Talk:Given name
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[edit] Vague fad period
- As a result, while the vast majority of Japanese women born before 1980 have names ending in ko, it is relatively rare for the younger generation.
It says "before 1980," however if you go back far enough this no longer holds. Tokek 07:33, 16 May 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Marie as a boys' name??
Marie as a boys' name??
- The latin name Marius comes from the etruscan root maru, which means male. It's not a version of Maria/Marie/Mary.
- Not all Marias come from the semetic Mr-y-m, which may mean 'bitter', 'rebellious,' or 'desired child' or something else entirely and which gives us the varied forms Mary, Marie, Maria, Marion, Miriam, Mariam, Maryam etc. depending on the specific form's translation history.
The name Marius had a feminine form: Maria. Colleen McCullough has a character, named Maria and called Ria, in one of her First Men in Rome series, set in BCE Rome, starting a century before the birth of Christ.
[edit] West African day names
Be nice to have a list of the West African day names.
By memory
Kouassi= Tues
Koffi/Kofi=Thurs
- Kofi means born on a Friday. And indeed 08 April 1938, the day Annann was born, was a Friday.
- I have edited the article as appropriate.
[edit] Linking to lists of names on other language wikipedias
In the section Related articles and lists, there are links to de:Liste gebräuchlicher Vornamen/A ("List of common German first names") and fr:Liste des prénoms ("List of French first names"). Is it a good idea to link to these lists in other languages? I think not. While it might be easier to maintain a single list of names, the lists in the other languages link to etimologies in that language. And besides, these are lists of names used in that country and not lists of names that originate from that country.
A better idea would be to have lists of names by origin (eg. Celtic names, Germanic names, Hebrew names, Latin names, etc.) This is already the case on the Polish and Catalan Wikipedias (see pl:Imię (the box in the top-right) and ca:Prenom (a list near the bottom of the article)). Ae-a 22:58, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Asian order
The practice of placing given name last in these Asian countries has been considered a manifestation of the importance of familial collective over individualism. I think this is reading too much into it. Those societies generally place larger categories before smaller categories in general. Dates are year-month-day, places are nation-province/prefecture/whatever-city, etc. So, it only makes sense that the pattern would continue in placing the large entity (family) before the individual -- Nik42 19:30, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I agree. It also implies some kind of correlation between name order and significance, which is not inherent in the western convention either. I'll take that bit out, and see if anyone complains. 20.133.0.14 12:30, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
In my openion, the significance for collective (familical) over individualism is not a unique phenominon, it is wide spread and well accepted practice. Let us take a case of Geographical Hirerchy. When two travellers meet in a third continent they always introduce themselves by countries (bigger entity), if further interest is sought, them comes the cities (smaller entity). In the similar way, Religion or Ethnical association are used. In the above example the travellers will first introduce themselves as Christian or Muslims rather than Catholics or Sunni. Similarly we say she is an artist or a doctor, not Expressionist or Gynaecologist. Same technique is practice in library classification, computers and Internet naming system. This logic could further be exclaimed by biological and zoological classifications. First we express its major identification the individuality e.g. Cat (family) then Cheetah (individual). In short the hierarchy from bigger to smaller entity is well practice and very much intact practice. That means that “Family” first, “individuality” later. That is why, in Asian countries, the name “Muhammad Arif” means Mr Arif belong to family (religion) of Muhammad which represent this universal hierarchical system of importance. By Is'haq, 2006 May 31, London
[edit] Limited Geographic Scope
I noticed a few things when looking through this article, which seems fairly good for common names in the U.S., Australia, and the U.K., but probably not for elsewhere:
- There is essentially nothing on African names (Kofi Annan being an exception)
- The detailed descriptions of name origins (hebrew, german, latin, greek, etc.) are all for common American/British/Australian names, with no examples of, say, Hebrew names in French-speaking countries
- Though some languages like Chinese and Korean have some information (which I found really interesting), there is little on Japanese (aside from the bit about -ko) or Spanish.
I'm not sure if the best solution is to move some content to an "English given names" article and improve what's left over or to expand the article in its current version, but there's a lot of potential for expansion either way.
Dave (talk) July 8, 2005 03:15 (UTC)
- Additional info on Chinese/Japanese/Korean names can be found on Chinese name, Japanese name, Korean name. --Menchi 8 July 2005 03:59 (UTC)
- Maybe we should create articles on names by origin/etimology (eg. Celtic names, Germanic names, Hebrew names, etc.). See my earlier comment. Ae-a 21:41, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
[edit] List of Equivalent Given Names
I would like to see a list of equivalent given names to the English across languages. A bit like the Names of European cities in different languages. E.g:
- John (from Hebrew, "God is gracious")
= Giovani (Italian) = Ian (Scotland) = Jean (French) = Johann (German) = Sean (Irish) etc. Is it worth me starting such an entry? Avalon 12:06, 20 October 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Some fool not making sense about relative significance of forenames
"The given name may be single, or several names may be given (the latter are known as middle names). In the latter case, one of them, generally the first, is commonly used while the others are mostly used for official records (Order of names is no longer as important).", dude what does that say?
