UniLang

Prowler wrote:A Swedish guy told me once that "Sven", a very stereotypical Swedish name, is an "old man's name". Just like here "Manuel" and "António" are names I associate with men aged 50 and above. Well there's some "Antónios" still but guys named "Manuel"? Don't know any below 50. Just like "Maria" is more common with middle aged women as well. Nowadays the trendy first name for girls seems to be "Ana". You look at HS class with 15 girls and 13 boys and 5 of the girls have "Ana" as their first name

linguoboy wrote:One Christian custom I miss is the tradition of naming people based on the saint's day they were born on. This kept some pretty unusual given names in circulation.

It seems to survive best in Francophone Africa (perhaps reinforced by local naming customs, which often dictate that children receive particular names based on the day of the week) and more weakly in Latin countries.

vijayjohn wrote:

linguoboy wrote:One Christian custom I miss is the tradition of naming people based on the saint's day they were born on. This kept some pretty unusual given names in circulation.

Really? How?

vijayjohn wrote:

It seems to survive best in Francophone Africa (perhaps reinforced by local naming customs, which often dictate that children receive particular names based on the day of the week) and more weakly in Latin countries.

This is kind of surprising to me because I still have a French textbook where they talk all about how people in France have a fête (on the day of the saint they were named after). The Irish friend I mentioned recently also briefly taught ESL in Portugal and said one of her Portuguese friends told her about how whenever a baby is born in Portugal, their parents have to pick a name for them from a set list of names like saints' names and "Vasco" and so on.

Osias wrote:I remember reading when O Rei do Gado first aired that people from Portugal would like to include "Luana" in the list of allowed names.

vijayjohn wrote:The Irish friend I mentioned recently also briefly taught ESL in Portugal and said one of her Portuguese friends told her about how whenever a baby is born in Portugal, their parents have to pick a name for them from a set list of names like saints' names and "Vasco" and so on.

Dormouse559 wrote:I'm always struck by the number of non-Portuguese surnames used as given names in Brazil (Edison, Emerson, Nelson …). Wikipedia says they were originally meant as homages to famous holders of those names. I get that, but I think in the U.S. at least, the first name is the go-to, with the last name being secondary (e.g. Martin Luther King <- Martin Luther, George Washington Carver <- George Washington).

Prowler wrote:And Nelson isnt the best example. You can find Nelsons in many non english speaking nations including my own. That being said I dunno a single one.

Dormouse559 wrote:

Prowler wrote:And Nelson isnt the best example. You can find Nelsons in many non english speaking nations including my own. That being said I dunno a single one.

Granted. As a matter of fact, I know a Nelson who is very American. I was seeing if I could think of three off the top of my head.

Dormouse559 wrote:I think in the U.S. at least, the first name is the go-to, with the last name being secondary

Prowler wrote:And why is Wanderlei such a common name?

Prowler wrote:the only "famous" Nelson i can think os is that simpsons character

Osias wrote:Pretty sure is the opposite, there's no "George Monument", just "Washington Monument", besides the city Washington DC, etc.

Prowler wrote:Brazil has to win as far as absurd "what the hell!" names go, though.

Varislintu wrote:

Aurinĭa wrote:Do you know why that law was created in 1900?

No. It's on my list of things to investigate, but I haven't gotten to it yet.

Varislintu wrote:I haven't mentioned this before here, but our baby fits pretty well into what is described as the high needs temperament. It has required me to invest physically even more than an average, easier baby requires. I haven't, for example, slept a longer stretch than two hours more than a handful of times in the last 8 months. This will affect my health long term. I'm wearing the baby in a manduca right now because he can't sleep without my physical presense. (This is actually a huge improvement -- until 6 months of age he didn't like the manduca and was not able to sleep in a sling either. )

Varislintu wrote:

Aurinĭa wrote:I agree that everybody needs to make their own decisions, but I think it makes sense to give a child the father's name. After all, the mother carried the child, which is a connection the father (or non-carrying other mother) can't have, so giving his (her) name to the child name would be an extra connection between father and child.

I think that's admirable. This was the main reason that I considered giving up my wish for the baby to have my last name. I think it's a good and valid reason. It's like a gift. One thing that I realised when mulling these things over, was that nobody else will see it as a gift. They won't even notice, or think about it. The baby getting the father's name is just the father's unquestioned privilege in this society, he will just be getting his due, because of course babies are named after the father. This wasn't the reason we ended up choosing my name, but it did make me feel a bit sad. You can't give a privileged person a gift related to that privilege in society's eyes. On a personal level of course, the receiver may realise what the other one gave up in giving it. It's a bit like male authors of PhDs or novels, thanking in the acknowlegements theirs wives for running the household and kids and typing up their manuscripts and proofreading them so they themselves could focus on other things. Like, I'm sure on the personal level the wife feels warm inside being thanked, because she may know the husband actually knows what she sacrificed, but on a societal level it's more of the same structural sexism.

Yeah, these would have weighed heavily in our case, but as it happens, we both have simple, easy, internationally similarly easy-to-pronounce names. I almost wish I was called Äyskäröinen or something, just so it had been easier to decide.