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<DIV>Very interesting article. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>In answer to your question, the pressure wasn't too bad, if you consider
putting a list together of about 50 names (for each sex) then arguing away as
you whittle them down to five, then putting together a virtual debate on which
one you feel is most appropriate. . . actually, ours was pretty easy. We both
liked it and luckily when he arrived, he did too.</DIV>
<DIV><BR>Something you want to tell me??????</DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px">
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV
style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A href="mailto:alexa.champion@EROLS.COM" title=alexa.champion@EROLS.COM>Alexa
Champion</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A
href="mailto:FLING@LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG"
title=FLING@LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG>FLING@LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG</A>
</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Monday, November 29, 1999 10:20
AM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> baby names</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>I thought some on the list might be interested in this article.
Lots of connections between naming, generations, race, class, gender,
etc. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Sorry for the html coding. <BR><BR><A
href="http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A56149-1999Nov28.html">http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A56149-1999Nov28.html</A><BR><BR>Playing
the Name Game With Baby</DIV>
<DIV>by Alysia Bennett</DIV>
<DIV>Monday, Nov. 29, 1999</DIV>
<DIV>C4<BR><BR><p>Once upon a time, before Frank Zappa named his son
Dweezil and his daughter Moon Unit, before Demi Moore named her girls Rumer
and Scout, there lived a boy named Jack and a girl named Jill. Plain folk with
plain names.</p><BR><p>Now, meet generation next. The mothers and
fathers of children named Sun-Everlasting God, Dezire Messiah, Treasure,
Sincere, Heaven Lee, Nobility, Trinity and Diamond. Sounds like a liturgical
recitation, but these are the actual names of local children born within the
last few months. Forget about names for the new millennium (Annikin and
Millennia). It doesn't get any better than this.</p><BR><p>But why
would parents choose such names and, as entertaining as they are, what effect,
if any, will these names have on the children? They can't all be rock stars,
pro wrestlers, super models and movie stars – occupations where an unusual
name might be an asset.</p><BR><p>And although the best and the
brightest of them may be computer engineers, scientists or even teachers, how
does Sun-Everlasting God get elected in a secular society? Certainly, Dezire
Messiah will have a tough time in Hollywood; there's already a Diamond in
pro-wrestling. And who will ever believe Sincere is, well,
sincere?</p><BR><p>Clevland Evans, associate professor of
psychology at Bellevue University in Nebraska and author of "Unusual and Most
Popular Baby Names," has written extensively on the subject and believes he
may know the answer to the first two
questions.</p><BR><p>"American culture has always been the most
individualistic culture in the world, but we're even more that way than we
used to be. This idea that everybody should be unique, and that you need to
give your child a name that expresses that, is very popular in the culture. In
particular, I get all sorts of e-mails and responses from people all the time
who want to know what the most popular names are so they can avoid giving them
to their children."</p><BR><p>Local birth announcements for the
past few months are a testament to just how creative some parents can be. Take
a look and a quirky pattern emerges in the form of six categories: deities,
personal traits, liquor, precious stones, the rampant and seemingly
indiscriminate use of the accent mark, and people who like to use the letter
"y."</p><BR><p>Perhaps recognizing that what a parent decides to
name a child is often visceral, Evans notes that talking about socioeconomic
differences usually is difficult. "That's one thing that Americans have such a
hard time with," he says. "Nobody is offended when I point out that African
Americans, on the average, have a different set of names than white Americans,
but I have a lot of people in the U.S. that get really offended when I point
out that upper-middle-class people have a different set of names they like [to
use] than working-class people do. Americans like to think that we are a
classless society and the only thing class means is that you have more income,
and otherwise, we are all alike. No, there are a lot of tastes and other
things that go along with [it], than just income."</p><BR><p>Take
for example the upper middle class, he says. Although they are looking for new
and unusual names too, they opt to go back and revive something that's not
being used much at the moment – names like Emma or Henry. "They're reviving
these old things, where the working class are the ones who will pick up on
names that are new, names that have not been used as first names until
recently." The name Brittany, he says, is a perfect example. "Until about 30
years ago Brittany was only a province of France."</p><BR><p>The
wealthy, he says, are less likely to choose that name. "Wealthy people want
antiques. They like old stuff because they are socialized to appreciate the
past ... the past has been good to their family, their culture.