As above some are confused as to what this means (though I and others find it clear) perhaps it could be repalced with:
"A given name may be single, in which case it is used in daily life. The alternative is that several names are given, in which case the first of these is used in every day life and others are mostly only seen on official documents and records. The order of names is however no longer as important as it used to be and 'middle names' may be used in every day life"
Both versions fall into the trap of conferring some sort of special status on the first forename. True, a majority of those with English-style names have their main forename placed first – but a very large minority do not. I'll have a think about a less narrow-minded version. For instance, 'first' and 'middle' is biased one way – 'central' and 'precursory' the other. 'Main' and 'supplementary' is more balanced. Grant 12:42, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Very Westernised
I don't see a mention about Chinese given names, or Asian given names (such as Singapore, Malay tradition etc.). Like what is said above, it does not represent a worldwide view. A cleanup is necessary and this is very urgent. Maybe I will try adding something into it. --Terence Ong 10:21, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
- I saw what is wrote about Chinese given names, still very short though. --Terence Ong 10:23, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Balinese Names; Birth order of 4 and then back again to the top
Balinese people, regardless of being male or female recieve one of four names based on birth order.
Though there are significant variations in the four names of Balinese people, mostly due to caste membership, there are precisely four names in Balinese culture that are repeated endlessly 10's of thousands of times. First born is "Wayan" (or Yan, for short), 2nd is "Made," 3rd is "Nyoman" (Man for short), and 4th is "Ketut" (often elided to Tut). Pronounce vowels pretty much as you would for Spanish/italian. Balinese names are rendered into Roman script by virtue of the Indonesian language being written so. The spelling to pronunciation relationship is said to be "perfect" because the spelling of words was revised significantly in the 70's and/or 80's (and even more recently).
The first born is Wayan, and if their is a fifth child, he/she is often called Wayan Balik (or Wayan "again"). Of course, Balinese children/people are given other names, including a new "name" after death. For example, a good friend of mine was named Nyoman Yanti. And, as a matter of fact, Yanti does indicate that she is female. However, it is important to realize that by and large, everyone does use these birth order names to refer to each, and to call each other constantly throughout the day. "Given" names such as Yanti, may be chosen due to, for example, the influence of popular culture or politics. Balinese do not have "family/surnames." I don't know well about customs in other parts of Indonesia, except to say that the Balinese system is unique to Bali (and the Balinese part of the neighboring island of Lombok). Other parts of Indonesia may also be unique. In West Sumatra, for example, among the Minangkebau people, inheritance and lineage is along matrilinear lines. Be that as it may be, it is common for these people to have only one name, a "given" name. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.133.198.69 (talk • contribs).
- This content has been moved to Balinese name. Rigadoun (talk) 20:48, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
[edit] William
How is "William" a French form? And what's the German name it's based on? john k 21:17, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
- See William (name). It became popular in English through William the Conqueror, who spoke French, but had, like most Norman nobles, a Germanic name. The modern French form is Guillaume; the modern German form is Wilhelm. One can tell that the French form is derived from Germanic because it starts in "gu"; this letter combination was used in French to imitate the Germanic "w"-sound that French doesn't have (other example: guerre from the same root as war). One can tell that the English form is derived from French because it doesn't have the l at the end that Wilhelm has. Chl 02:10, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
[edit] First name?
The article does not make it very clear whether "first name" is defined to always be the same thing as "given name" or not. I recently saw an official U.S. form where one had to give both "first name" and "given name" separately. As I was under the impression that these are the same thing, naturally I was quite baffled at the redundancy. If it is correct, IMO the article should at the beginning state that the given name (known also as the first name) is the first forename of a person (Asian ordering doesn't matter here, as they don't call them by position, e.g. 苗字="family name" and 名前="given name" in Japanese, and calling family name the first name under any circumstances would be eccentric use of English to say the least, so there's no confusion unless you deliberately misunderstand). 82.103.206.128 11:13, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Too many examples
There are too many examples in the etymology section. Personally, I think that the examples should be cut down to the most common boys' and girls' name in for each etymology for the UK and US. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 20:09, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Proposed merge from "First names"
I support the proposal. "First name" (singular) already redirects here, and "Given name" is better from the worldwide perspective". A redirect should, of course, be retained. --Boson 00:20, 28 October 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Scandinavian Names
Seems conspicuous by their absence.
Icelandic names all have a meaning, for example Elín means "The Bright One". They should get a mention somewhere at least! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 143.167.233.7 (talk) 17:01, 28 February 2007 (UTC).
