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Posts Tagged ‘ unisex baby names ’

VINTAGE BABY NAMES: Testing the 100-year rule

Friday, January 15th, 2010

vintagebaby2In the world of baby names, there used to be something  called The Hundred Year Rule, based on the assumption that it took a full century for a name to shake off its dusty image and sound fresh again.  I use the past tense because this obviously doesn’t hold true anymore; like everything else, the process of name resuscitation has speeded up wildly. 

So when we look at the popularity lists for a hundred years ago–1910– we see any number of names that have already popped back—names like Grace, Ruby, Emma, Ella, Violet, Sadie, Ruby, Isabel, Max, Oliver and Felix.

The question is, are there any names from a century ago that we’ve overlooked and are still worthy of re-evaluation?  Here are some you might consider, all in the Top Thou of 1910—although we do have to keep in mind that the US population then was about 30% of what it is now, so some of these names were attached to a very small number of babies.

 GIRLS (starred names were in the Top 100 then; none of them appears on the current list)

 ADELIA

*AGNES

AILI

ALBERTINE

AMALIA

ANTONIA

ARA

AURELIA

AVIS (more…)

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Posted in Uncategorized, baby name popularity, boys' names, boys' names for girls, classic baby names, gender and names, girl names, girls' names, historic names, name history, name popularity, neglected names, overlooked names, popular names, traditional baby names, vintage baby names | 27 Comments »

THE SOFTER SIDE OF BOYS’ NAMES

Wednesday, July 8th, 2009

boyflowersFor a long time, as girls marched in masculine naming territory, appropriating such previously all-boy choices as Blair and Blake, Avery and Riley, Peyton and Parker, the boys retreated to firmly male turf, reviving such classics as William and Henry, forging into new macho terrain with names like Hunter and Stone.

It was okay, the thinking went with names as with clothing, toys, and career aspirations, for girls to adopt masculine attributes, but not for boys to take up girlish things.

Now, though, something surprising has happened. Boys’ names are getting decidedly softer, with traditional choices that include sibilant sounds and vowel endings gaining in popularity, and parents reclaiming unisex names for their sons.

(more…)

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Posted in baby names of 2008, boys' names, gender and names, unisex baby names | 34 Comments »

UNISEX NAMES: What’s Hot, What’s Not

Wednesday, May 13th, 2009

charliead1When we wrote our first book, Beyond Jennifer & Jason,  we hit on the idea of grouping unisex names into percentage categories–which were used more for girls and which for boys. These ranged from 90% feminine (Shannon and Tracy) to 75% feminine (Kim and Jan) to 50-50 (Ricky, Nicky) to 75% male (Kirby, Kyle) to 90% masculine (Addison, Glenn).

Most of those names have fallen completely off the radar (though long before Grey’s Anatomy, Addison was the nickname/surname of Bruce Willis’s macho character in Moonlighting), but the release of the new Social Security figures provides a good opportunity to check up on which side of the gender line unisex names are falling right now.

UNISEX NAMES GETTING MORE FIRMLY FEMININE

ADDISON
ALEXIS
ARIEL
BAILEY
EMERSON
HARPER
JORDYN
LONDON
MARLEY
PAYTON
REAGAN
REESE
RILEY (though still strong for boys)
SKYLAR
TAYLOR
TEAGAN

UNISEX NAMES MORE MALE

ANGEL
CAMERON
CHARLIE
DYLAN
HAYDEN (though the gender gap is narrowing)
JADEN, JAIDEN, JAYDEN
JAYLEN
JORDAN
MICAH
PARKER
PHOENIX
SAGE
ZION

UP FOR GIRLS AND DOWN FOR BOYS (in 2008)

ALEXIS
ALI
BAILEY
DEVON
FINLEY
HAYDEN
JUSTICE
KENDALL
LOGAN
QUINN
REAGAN
SAGE
TAYLOR

UP FOR BOYS AND DOWN FOR GIRLS

JAIDYN, JAYDEN
KENNEDY
PEYTON
ROWAN
SKYLER

UNISEX NAMES RISING FOR BOTH BOYS AND GIRLS

AVERY
CHARLIE
EDEN
EMERSON
EMERY
HARLEY
HARPER
JAYLEN
KAYDEN
LONDON
MARLEY
MICAH
PARKER
PAYTON
PHOENIX
RILEY
RORY
RYLEE
ZION

AND THOSE FALLING FOR BOTH SEXES

ANGEL
ARIEL
CAMERON
CASEY
DAKOTA
DYLAN
JADEN, JADYN
JAMIE
JORDAN
REESE
RYAN
SIDNEY
SKYLAR
TYLER

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Posted in Uncategorized, baby name popularity, baby names of 2008, best baby names, boys' names, gender and names, girls' names, name ideas, name style, name trends, unisex baby names | 30 Comments »

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