Hello, Sunshine.
I'm Maria.
And my name is Rory, and we are the hosts of the IELTS Speaking for Success podcast, the podcast that aims to help you improve your speaking skills, as well as your listening skills along the way.
We've started this podcast to give you joy, gorgeous grammar and super-duper vocabulary for your high IELTS score.
Bad 9 score.
So, names.
Rory, it's a comeback of the topic.
Names.
How horrible is this?
It's not as horrible as talking about sitting, which still remains the worst topic of all time.
And Rory, what's your name?
Rory Fergus Duncan, good god, done, done, done, what?
Rory Fergus Duncan Goodwillie.
You know this.
We've been colleagues for like almost seven years now.
So it's like, not what's your name, it's what are your names, Rory?
But you have different kinds of name.
You have a full name and a nickname and a middle name.
But we're getting ahead of ourselves here because we need to do this in the context of the questions.
So that will be the focus of our vocabulary.
But do we have a grammar focus today?
Do we?
We do.
I'm going to have lots and lots of different question tags.
So we'll show you well the question tags in action for this topic, and then we'll talk about how to transfer them to different ones later on.
Yeah, question tags.
These little annoying little questions.
Why are they annoying?
They're little annoying little buggers because it's not clear what grammar to use, like don't, do.
We might make mistakes with them.
It's like you love question tags, don't you?
Also, the intonation is like what's intonation do i use?
Do i use, don't you or don't you?
Well, we'll have plenty to say on that at the end, when we go through them all, or actually halfway through, because we do our explanations as well now, don't we?
Sorry, that was a question tag, i didn't mean to put it in there.
Let's start, shall we?
Yes, let's get to it!
Sorry!
Rory, does your name have any special meaning?
Well, everyone has a special meaning, don't they?
Mine describes the qualities of being red-haired and connected to royalty.
Well, my first name does.
And then, if I think about my family name, we have a family motto connected to it, which means learn to suffer.
So make of that what you will.
Do you like your name?
Well, almost everyone does, don't they?
Actually, there was a brief time when I wanted to change it to something else, but now I appreciate it for the unique thing that it is.
What name do your parents or relatives call you?
Just the first one, unless I'm in trouble, in which case it's my full name.
Although I think that's true in a lot of places, isn't it?
Would you like to change your name?
Well, like I said, I used to want to change it, but that was just a phase and I don't want to anymore.
But even if I did in Scotland, you don't have to do anything special to change your name, like a deed poll or something like that.
It's one of the few countries where this is not a requirement, actually.
Does anyone in your family have the same name as you?
No, I think that would be a bit confusing, wouldn't it?
I've never quite understood why some people are named after their fathers and their mothers.
To be honest, it just seems like a lack of imagination.
Are there any differences between how people name their children now and in the past in your country?
Well, I suppose there are more names to choose from now, aren't there?
And more old-fashioned names seem to have, well, fallen out of fashion, for lack of a better term.
There also seem to be fewer nicknames as well, but that's just my opinion.
I don't know if that's an actual fact or not.
How do people choose names for their children?
Well, you'd have to ask them, wouldn't you?
I know my parents went with traditional Scottish names because that was something that worked well for them.
But I'm not sure that's something that's true for everybody, is it?
This week on our premium mmm delicious premium yum-yum-yum.
Speaking part two, Rory is gonna describe a movie he's watched recently and would like to watch again.
And in speaking part three, we're discussing films and going to the cinema.
These are the freshest IELTS speaking topics.
And on our writing podcast, yes, we do have writing podcast, we are discussing maps.
A graph with maps will give you the structure, the vocabulary, grammar.
Do check them out.
The links are in the description.
Thank you, Rory, for your answers.
Rory, Fergus, Duncan, Tequila, Godzilla, Godzilla, Goodwill.
Wait, hold on.
Where did the tequila come from?
Tequila, Godzilla.
Where does that come from?
I'm just adding random names to your name.
So just for the fun of it.
You have four names, why not six?
Um, six seems excessive, at least in Scottish culture.
