About inogolo

English Pronunciation Guide to the Names of People, Places, and Stuff

About the inogolo.com website

Overview

Welcome to inogolo, the practical, easy-to-use website devoted to the English pronunciation of the names of people, places, and various things. The site contains a searchable database with both phonetic and audio pronunciations in English. Welcome to inogolo, the practical, easy-to-use website devoted to the English pronunciation of the names of people, places, and various things. The site contains thousands of pronunciations (each with phonetic and audio) in English. The site can be searched or browsed-- alphabetically, by tag, or through topical pronunciation guides.

The website has two purposes:

To provide an easy to use tool that will help English speakers pronounce difficult and commonly mispronounced names.
For non-English speakers and those for whom English is a second language-- to provide an easy to use tool to help pronounce common English names, since many English names follow no phonetic rules.

A few notes about the site:

For ease of use, the phonetic pronunciations are represented using a respelled transcription with no special characters, signs, or symbols as in dictionaries or the International Phonetic Alphabet.
The pronunciations of names from non-English speaking countries are not in the accent and language of origin and are 'anglicized' to varying degrees. The pronunciations are in American English with the General American accent. The goal is not to mimic Spanish, German, Chinese, and Polish accents, but to provide a tool so that names are not completely butchered.
This is not an academic website or a tool for linguists and onomasticians . It's a practical tool for the average person.

Who created the website?

The inogolo website is the part-time project of Stuart Yoder who lives and works in the Austin, Texas area, and enjoys orthoepy as a hobby.

Where do the pronunciations come from?

There are two categories of pronunciations on the site-- 1) names in general (e.g. Nguyen), and 2) the name of specific persons, places, or things (e.g. Theodore Roosevelt, Uvalde, Porsche, Linux).

For names in general, whenever possible pronunciations are verified and cross-referenced across multiple sources. Sources include:

personal knowledge (for most common English names)
a partial list of some web resources and books referenced is at the inogolo pronunciation resources page.
people-- if I can locate someone with the name I ask them.
if the language of origin can be determined I ask a native speaker of the language if possible
user submissions and corrections through the online suggestion submission form have been very helpful.
other resources used-- the internet (blogs,forums,news articles,etc), radio and TV media, encyclopedias, dictionaries

For the names of specific people and places pronunciations are verified and cross-referenced across multiple authorities when possible. The names of people no longer living tend to generate the most disputes. If a pronunciation is disputed it will be noted and usually any alternate pronunciations are given as well. Sources include:

authorities and sources listed at the inogolo pronunciation resources page.
the person themselves or their representative
for places, Merriam Webster's Geographical Dictionary (disputed pronunciations other authorities are checked as well)
media sources such as radio and TV
the internet (blogs,forums,news articles,etc)

Where did the name inogolo come from?

The word is made up, but was inspired by putting together a couple of Latin words.

      in       (Latin prefix for 'not', 'against')
       +
    iuguolo    (Latin for 'butcher')
    =======
    inogolo

The website is about not butchering names!

Contact Information

Suggestions for names, pronunciations, or any other improvement are welcome. Send email to stuyoder@inogolo.com (link).

If you have a suggestion for a name that you would like to see included in the inogolo database, please use our online suggestion submission form. It's an easy one-click process and no registration is required.

For any questions or other information about inogolo send email to stuyoder@inogolo.com (link).

Copyright

All content on this site is copyright inogolo.

Privacy Policy

inogolo does not collect personal information about visitors who visit the website beyond the normal data contained in web server log files.

The inogolo forum software places a cookie, a text file containing bits of information (such as your username and password), in your browser's cache. This is ONLY used to keep you logged in/out. The software does not collect or send any other form of information to your computer.

inogolo will not sell or share personal private information (such as email addresses) to third parties.