s/o Names you like but rarely hear

[Anonymous]

I like Melissa and Earnest

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

If you didn't know how to pronounce the name growing up, it's not your culture. You're trying to put out that you have a connection to Ireland that is not there. There are Irish Americans that are still very closely connected to this culture -- they have living Irish people in their families, or they travel back and forth and keep close with relatives in Ireland. But those names aren't exotic to those people, they're just names. So again, if you didn't hear these names growing up, if you had to be taught how to pronounce them when you were thumbing through baby name books: then you are part of the diaspora, you are Irish American, you are not Irish. And it might hurt your feelings to learn this, but nobody hates Irish Americans who don't understand they're not actually Irish more than the Irish do. It's a pretense. That's why the Irish PP in this thread put an obligatory "Sully from Boston" dig in her response.

Sincerely, a Murphy

Or maybe you just like the name.

My background is Jewish. If I encountered a Goldie Chen, or a Goldie Vassilikos, or a Goldie Garcia, or a Goldie Tesfaye, or Goldie Bhattacharya, or ... I wouldn't think, "You don't get to use that name because you don't have a Jewish background."

Except Goldie is not analogous to Saorsie. Goldie is like Patrick. If you met a Shlomo Garcia you wouldn't assume a Jewish connection, or side-eye a lack of Jewish connection?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had an Enzo in my class last year and thought it was an awesome boy name.

My husband is Vinchenzo and we call him Enzo. Its nice because we were able to name our son Vinchenzo and call him Vinnie so they have the same name but different nick names making it the best of both worlds in the name sake category.

Did you really use the h? It's completely wrong in Italian. It's Vincenzo.

I was wondering the same thing! I wonder if the families are so far from the immigrant ancestors that they know the pronunciation but not the spelling, so at some point in the past, someone threw an h in there. That's what happens in the melting pot.

At least in my midwestern eastern european family, my grandparents generation would purposefully Americanize spellings to make it more white bread and easier for folks. The grandparents were either immigrants or the children of immigrants that spoke the language, so not too far removed, but an intentional attempt at assimilating. If it's a family name, it may have been purposefully change or misspelled by immigration officials.

[Anonymous]

Erin

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

If you didn't know how to pronounce the name growing up, it's not your culture. You're trying to put out that you have a connection to Ireland that is not there. There are Irish Americans that are still very closely connected to this culture -- they have living Irish people in their families, or they travel back and forth and keep close with relatives in Ireland. But those names aren't exotic to those people, they're just names. So again, if you didn't hear these names growing up, if you had to be taught how to pronounce them when you were thumbing through baby name books: then you are part of the diaspora, you are Irish American, you are not Irish. And it might hurt your feelings to learn this, but nobody hates Irish Americans who don't understand they're not actually Irish more than the Irish do. It's a pretense. That's why the Irish PP in this thread put an obligatory "Sully from Boston" dig in her response.

Sincerely, a Murphy

Or maybe you just like the name.

My background is Jewish. If I encountered a Goldie Chen, or a Goldie Vassilikos, or a Goldie Garcia, or a Goldie Tesfaye, or Goldie Bhattacharya, or ... I wouldn't think, "You don't get to use that name because you don't have a Jewish background."

Except Goldie is not analogous to Saorsie. Goldie is like Patrick. If you met a Shlomo Garcia you wouldn't assume a Jewish connection, or side-eye a lack of Jewish connection?

Side eyeing an obnoxious or pretentious baby name choice is not the same as crying cultural appropriation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

If you didn't know how to pronounce the name growing up, it's not your culture. You're trying to put out that you have a connection to Ireland that is not there. There are Irish Americans that are still very closely connected to this culture -- they have living Irish people in their families, or they travel back and forth and keep close with relatives in Ireland. But those names aren't exotic to those people, they're just names. So again, if you didn't hear these names growing up, if you had to be taught how to pronounce them when you were thumbing through baby name books: then you are part of the diaspora, you are Irish American, you are not Irish. And it might hurt your feelings to learn this, but nobody hates Irish Americans who don't understand they're not actually Irish more than the Irish do. It's a pretense. That's why the Irish PP in this thread put an obligatory "Sully from Boston" dig in her response.

Sincerely, a Murphy

Or maybe you just like the name.

My background is Jewish. If I encountered a Goldie Chen, or a Goldie Vassilikos, or a Goldie Garcia, or a Goldie Tesfaye, or Goldie Bhattacharya, or ... I wouldn't think, "You don't get to use that name because you don't have a Jewish background."

Except Goldie is not analogous to Saorsie. Goldie is like Patrick. If you met a Shlomo Garcia you wouldn't assume a Jewish connection, or side-eye a lack of Jewish connection?

Side eyeing an obnoxious or pretentious baby name choice is not the same as crying cultural appropriation.

My initial post explicitly said "side-eye," and my reason for the side-eye is that it's appropriation. I'm not crying, but thanks for your concern.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

If you didn't know how to pronounce the name growing up, it's not your culture. You're trying to put out that you have a connection to Ireland that is not there. There are Irish Americans that are still very closely connected to this culture -- they have living Irish people in their families, or they travel back and forth and keep close with relatives in Ireland. But those names aren't exotic to those people, they're just names. So again, if you didn't hear these names growing up, if you had to be taught how to pronounce them when you were thumbing through baby name books: then you are part of the diaspora, you are Irish American, you are not Irish. And it might hurt your feelings to learn this, but nobody hates Irish Americans who don't understand they're not actually Irish more than the Irish do. It's a pretense. That's why the Irish PP in this thread put an obligatory "Sully from Boston" dig in her response.

