conuly

Really, I shouldn't've, because they're supposed to do that for people who donate over $100, and I donated $2, but I'm not complaining. It's a first grade class, so of course Jenn and I pored over it to compare and contrast with Ana's handwriting and tell ourselves how INCREDIBLY good at writing Ana is :) (BTW, I copied out Ana's introductory letter for her penpals and typed it up if anybody else is having a last minute desire to have their kids write back and forth.)

I took notice of one of the names signed on the letters - Brenda.

Now, I know that when it comes to names everything old is new again. People like nostalgic names right now, they're very popular. This is no doubt why Ana's grade at school contains a Lucy, a Bonnie, and an Edwina. This is probably why Evangeline's class has a Billy and a Bobby. It's certainly why Ana and Ava are such popular names with children their age.

But Brenda? Brenda isn't an "Old fashioned from 100 years ago name" - it's an "Old fashioned from the 50s name". That's even more old-fashioned from one suitably distant enough to be trendy. It took me completely by surprise.

Anyway, thinking about all this led me to find out that not only does NYC post its own baby name statistics independent of the rest of the state, they divide it up by ethnic group. (PDF!) What's very interesting about that is not how they divide it up, but how they group people together.

In a very diverse city, it's not surprising that we have a variety of infant names. We have the standards that are popular everywhere right now, and some that you KNOW are only popular in some groups. So when you look at a list of, say, Asian Females... the truth is that I don't need statistics to tell me that the guy who names his kid Fatima (or, in the male list, Ibrahim) is not the same person as the one who names his kid Yu or Xin. And in the "White, Non-Hispanic lists", it doesn't take much to guess that the people naming their kids Schlomo and Rifka, Mordechai and Gittel aren't the same people naming their children Christian, Christopher, or Christina... nor yet Antonio and Maria.

So, you know, these lists aren't that useful unless you know how to read them. Of course, "useful" assumes they have a use at all, which they probably don't unless you're writing a book or are seeking to discriminate against somebody's resume and aren't even bright enough to do that without assistance.

They're interesting, though.

Probably because it's such a popular name :)

I used to be heavily into name origins as a kid, and names, and naming. I've very nearly forgotten about all that, but a few things made me remember. One was an argument with Elise about the meaning of her name (culminating in the ultimate "Don't call my parents wrong!" when, well, they are wrong, and very much so! And no, I don't think I'm always right. I take care, when speaking, to be right, at least inasmuch as that's possible), and the other was the search for a name that goes nicely with Virginia for mayna. Too many people are having kids lately.

Anyway, so I'm browsing a Welsh language site looking for nicknames for Guinivere (her idea, but I do like that name well enough, though I also like Ghislaine, so who knows?) and I came across: Lilybet. Short for, presumably, Elizabeth, as it means "God's promise", which... yeah.

That's almost as good as Ianto, Yet Another Variant/Nickname for John. Maybe better, because it's a girl's name, and sounds normal in the US.