But then how many names do you have?
Four?
No, I have three.
I have my first name, Maria.
Then actually Malashenko, that's my surname Maria, my name, my first name and the middle name Sergeevna.
So three names, easy.
Although your middle name, it's got a different logic behind it to mine.
My parents picked my middle name as a fashion statement, which means that it's not done for serious reasons.
Whereas your middle name is done for different reasons, isn't it?
Like if we talk about how children are named in Russia.
Yeah, just because of my father.
He's Sergei.
So I'm Sergei now.
So just after my father.
Yeah.
And there's a word in English to describe this as well.
It's patronym.
And I think it's the same word in Russian as well, isn't it?
So, patronym, right?
Or the middle name?
Not quite.
Patronym doesn't mean your middle name, it means it's the name from your father.
Oh, okay.
What's the middle name?
The middle name is just.
It can be a name that's given for religious reasons, or it can be done as sort of a fashion statement.
It's something about class, for example, or about aspirations.
Right.
It can also be a nickname.
Oh, a nickname.
My middle name can be my nickname.
Or some people, oh God, in my family, they've done this as well.
I have an uncle that changed his first name.
So his original first name became his middle name.
So yes, it happens for all kinds of reasons, actually.
But your middle names are for different reasons.
Patronyms are related to your father's name.
Oh, okay.
So we have our first name.
We can have our surname or family name or second name and also this middle name or patronym.
You could have both.
Or you can have just Tequila Godzilla just as a fashion statement.
Or you can just make something up completely.
And like I say, in Scotland, that's something that's very easy to do.
At least as far as I'm aware.
To change your name in Scotland, you don't need to do anything legal.
Whereas to change your name in England, you need all kinds of legal documents.
What's it like in Russia?
Do you have to do the same thing?
Well, to change your name, you should change all your documents.
You should go to a special place and do some things and file some, I don't know.
So there's no need to do this in Scotland.
Like you just say, this is my name and you can change it later on.
Okay, this is my name, and that's it.
I would point out that this is not something that happens regularly.
It's just something that doesn't have a system behind it yet, anyway.
What's the meaning of Rory's name?
So, Rory told us that my name means redhead. or it describes the quality of being red haired.
So if you're watching this video, then you can obviously see that my parents kind of got that wrong.
It's just a nice Scottish name for them.
I don't think they chose it for that particular meaning.
Also, Rory means the name of red king.
So Rory is a king.
We have royalty.
Royalty on the podcast.
Yeah, and also the Duncan clan used to be, well, there used to be a King Duncan, for example.
So clan name is connected to royalty in that way.
Duncan.
But probably, like everybody, has some kind of connection to some sort of famous person at some point through their name or through their family name.
Well, Maria, Maria, you know, has many origins and meanings.
We can also say it about your name or my name.
It has many origins and meanings.
It means beautiful.
Also merciful and pretty much Virgin Mary.
So all kinds of modest aspirations there.
Also, it's interesting that historically, Maria was the name given to males, to men.
So as a male middle name.
So it was like back in the 18th century, it was like Rory, Maria, Gonzalez, Gonzalez.
Tequila Godzilla.
Tequila Maria.
Duncan.
You know, I should point out if there are any Spanish speakers listening.
Please know that we're not making fun of your culture.
It's just people being silly with names.
What's family motto?
Family motto is like a slogan that describes the values of a group of people.
So in this case, it's the family.
And in the case of my family, it's the quality of learning to suffer through things.
When you say if you like your name or you dislike your name, you can say, I used to hate it.
I used to dislike it.
I used to in the past, right?
But now I adore it.
Names could be unique, traditional names, modern names.
What else?
Unique, traditional, old fashioned.
And if you're super lucky like me, you can use a very special word, which I didn't use to describe this, but I should have.
You can have a traditional form or you can have a version of it.
So my name Rory R-O-R-Y is the English version or the anglicized version of Rory, which is the name in the original Scottish language.
Rory.
And so if you have a word similar to anglicized, then you'll be quite lucky in that sense.
