Let’s say you have a two-year-old son named Connor. Then suddenly you wake up one morning and see that Scarlett Superstar has just named her new baby daughter Connor. And the thought runs through your mind–omg!!–are thousands of other parents now going to follow her lead and name their little girls Connor? Is this the end of Connor as a boy’s name?
To the horror of many parents of boys, it can and sometimes does happen. Think about Addison and Avery and Jordan and Morgan and all the other gender blurring we’ve seen in recent years–and sometimes it is a single starbaby who has, if not incited the trend, at least accelerated it. A few once strictly-male names that fit this profile:
BAILEY–somewhat used for girls since the 80s, but really popped after several celebs chose it.
DYLAN–never heard as a girl’s name until Mia Farrow used it for her daughter in 1985, with the Sean Penns following suit in 1991–it’s now fully accepted as a female option.
EMERSON–Teri Hatcher’s daughter was born in 1997, but the name didn’t really take off until all the publicity surrounding the mega-success of Mom’s show Desperate Housewives.
FINLEY –used by Angie Harmon and Jason Sehorn in 2003, hopped onto the girls’ popularity list in 2005.
ROWAN–the Irish surname chosen by Brooke Shields in 2003 that led to hundreds of baby girl Rowans born last year.
To a lesser degree, this can happen with a celebrity’s own name too. Although Glenn Close and Daryl Hannah didn’t do much to alter the gender images of their names, Drew Barrymore, Cameron Diaz and Reese Witherspoon certainly did–there were over 2,300 girls named Reese last year.
So, which celebrity-endorsed boy-to-girl names have had or will have a lasting impact?
STARBABIES WHO HAVE ALREADY HAD AN EFFECT:
Those that could:
ELLIOT/ELIOT
Those that probebly won’t (though you never know):
RIPLEY
Tags: Bailey, boys' names, Brooke Shields, CAmeron Diaz, celebrity babies, celebrity baby names, Drew Barrymore, Dylan, gender of names, girls' names, Reese Witherspoon, Rowan
This entry was posted on Monday, December 1st, 2008 at 1:44 am and is filed under baby name popularity, boys' names, celebrity baby names, celebrity names, gender and names, girls' names, name style, name trends . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
December 1st, 2008 at 5:20 am
Hmm. Rowan is a female name in Scotland, always has been. There were female characters in books called Rowan long before Brooke Shields named her daughter Rowan. She may have brought it to people’s attention, but she did not turn it from a male to female name.