Metallica! Time for dinner!!!

from the Associated Press:

Couple Fights to Name Baby 'Metallica'

STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) - Metallica may be a cool name for a heavy metal band, but a Swedish couple is struggling to convince officials it is also suitable for a baby girl.

Michael and Karolina Tomaro are locked in a court battle with Swedish authorities, which rejected their application to name their six-month-old child after the legendary rock band.

``It suits her,'' Karolina Tomaro, 27, said Tuesday of the name. ``She's decisive and she knows what she wants.''

Although little Metallica has already been baptized, the Swedish National Tax Board refused to register the name, saying it was associated with both the rock group and the word ``metal.''

Tomaro said the official handling the case also called the name ``ugly.''

The couple was backed by the County Administrative Court in Goteborg, which ruled on March 13 that there was no reason to block the name. It also noted that there already is a woman in Sweden with Metallica as a middle name.

The tax agency appealed to a higher court, frustrating the family's foreign travel plans.

``We've had to cancel trips and can't get anywhere because we can't get her a passport without an approved name,'' Tomaro said.

They should have moved to the USA, where names like Tesla (probably after the band and not after the inventor?), Jamiroquai, Rush and Slade (To name a few) have been found on birth certificates.

Author Pen names

Lately I've been into authors' pen names. Here are a couple of sites where you can find lists of them:

Author Pen Names

a.k.a

and finally, How To Choose a Pen Name.

Dear uh... Mr. or Mrs. Balasubramanian...

If you're not familiar with Hindu names, this is a cool toy-- it tells the gender of names. I used to work in a university, and professors were always emailing me asking if the student they were meeting with was male or female. I should have directed them here!

Hindu Name Guesser

I think it works by analyzing the last letter or so of a name, and then using naming conventions to guess the gender. Of course, the first name I entered was "Aditya," which is the name of a dude I know. I always thought it would be beautiful on a girl... and the name guesser told me it was a female name. Were Aditya's parents hoping he was a girl, or is this the exception to the rule? Just for kicks, I typed in "Susan" and it told me it was a male name. I guess most Sanskrit-based names ending in N are for guys (like Narayan, Naveen etc.)

If you're not into Hindu names, check out the Baby Name Guesser. This tool searches the web and delivers results based on the findings. This site also has sone fun toys, like the Alter Ego Finder, which gives you a name of an "alter ego" by finding names with similar popularity and gender. The one it came up with for me was Cecilia Hillman, which is super creepy, because I was once engaged to a dude with the last name Hillman, and I always planned on naming my first daughter Cecilia. Cecilia Hillman was the name of our fictional kid.

Name of the Year

The Name Of the Year blog collects interesting, unusual names. you can even vote for their Name Of the Year!

A Brief overview of Chinese naming practices

Here's a short article on how Chinese parents can come up with their children's names.

Chinese Baby Names

Ritzy Urban moms: definitely using creative names

Here's an article about the naming choices of the well-to-do in Manhattan:
Baby Names Get Weird... Milo, Shiloh... Thijs?

Jerry Seinfeld would have been right at home in ancient Rome.

Wasn't Seinfeld the one who thought Seven was the perfect name for a kid? Maybe I'm getting the joke wrong; I think I've seen that show maybe twice. However, everyone I know is constantly quoting it at me, so I know there's something about naming a kid Seven. Incidentally, there is a little boy named Seven in Ithaca (his brother's name is Tenor).

Anyway, here is a list of Numerical Names from Wikipedia.

Finally, a decent baby name site!

Check it! These guys strive to have accurate information and not just gimmicky pink and blue name charts!

Baby Name Addicts

While your at it, take the baby name survey at this site-- apparently the survey owner wants to write a baby name book based on this research!

History of African-American names

Continuing my fascination with African-American naming trends, I found this site about a brief history of African American names:

Finding Our History: African American Names.

Creating new names out of old names has been a long-standing tradition in African American culture. Long before there were LaTanyas, Donnelles and Andraes, there were Samanthas (Sam + -antha bet you didn't know this was a 200-year-old African American creation!), Authorine (the first African American student at a white university in Alabama), Araminta (Harriet Tubman's first name at birth), & Cabell (Cab Calloway's birth name).

Another site about the importance of names in both African American and African culture:

Slavery in America: African American Names

Irish Names for everyone

I've long been interested in Irish names, but it seems like the Irish aren't as into them as I am.
Here's the top baby names in Ireland for 2005, as reported by the Central Bureau of Statistics.
I put the Irish names in green (of course!).