But if you don't, then don't worry because, for example, a lot of students from Asian countries like China and Japan choose a name in English as well, to describe themselves.
So you could also talk about this quality too.
You can say that, oh, I'd prefer an unexpected name.
Or my name is one of the top feminine names.
Feminine for women.
Or one of the top boys' names.
Top, like the most popular names.
Although in my case I think I was pretty much the only Rory Fergus Duncan Goodwillie in the entire Russian Federation and probably the world.
Can you imagine if you had two Rorys in your family?
Oh, Rory, not you, not another Rory.
No, you, Rory, sit down.
You, Rory, stand up.
Well, I imagine that there will be other Rorys around, but it's never come up that often.
It's not really a popular name, which is helpful.
Yeah, so what name do parents call you?
So parents call you by name.
Or they can call you by your full name.
Rory Duncan Fergus Goodwillie.
Come here.
Will you ever get it right?
No.
No, what did I do this time?
Let's not focus on that.
This is not the focusing on Ori's name show.
This is the focusing on grammar and pronunciation and vocabulary show.
Yeah.
So but like vocabulary wise, can I say like my parents call me by my first name?
So call me by my first name.
Yes.
Or you can say my parents call me by a nickname or they use a nickname.
Yeah, so my parents used my nickname, for example, would be one way of looking at it.
Yeah, and the nickname could be like a variation of your name.
Something like, okay, Maria, like Mashulya.
Yeah, would it be my nickname?
Like, kind of like...
If you wanted to be super high-level Band 9, you could say the diminutive form of my name is Masha.
Or Rorochka, depending.
Which is just another way of saying the cute version of my name.
The cute version of my name.
So you can say my relatives sometimes use the cute version of my name.
What is this diminutive?
Diminutive.
Diminutive.
Yeah.
And could you give us in a sentence?
So my parents call me by...
Yeah, my parents call me by...
Well, my parents don't call me that.
My Russian friends call me by the diminutive form of my name, Rory.
Rorichka, sorry.
Sweet, sweet.
Right, would you like to change my name?
Would I like to change your name?
Yeah, would you like to change my name, Rory?
No, there can only be one Maria.
Sweet.
You can say I don't need to do anything special to change my name or it's a very difficult procedure, so I wouldn't want to change my name.
Or I'd like to change my surname or a middle name.
Or maybe you want to add Tequila Godzilla to your name.
Then we can use a nice phrasal verb to be named after somebody.
Yes.
So, for example, yeah, I was named after my great-grandmother who was also Maria, for example.
And for my middle name, I was named after the dog of my family's friend.
Dog?
Yeah, they had a dog called Fergus.
So my parents thought that would be a hilarious idea.
Rory, Rory, you shouldn't have said that.
You've just mentioned that you are royalty and Red King, Maldon.
No, there's the like listen listen, there's.
There's a whole load of things about my name that are not right.
So the red haired part, the royalty part, the dog part and the whole learning to suffer part, which I completely disagree with.
Like, don't suffer through things.
Just...
Just don't tolerate it.
Don't put up with suffering.
Do something about it.
Why don't you just add Tequila Godzilla?
All right.
Rory Tequila Godzilla.
In fact, it makes more sense for you to add it because first of all, you're a lady.
And then, second of all, because it's like it all matches up with the feminine forms, because they end in R.
Or A. Oh, yeah.
Tequila Godzilla.
Godzilla.
That's really feminine.
Yes.
Maria Malashenko Tequila Godzilla.
What's your problem?
Oh, my God.
Okay, some names can fall out of fashion.
Some names could be fashionable and the old-fashioned names which just fell out of fashion, so they're just like they're not fashionable anymore.
And then the last question is interesting.
How do people choose names for their children?
Exactly.
How?
How do people choose names?
Well, I don't know.
We can say they choose the top names, the most popular names.
They name people after somebody they like.
Yeah, they name people or you just can say, I'm not sure that's true for everybody.
So maybe some people choose really extraordinary, unexpected, unique names.
But pay attention to question tags.
