Quotes about Names

Your name says such a lot about you...

David Figlio of the University of Florida showed that girls given more feminine names are less likely to study maths or science, and that parents could set female twins on to opposing career paths by giving them names at either end of what he calls the femininity spectrum. He also showed that by giving children names which teachers perceive as being lower-status you may lower their likely academic achievement in comparison with children with more traditional names.

Our hero of the week is Alistair McLean, boss of the upmarket travel company Activities Abroad, who delivered an un-PC broadside against Britain’s chavs in a letter to customers. He simply identified the names of people you wouldn’t find on an Activities Abroad holiday: Dazza, Britney, Chardonnay, Shannon, Candice and the like. The names you would hear will be ones like John, Henry and Anne, he said.

My dad is adamant no one should ever shorten our names because “they're not the names he gave us” - no one calls me Rach or Andrew Andy in front of my dad. Guardian Mar 8 08

At my school, no one was called Jonathan and it was considered posh, but my family wouldn't let me shorten it. People would phone up and ask for John or Johnny and my parents would say "Nope, no one here called that." Guardian ditto

More here, and links to the rest.