With poorer people, the past hasn't been necessarily good to them. Focusing on
the future is what is positive for them, and so newer things are what they
like."</p><BR><p>Looking at people's tastes in clothing or
furniture, he says, is further proof that socioeconomic factors play a part in
the choices we make. "Poorer people are much more likely to want newer styles,
where more wealthy people are more likely to go for things that are more
traditional. It's the same way in baby names."</p><BR><p>As for
cultural differences, he points to the use of alcoholic beverages as first
names. Whites are more likely to choose names like Brandy or Sherry.
Chardonnay and Shampagne, names given to two local children, are much more
likely to be African American, he says.</p><BR><p>"African
Americans are much more comfortable creating new names for their kids. They're
more comfortable taking some of those words like chardonnay over, but of
course, they're even more comfortable just making things up from syllables
like Shamika [or] Shalonda than people of other ethnic groups are. It's been
that way since the 1960s."</p><BR><p>Ageism, he says, is another
factor, especially when choosing girls' names. He says that a lot of Americans
will not give a child, especially a daughter, a name that they know anybody
over 25 has. For some, a name that was popular in their own age group or their
parents' age group is not new enough. Part of that, he says, is
ageism.</p><BR><p>"Ask people to tell you what are the women's
names they think are ugly, that they would never give a baby today. Most of
them come up with a list of names that are the names that are popular for
women who are in nursing homes, because it is so bad to be elderly, especially
as a woman in our culture.</p><BR><p>"Everybody thinks names like
Ruth and Ida, Bessie and Maude are ugly. They'll tell you it's the sound that
makes them ugly. It's not the sound, because you can find pairs of names that
sound almost exactly alike, but have completely different images like Elsie
and Kelsie. It's that Elsie is associated with wrinkles in their mind [and]
that makes it sound ugly. Kelsie is new, so it sounds
pretty."</p><BR><p>Culture, class and attitudes about aging may
play a part in what parents name a child, but some names might not be
explained away so easily. They border on the romantic and fantastical, saying
more about the parents as individuals than the group they belong to.
Twenty-two-year-old Loijielyn Cruz Marasigan, an accounts payable clerk from
Rockville, named her daughter Lady Marien. The story of Robin Hood was not an
influence, she says. Marien is a combination of her nickname, Jien, and her
husband's first name, Marlon. Combining the names of the parents to produce a
child's is a family tradition, but adding Lady made it
special.</p><BR><p>"You don't want a typical name," she explains.
"We wanted it to be Princess Marien but that was too long, so we chose Lady,
and it still sounds like royalty."</p><BR><p>"We wanted something
easy to say, pretty, feminine, but different," says Shelley D. Nembhard, a
35-year-old RN at Mid Atlantic Medical Services Inc., who moved here from
England eight years ago. She and her husband, John, an EKG technician, named
their daughter Rhayvenne Starre. Their families, she says, "didn't know how to
react, but they got used to it." They get "a mixed reaction" from
non-family.</p><BR><p>The couple also has a 3-year-old daughter
named Chynna Raynne and an 8-year-old named Thea. "We wanted to give them
names that were different, but not something that they'd get teased for in
school," she said.</p><BR><p>When Mysty Snelson, a 31-year-old
clerk at the National Institutes of Health, was looking for a name for her
daughter, she found the answer in a book called "Heaven," by V.C. Andrews,
author of the best-seller "Flowers in the Attic." She named her Heaven Noelle
Bradbury. Of the uniqueness of her youngest child's name, the mother of three
says, "I've noticed that a lot of people really love her name or are really
turned off by it and ask me 'What about when she starts school?' It'll be
interesting to see how people react in the future."</p><BR><p>She
may not be waiting and watching alone. According to Evans, the name is not so
unusual anymore. Three local baby girls were given that name within the last
few months, and it's catching on in other parts of the country. In 1998, five
newborns in Nebraska alone were named Heaven.</p><BR><p>"We live
in a mass culture," Evans says. We "watch the same television, listen to the
same music, read the same newspapers."</p><BR><p>So, Heaven is
safe. But what about Trinity, Dezire Messiah, Messiah Emanuel and
Sun-Everlasting God? Or Nobility and Favour? What will the effect be on these
children? According to Evans, psychological research generally shows that
having an uncommon name is neutral or slightly positive, especially for girls.
However, he says, "that's for the mass of uncommon names, which don't sound
humorous or have a negative connotation to people.</p><BR><p>"The
[example] I always use," he says, is that of "a little boy born in Florida a
few years ago named Tragedy. Obviously, if you name your child something like
that, it's going to be a negative influence. There's a way to get too creative
that people then can't take you seriously. The happy medium is the way to
go."</p></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></BODY></HTML>