Web of Language: What to name the baby? Forget grandma, hire a consultant

[Charles Doyle]

Reminds me of the party game of chosing one's "porn star" screen name on the basis of a formula. One formula is the name of your first pet + the name of the street your family live on when your were born.

--Chalrie
_____________________________________________________________

---- Original message ----
>Date: Sun, 15 Jul 2007 21:33:40 -0500
>From: Dennis Baron <debaron at UIUC.EDU>
>
>There's a new post on the
>
>Web of Language:
>
>What to name the baby?  Forget grandma, hire a consultant
>
>Today=92s hi-tech parents can now do what corporations have done for =20
>years: hire a consultant to devise a name to capture the essence of =20
>their latest product.  There=92s a growing number of =93nameologists=94 =
>=96 =20
>on line and in print =96 intent on selling prospective parents the =20
>perfect baby name. ...
>
>Until recently, parents looking for baby-naming help had few =20
>resources: family and friends, ethnic or religious traditions, or =20
>books like the 1930s classic, What shall we name the baby?, resources =20=
>
>which list names for boys and girls, and sometimes suggest what the =20
>names might mean....
>
>But now that the name consultants are on the case, promising to =20
>reduce the stress of baby naming and turn a process fraught with =20
>tension into a rational, easy-to-follow recipe, finding the perfect =20
>baby name is as easy as microwaving dinner. Because consultants earn =20
>their fee by telling other people what to do, parents who can=92t make =20=
>
>up their minds about names will no longer have to take their baby =20
>home from the hospital with a birth certificate reading =93Baby.=94 ...
>
>.  A pair of California writers, Whitney Walker and Eric Reyes have =20
>gone into business as baby name-brokers, using scientific rigor =96 or =20=
>
>what passes for it =96 to come up with the perfect naming formula ...
>
>Find out more -- read the rest -- on the
>Web of Language
>
>www.uiuc.edu/goto/weboflanguage
>
>
>Dennis Baron
>Professor of English and Linguistics
>Department of English
>University of Illinois
>608 S. Wright St.
>Urbana, IL 61801
>
>office: 217-244-0568
>fax: 217-333-4321
>
>www.uiuc.edu/goto/debaron
>
>read the Web of Language:
>www.uiuc.edu/goto/weboflanguage
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org