Sincerely, a Murphy

Or maybe you just like the name.

My background is Jewish. If I encountered a Goldie Chen, or a Goldie Vassilikos, or a Goldie Garcia, or a Goldie Tesfaye, or Goldie Bhattacharya, or ... I wouldn't think, "You don't get to use that name because you don't have a Jewish background."

Except Goldie is not analogous to Saorsie. Goldie is like Patrick. If you met a Shlomo Garcia you wouldn't assume a Jewish connection, or side-eye a lack of Jewish connection?

No, I certainly would not side-eye a lack of Jewish connection. I would assume that there was one, but I wouldn't get upset if there weren't. We don't own the name. There's no licensing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Except Goldie is not analogous to Saorsie. Goldie is like Patrick. If you met a Shlomo Garcia you wouldn't assume a Jewish connection, or side-eye a lack of Jewish connection?

Also I do think that Goldie is analogous to Saoirse -- unless you're referring simply to pronunciation? In which case Shlomo isn't analogous either. Irish phonetic rules are unique.

[Anonymous]

Way to totally derail this thread PPs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Boy names I'd love to hear: David, Gideon, Daniel, Joseph

Girl names: Ruth, Elizabeth (in full), Marigold, Clementine

I have old-fashioned taste, I guess!

Seriously? These are all among the most common names given to children in this day and age.

I have 2 kids and have never met kids with these names.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

If you didn't know how to pronounce the name growing up, it's not your culture. You're trying to put out that you have a connection to Ireland that is not there. There are Irish Americans that are still very closely connected to this culture -- they have living Irish people in their families, or they travel back and forth and keep close with relatives in Ireland. But those names aren't exotic to those people, they're just names. So again, if you didn't hear these names growing up, if you had to be taught how to pronounce them when you were thumbing through baby name books: then you are part of the diaspora, you are Irish American, you are not Irish. And it might hurt your feelings to learn this, but nobody hates Irish Americans who don't understand they're not actually Irish more than the Irish do. It's a pretense. That's why the Irish PP in this thread put an obligatory "Sully from Boston" dig in her response.

Sincerely, a Murphy

Or maybe you just like the name.

My background is Jewish. If I encountered a Goldie Chen, or a Goldie Vassilikos, or a Goldie Garcia, or a Goldie Tesfaye, or Goldie Bhattacharya, or ... I wouldn't think, "You don't get to use that name because you don't have a Jewish background."

Except Goldie is not analogous to Saorsie. Goldie is like Patrick. If you met a Shlomo Garcia you wouldn't assume a Jewish connection, or side-eye a lack of Jewish connection?

No, I certainly would not side-eye a lack of Jewish connection. I would assume that there was one, but I wouldn't get upset if there weren't. We don't own the name. There's no licensing.

+1. This is the fundamental flaw in claiming cultural appropriation with baby names, especially when it's white Americans using names from other backgrounds. Because PP refuses to answer the question I've asked more than once, I'll give the answer. If generic white Americans aren't allowed to use any names except generic white American names, there are literally no names aside from America, Savannah, Madison and whatever other names were literally made up in the U.S. While it may be cultural appropriation to steal a baby name that is used in specific contexts in specific cultures, it is not cultural appropriation to use a name that is not your actual culture. There are certainly plenty of non-English Elizabeths and non-Hebrew Rachels out there. PP just has a personal hang ups with Irish Americans using the hard to pronounce Irish names and is trying to paint an overbroad brush about cultural appropriation.

Sorry for the derail, all.

[Anonymous]

My DD has one of the names on this thread! It gets flack on DCUM for being too out there, but we get a lot of spontaneous compliments on it IRL.

Simone
Margaret
Dinah
Sidonie
Sabine (though the connotations are a no-go for me)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bridget is a classic name I dont hear too much. Mildred is my favorite "old person name" that I think should come back. Millie is adorable in my mind. Im done with all versions of Eleanor and Stella. Those old people names are DONE.

haha! The name Bridget is always interesting to me. Bridget is/was the stereotypical working/low class name in Ireland...it was THE name for Irish domestic maids/servants/the "help" so much so that for a really long time, many women would actually change their names to avoid that stereotype. I'm never sure if Irish American "never been to Ireland but my last name is Sullivan or O'Reilly!!!" crowd doesn't know this or doesn't care.

We know and don't care. Irish American naming conventions are distinct from Irish naming conventions, and this kind of class-nervousness doesn't mesh well with the large contingent of Irish Americans that take pride in the fact that we overcame discrimination.

That said, I have all the side-eye in the world for Irish Americans who've never been to Ireland buying into current bandwagon trend of naming their kids Aelish or Saorsie or Aoife. If someone had to teach you how to pronounce it after the age of 15, it's not your culture.

So what? Cultures don't own names.

Yes, because the really troubling thing about cultural appropriation is an American with Irish ancestry naming their kid Saorsie.

So, it's cultural appropriation. So, I side-eye people who appropriate culture that is not their own. So, you get defensive about that. So, you post a nonsensical question about "ownership."

That's what.

[Anonymous]

Gotta love white people appropriating the "cultural appropriation" argument.

[Anonymous]

Zelda is my favorite name ever.