given names

[Frederick J Newmeyer]

Hello,

I have a question posed to me by a non-linguist friend that borders on trivia, but is perhaps deeply interesting nonetheless. Does anybody know of a culture where no distinction is made between male given names and female given names? That is, cultures where if somebody says to you something like "I'd like you to meet Gkz'itfo some day," you have no cues as to whether Gkz'itfo is a man or a woman. English and some other European languages have SOME names like that (Lee, Kim, Sandy, etc.), but I wonder if there are places where ALL names are gender-neutral.

Thanks. I'll summarize.

--fritz


Frederick J. Newmeyer
Professor Emeritus, University of Washington
Adjunct Professor, U of British Columbia and Simon Fraser U
[for my postal address, please contact me by e-mail]