correctly and to acknowledge the difficulties we find when learning a new name that is unfamiliar to us. 

When discussing this with the public, Enzo found that the issue of names being
mispronounced or mis-spelled is something that highlights an experience that is common across all communities, regardless of nationality or language.