In the boys' list, there are 8 Irish names in the top 25, and I suspect that Ryan is in there more because it's a "modern" name, rather than having a long, Irish heritage (it was used primarily as a last name only in previous centuries).

The Girls have 6 Irish names in their top 25, though I'm thinking that Molly may be used more for it's old-fashioned charm than it's Irishness (along the lines of Sophie, Lucy, Katie, Emily etc.)

Why people use names has always fascinated me, but that's a whole other ballgame!

BOYS:

1. Jack
   
2. Sean
   
3. Adam
   
4. Conor
   
5. James
   
6. Daniel
   
7. Cian
   
8. Luke
   
9. Aaron
   
10. Michael
    
11. Dylan
    
12. Ryan
    
13. Jamie
    
14. Ben
    
15. David
    
16. Thomas
    
17. John
    
18. Patrick
    
19. Matthew
    
20. Darragh
    
21. Eoin
    
22. Oisin
    
23. Shane
    
24. Alex
    
25. Evan
    

GIRLS:

Katie Amy
Aoife
Ciara
Sophie
Chloe
Leah
Ella
Emily
Rachel
Niamh
Grace
Rebecca
Hannah
Caoimhe
Ava
Lauren
Jessica
Anna
Kate
Roisin
Lucy
Molly

If you want some historical Irish names for your baby (or your D&D character), check out Fantasy Ireland's Top Baby Names. I always find it fascinating what names people gravitate towards and why-- this site gives information as to why each name is cool in their eyes.

Meet my daughter, Vagina (va GEE na)...

Snopes.com is awesome. Here's an interesting article about the common urban legend names we're always hearing about.

Another is about comments from a Congresswoman about giving hurricanes African-American names that were warped and painted with racism.

Unwanted baby names!

Send us your unwanted baby names

Why waste a perfectly good name like, er, Leopard?

Everybody has one. No, not one of those. We're talking about that list of brilliant but unused baby names. Most people come up with something like 2,734 good ones before having to settle on just one or two - unless, they really go nuts and knock out maybe three. But still, think of all the wasted potential...

New trend: biblical names

Celebs turn to the Good Book for baby names

By Gayle White

Cox News Service

Hollywood is a long way from Puritan New England, but celebrities are harking back to an old tradition: biblical baby names.

Consider:

Robert De Niro's son Aaron.

Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin's little girl, Delilah Belle.

Annie Potts' Isaac Harris.

Albert Brooks' two-for-one Jacob Eli.

Not to mention all the Elijahs, Hannahs and Jacobs in Beverly Hills preschools.

Shiloh Jolie-Pitt and Moses Paltrow-Martin are among the newest additions to the rolls of Scripture-based baby monikers.

Judith Tropea, author of "Classic Biblical Baby Names," says she thinks the trend shows that people want names that are "meaningful, spiritual and have lasted through the course of time."

Tropea, who lives in New Jersey, is expecting her third son. Matthew is 8; Daniel, 6.

She's considering Noah for the newest addition.

Tropea has some suggestions that go way beyond the obvious in scriptural appellations.

For her:

Damaris -- a woman who listened to Paul as he preached about Jesus in Athens.

Elisheba -- wife of Moses' brother Aaron.

Kezia -- Job's second daughter.

Tirzah -- the youngest of five sisters who protested Moses' division of Canaan based on sons. God agreed with the girls.

Zipporah -- given to Moses as a wife.

For him:

Aeneas -- a paralyzed man healed by Peter in the name of Jesus.

Gaius -- a popular name among Christians in Rome.

Nicanor -- an early disciple of the church in Jerusalem.

Othniel -- the first judge of Israel after Joshua's death.

Zuriel -- a Levite ruler during the exodus from Egypt.

I've been pushing Keziah and Tirzah for years! I also love Damaris. The Pilgrims used Damaris quite a bit.

Names and Socioeconomic Status/Race

Here are a couple of articles about the socioeconomic differences in naming trends, as well as the difference in naming trends between blacks and whites in the USA.

A Roshanda By Any Other Name

Where do Baby Names Come From?

I am totally fascinated by African American vs. white naming trends. White people have a tendency to make fun of names like Lakisha, Shaniqua, etc., that are pretty much exclusively used by African Americans. I've heard comments like, "adding -isha to a name doesn't make it African," and "it's so obvious that they're black" (implying that if LaShondra had been named something "whiter," she might be taken more seriously).