Our focus was question tags and you did hear a lot of examples.
And now let's transfer them to different topics.
So I'm going to ask Rory different questions about different topics and Rory will give me answers with question tags.
Rory, are you ready?
Yes, I am.
Aren't I?
Rory, do you like Godzillas?
I think everybody does, don't they?
Are you fond of tequila?
No, I'm not.
It's not a really great tasting drink, is it?
Do you think it's important to know the meaning of your name?
Well, I can't imagine it makes a difference in most conversations, does it?
When was the last time you went out?
Well, I suppose that would have been about two weeks ago, wouldn't it?
Did you like your nickname at school?
Well, I think most people liked their nicknames at school, didn't they?
Rory, let's choose the name for you.
You don't have a choice, okay?
But you are changing your name.
Let's imagine.
I like it.
You don't have a choice, but you're going to do this.
So there is no choosing whether to change my name or no.
So you have to choose it, but I'll give you options.
And, dear listener, could you please write in the comments which name will go well with our Rory Duncan the Red King?
All right.
So your new name, Rory, are you ready?
Okay.
Zosimos.
Zosimos.
Zosimos.
All of those names sound totally ridiculous.
No, you have to choose one.
Why do I have to choose one?
Why?
No, because... Okay, so which name would you choose, Rory?
Zosimus, Bram, Dudley.
I guess Bram.
Bram.
Would you be Bram?
Bram, Duncan, Fergus, Goodwill.
Bram.
Okay, Rory Bram.
Like Telegram.
Oh, boy.
Could you please write things about your name?
So what's your full name?
And if you want to change your name, which name would you pick?
Dudley or Sebastian?
And would you add any ridiculous names like Banana Hammock, Tequila Godzilla?
Can you write in the comments what your names mean, if they have any meaning?
Because that would be cool to find out if there are similar names with similar meanings in different countries.
Yes, for IELTS, you should know the meaning of your name.
There's a perfectly normal English sentence.
You should know the meaning of your name for this particular English language exam.
You can just make it up.
My name means powerful burning eagle.
The queen of everything.
Yes, queen of everything.
Get out of my way.
Then give me this band 9.
Mr. Examiner, what is the meaning of your name, I wonder?
Band 2?
Right.
What's the meaning of my name?
Band 9.
Everything that comes out of my mouth means bad.
Thank you very much for listening, for watching, for your comments.
I'm sending you love, joy, and... Gorgeous grammar and vocabulary for a high score.
Bye.
Rory, does your name have any special meaning?
Well, everyone has a special meaning, don't they?
Mine describes the qualities of being red-haired and connected to royalty.
Well, my first name does.
And then, if I think about my family name, we have a family motto connected to it, which means learn to suffer.
So make of that what you will.
Do you like your name?
Well, almost everyone does, don't they?
Actually, there was a brief time when I wanted to change it to something else, but now I appreciate it for the unique thing that it is.
What name do your parents or relatives call you?
Just the first one, unless I'm in trouble, in which case it's my full name.
Although I think that's true in a lot of places, isn't it?
Would you like to change your name?
Well, like I said, I used to want to change it, but that was just a phase and I don't want to anymore.
But even if I did in Scotland, you don't have to do anything special to change your name, like a deed poll or something like that.
It's one of the few countries where this is not a requirement, actually.
Does anyone in your family have the same name as you?
No, I think that would be a bit confusing, wouldn't it?
I've never quite understood why some people are named after their fathers and their mothers.
To be honest, it just seems like a lack of imagination.
Are there any differences between how people name their children now and in the past in your country?
Well, I suppose there are more names to choose from now, aren't there?
And more old-fashioned names seem to have, well, fallen out of fashion, for lack of a better term.
There also seem to be fewer nicknames as well, but that's just my opinion.
I don't know if that's an actual fact or not.
How do people choose names for their children?
Well, you'd have to ask them, wouldn't you?
I know my parents went with traditional Scottish names because that was something that worked well for them, but I'm not sure that's something that's true for everybody, is it?
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