Cultural Naming Patterns

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Judy calling from Oceanside, California.

Excellent. What would you like to talk with us about?

I was calling to ask questions about naming conventions, in particular along maternal lines.

What would you like to know?

Well, I’m just wondering if there are any that you know of.

I’m familiar with mostly naming after your father’s last name.

And in my family, I have a sort of system where I’m named after my grandmother,

And my mother’s named after her grandmother.

It skips a generation then?

Yeah.

Yeah, I’ve heard of that before.

I think it’s kind of a way to, I don’t know,

It seems a little weird sometimes to name your daughter after yourself, even though I think with boys it’s a lot more common and usual.

But this way, you’re not naming your daughter after yourself, but it does follow a little bit of getting your name passed down along your mother’s line.

Yeah, it is far more common in the United States to name boys after their fathers.

Those are called patronyms, by the way, particularly in the South and the American West.

And it’s related to basically the patriarchal society that we live in,

Where a far higher value was placed on the male lineage than on the female lineage.

But it hasn’t always been the case.

And something that surprises people when they find it is that when women are named after their mothers,

They can take the junior at the end of their name as well.

Oh, I’ve never seen that.

Yeah, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt’s daughter, her name was Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

Actually, that was Eleanor’s full name, too.

And she had a junior after her name, Anna Eleanor Roosevelt Jr.

And interestingly, Eleanor Roosevelt’s mother was named Anna Rebecca Hall Roosevelt.

So at least the first name was the same, right?

Yeah, Anna was their first name.

And because they were related, they were like second cousins or something.

She came with the Roosevelt name.

Am I remembering correctly?

I don’t remember.

I don’t remember either.

In any case, Judy, there aren’t that many traditions in our society for naming girls after their mothers, but it’s not unheard of.

And certainly there’s no reason not to do it if you like a name.

Yeah.

In Kentucky, when I was growing up, I did know three generations of Polly’s.

Polly’s.

And they didn’t formally use junior and senior, but informally they did around the house.

There is a really interesting academic paper that you might hunt up.

I don’t know if it’s in full online, but you can search for it.

It’s called Naming Patterns Reveal Cultural Values, Patronyms, Matronyms, and the U.S. Culture of Honor.

It’s by Ryan P. Brown and some other authors.

It’s from 2013.

They point out that we rarely name girls after their mothers in this country except for the name Elizabeth

Because Elizabeth has so many different possible nicknames and shortened forms

That it makes it a lot easier to feel comfortable about not having that confusion of the same name.

Right. Liz, Lizzie, Beth, Lisa.

Yeah, right.

Interesting.

Judy, thank you so much for your call. We really appreciate it.

Thanks a lot. Nice talking with you.

Take care now. Bye-bye.

Take care. Bye-bye.

Bye.

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