Of the various injustices perpetuated by Britain upon Ireland over the past couple of centuries, the flagrant mispronunciation of Irish surnames is hardly the most grievous act to be committed. It just feels that way sometimes.
Football supporters are especially sensitive to this. Be it Cahill, Keogh or Doherty, Irish surnames are frequently mangled by UK football commentators. Syllables get added. Emphasis gets misplaced. You get used to it, but it never stops being grating.
This weekend, BBC viewers are being forced to grapple with the reality that they've been mispronouncing Martin Keown's surname for the last 41 years.
As Keown was being introduced on Football Focus this weekend, presenter Kelly Somers stopped to ask the Arsenal legend about his surname.
KS: Before we go any further, have I got that right because you said this week we've all been saying your name wrong for years?
MK: Yes, it's Keown [pronounced Kyowen]. Martin [Kyowen].
KS: Are you happy if I just stick with KEY-OWN?
MK: For now.
(The BBC account who originally tweeted the clip opted to delete it on Sunday morning)
The former Arsenal great was affable throughout but it was a brief if maddening insight into a curious aspect of Anglo-Irish relations.
Martin Keown: 99% Irish
Keown's Irish roots are strong. He could have, and perhaps should have represented the Republic of Ireland. His mother came from Galway and his father came from Fermanagh. His son Niall played for the Ireland U21s.
The Football Focus conversation had arisen on the back of a discussion Keown had shared with Hayters TV during the week about his and his father Raymond's long-running but ultimately futile efforts to have the family name pronounced correctly in Britain.
"Key-owen is the pronunciation My father worked hard [to tell people] and I kind of gave up on it because it was so difficult to get people to say the word. The Irish just say it. It just rolls off the tongue as it's part of their dialect."
❌ Have we been getting Arsenal legend Martin Keown's name wrong all this time?!
The defender reveals all in our exclusive interview: https://t.co/7TfyCJGZqU pic.twitter.com/QfSWPuFuVo— Hayters TV (@HaytersTV) January 1, 2025
Keown published his autobiography before Christmas and had some interesting thoughts on the complexity of his Anglo-Irish identity when speaking to Paul Rowan of the Sunday Times.
“The second generation we don’t speak with an Irish accent, but if you cut us we are as much Irish as you are. When we went to Ireland we were like Plastic Paddies and then over here we were the Irish so and so’s. So it was difficult to find your identity.”
(In that same interview, Keown said his two brothers had their DNA tested and found themselves to be 99% Irish).
The Football Focus clip has generated a lot of conversation on Irish social media. From an Irish perspective, it's hugely surprising that members of the media would be so unfamiliar with right way to say his name. Even more surprising - in the context of this weekend's Football Focus - was the decision to go on saying the name the wrong way after being corrected.
For what it's worth, Somers also replied to one commenter on Twitter who was peeved that she reverted to the incorrect pronunciation so quickly:
I didn’t just go on tv and ask him this - we spoke about it before and he said he’s fine for us to continue saying it as it is. I would never be rude to anyone, let alone a pundit. What you don’t see is after this, we all laugh about it.
Maybe 2025 will be the year people in the UK start saying Martin Keown's surname the right way.
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