NAMING TRENDS

"Yes, but it's pronounced 'throat warbler mangrove'"

For over a decade my first name was the #1 choice for baby boys in the USA, leading to a lot of confusion in school when someone yelled it. I prefer to go by my whole name, Christopher, but people insist on shortening it, which I think it somewhat rude. I worked at a sandwich shop once where the boss apparently either could not remember my name or just thought it was cute to call me by everything else he could think of. Chief, Bud, Cochise, Buster, Champ, etc. He had a whole roster to fill in for names. Christopher has slid a bit in popularity, but it's still in the top ten.

Names are an interesting thing, I wrote a while back about the bizarre and sad names that celebrities love giving their kids, as if being related to Tom Cruise or Nicole Kidman isn't hard enough on a child. Recently an article at Live Science reported changes in baby names over the years. Jeanna Bryner compared baby names in the US from 1950:

1. James / Linda
2. Robert / Mary
3. John / Patricia
4. Michael / Barbara
5. David / Susan
6. William / Nancy
7. Richard / Deborah
8. Thomas / Sandra
9. Charles / Carol
10. Gary / Kathleen

To 2007:

1. Jacob / Emily
2. Michael / Isabella
3. Ethan / Emma
4. Joshua / Ava
5. Daniel / Madison
6. Christopher / Sophia
7. Anthony / Olivia
8. William / Abigail
9. Matthew / Hannah
10. Andrew / Elizabeth

What stands out is that lately Bible names are very popular, there are nine names from the Bible in the 2007 list (Abigail, Andrew, Daniel, Elizabeth, Hannah, Jacob, Joshua, Matthew, Michael), although it's likely a lot of the parents aren't aware of some of them such as Abigail and Elizabeth.

Names you just don't see any more from the 1950 list include Patricia, Carol, and Charles. Just not too many chucks around these days. According to Baby Name Resources, the top 10 British names are:

1. Jack/Emily
2. Joshua/Ellie
3. Thomas/Jessica
4. James/Sophie
5. Daniel/Chloe
6. Samuel/Lucy
7. Oliver/Olivia
8. William/Charlotte
9. Benjamin/Katie
10. Joseph/Megan

It struck me as odd how many of the girls' names were shortened or alternate versions rather than the full name. Jack instead of John, Katie instead of Katherine, Ellie instead of Elizabeth. Harry was the 11th most popular choice, which is strange for such a classic British name.

Number 20 on the list? Mohammad. Just that spelling, if you include all the variations it ends up in the top five. Number 19 was Callum, which is just odd, I've never known anyone named Callum, yet the British seem to love it. Again, a host of Biblical names such as Thomas, James, and Samuel.

Incidentally I hit the Baby Name Resource "suggest a boy's name" button a few times and got Baris, Trace, Dalton, Truman, and Aaron, which looks to me like it was designed by women who watch too many soap operas. The burning need for your child to have a unique name is troubling to me, kids have a tough enough time without being hung with some moniker the teachers can't pronounce and the kids will mock. For girls I got Wren, Willow, Gwyneth, Mira, and Joy. I guess they're trying to suggest names you wouldn't have thought of on your own, or something. But Baris? Is that like Bort?

The Live Science story noted that in 1950 a quarter of all children named had one of the top ten names, but today only one tenth get these names. Parents are going crazy with unique and special names the mom thought up in 5th grade and have held to fondly. Sometimes the mom is in fifth grade and the names reflect this. Star, Shaquandra, Sunday, or Miller Lite.

There's a resource one of the commenters mentioned at the site called Baby Name Trends (there's an absurd number of baby name sites out there) which tracks and shows you various trends and odd patterns of baby names. Here's what the name frequency of naming boys Christopher looks like over the years:


As the article points out, the name Madison erupted in popularity after being virtually unknown before 1985 when the movie Splash came out. I don't mind it so much as a girl's name, but it does sound more like a guy to me. Madison Blair, handsome but troubled jazz musician/heart surgeon on As Your Stomach Churns weekdays on Lifetime.

Names are part of a culture's identity, they speak the past and traditions, they pass on heritage of one generation to the next. When you say "Jack Thompson" chances are someone thinks that's a British name, while Arie VanDyke is probably Dutch, Yukio Koshima is Japanese and so on. It's a way of identifying a culture and a society. The US is making this difficult to do, almost in rebellion of the idea of even having a cultural identity in the United States - something I know at least some on the left would delight in.

One more time I'd like to offer a humble suggestion that parents stop a moment and consider that maybe it's a good idea to give your child a name that's been in the family before, a heritage name that speaks of generations and tradition, a name that extends culture rather than adds to it, that continues ideals and familiarity rather than something special and unique that you've always thought was just darling. Just give it some thought, please? Give your kid a break.

Culture, Names, Babies/div>