Today I met a pregnant black woman who plans on naming her daughter Samaria (pronounced like Sa MAHR ee a (second syllable rhymes with 'car'), not like sa-mary-a, where the 2nd syllable rhymes with 'bear')-- she made it up after the Samartian women in the bible. She asked me if I'd heard of the name, and I said "no, but I've heard sa-mary-a." She breathed a sigh of relief, saying she wanted her daughter to have a totally unique name. In fact, the baby's middle name is going to be Eunique (baby's dad picked that one out).

The woman stressed the "unique" thing several times. It's funny, because white people seem to want just the opposite. When white people are talking about baby names, they are always worried that the child's peers will make fun of it, or that a boy's name will be "girly" (a really big fear). A name's uniqueness doesn't seem to enter into the equation at. all.

I would love to do some kind of project on naming and race, but I'd look like a total freak walking up to random black people and being like, "what's your name? How did you get that name?" I'd also like to talk to white mothers of babies with (1)really common names and (2) really odd names. Ahh, the things I would do if I had the time and money to do stuff!

How popular is your first name?

I have no idea where this information comes from, but Name Statistics is kind of a fun site. It will tell you how common your first name is, and then give you some HTML to paste in your blog or webpage or wherever you'd like.

For Example:

Otto is the #504 most common male name.
0.018% of men in the US are named otto.
Around 22050 US men are named otto!
source namestatistics.com

Dorcas is the #1388 most common female name.
0.005% of females in the US are named dorcas.
Around 6375 US females are named dorcas!
source namestatistics.com

How many people have your name?

This site is really fun: it tells you "how many people" have your name (first and last) in the USA. By "how many people," it doesn't count the number of actual people who have your name; how it works is it takes the popularity of your first name and last name and then figures out the probability that someone will have both your names, based on the US population (which recently hit 300,000,000).

It's fun, though. I threw in some fairly improbable (or just silly) name combinations just to see what it would come up with:

According to the statistics,

There are 12 people in the U.S. named Abdul Murphy.

There are 20 people in the U.S. named Herschel Lopez.

There are 15 people in the U.S. named Julio Chen.

There are 4 people in the U.S. named Tanisha Wong.

There is 1 person in the U.S. named Mohammed Goldstein.

There is 1 person in the U.S. named Monique Gupta.

There are 21 people in the U.S. named Jesus Singh.

There are 12 people in the U.S. named Marilyn Manson.

There are 78 people in the U.S. named Martin Barton.

There are 529 people in the U.S. named Kelly Kelly.

There are 2 people in the U.S. named Dick Head. (heheh I couldn't resist)

...and, look out world, because There are 503 people in the U.S. named George Bush!

Name your kids David & Susan to invite wealth?

Here's a kind of pointless article from Netscape News: It's about the richest people, and what their names are. The article implies that in order for your children to be successful, name them things from these lists.

However... John is a pretty common name all around. If you could take a poll of the *poorest* people out there, I'll bet John will rank pretty high as well. Would that mean that your baby John is destined to become a hobo?

The name is Bond...

A man, formerly named David Fearn, has legally changed his name to James Bond, with his middle names being all the titles of the Bond movies thus far. What will happen when they come out with another movie?

I'm too sexy for my name

From The Atlantic:

What's in a Name?

If you feel that the opposite sex isn't giving you the attention you so richly deserve, maybe you should consider making a change—a name change, that is. According to a preliminary study by an MIT cognitive scientist, the vowel sounds in people's names may have an impact on how others judge their attractiveness. Specifically, when the men in the study were assigned names with a stressed front vowel (a vowel sound spoken at the front of the mouth), they were rated as more attractive than when they were assigned names with a stressed back vowel. (In other words, good news for Dave, Craig, Ben, Jake, Rick, Steve, Matt; bad news for Lou, Paul, Luke, Tom, Charles, George, John.) In women the effect was reversed, and a stressed back vowel (Laura, Julie, Robin, Susan, Holly) boosted sex appeal, whereas a stressed front vowel (Melanie, Jamie, Jill, Tracy, Ann, Liz, Amy) had the opposite effect—to the author's disappointment, no doubt.

—"What's in a Name? The Effect of Sound Symbolism on Perception of Facial Attractiveness," Amy Perfors, MIT

This study has been written about in a few different places, including New Scientist, on Netscape News, and MSNBC. While the spin may be slightly different for each article, they all agree on one thing: Amy is a pretty un-sexy name. No wonder I changed mine!

Welcome to the Onomastics Blog!

We'll post any interesting articles out there in the world of naming.