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Help[Opinions] Re: Rowan
in reply to a message by Lissa
Rowan is quite masculine to me. . .
I suppose conventionally the modern name is unisex (people will be unsure what sex Rowan is), when you assume the "rowan tree" meaning, but I think of the "little red" meaning as being more masculine. The -an diminutive names seem to be originally boy names, although I'm not sure - at any rate, they still immediately indicate males to me today, and I feel some dissonance when I see Ryan and Rowan on girls.
I have neglected the name Rowan (on my boys list) lately for the same reason as you, as well as the fact that I found out it's trendy. I still like it very much as a gentle, earthy, masculine name. If I had a kid and loved the name enough, I'd use it for a boy anyway.. it has been masculine, will never be totally feminine, so the unisex usage wouldn't stop me, if I was that crazy about it. I don't think it should stop anyone.
I'm into gender distinctions for the most part also, but it's really about convention for me. And conventions change, so I have to change my definitions of what names indicate gender depending on how people around me are named.
BtN has Rowan listed as unisex, and I have grudgingly accepted that at face value -- until today, that is, when I noticed that Ryan had been changed to unisex! I know it reflects current usage, but the site is supposed to be at least somewhat about overall history, and at least the entry should indicate that the name has been (probably close to completely) male until extremely recently. To list this name as unisex without qualification is just misleading.
So now I have my doubts about trusting that Rowan is really unisex too. It's a boy's name, gosh durnit! :-P
At any rate, most usage of the name Rowan, as far as I know, is almost entirely within the last sixty or seventy years - so it's not like you have this huge historical precedent for it being male; but there is a significant precedent.
Sorry about the rant. I'll come to accept the unisexing of male names, although at first it's disappointing when your favorite masculine names get unisexed and you can no longer use them to clearly indicate a boy. At least I think the associations with femininity that a unisexed name brings to male bearers (like a male Rowan) are fairly easy to make into a positive, compared to the forcible associations with masculinity for females named male names (like a female Ryan).
- chazda
I suppose conventionally the modern name is unisex (people will be unsure what sex Rowan is), when you assume the "rowan tree" meaning, but I think of the "little red" meaning as being more masculine. The -an diminutive names seem to be originally boy names, although I'm not sure - at any rate, they still immediately indicate males to me today, and I feel some dissonance when I see Ryan and Rowan on girls.
I have neglected the name Rowan (on my boys list) lately for the same reason as you, as well as the fact that I found out it's trendy. I still like it very much as a gentle, earthy, masculine name. If I had a kid and loved the name enough, I'd use it for a boy anyway.. it has been masculine, will never be totally feminine, so the unisex usage wouldn't stop me, if I was that crazy about it. I don't think it should stop anyone.
I'm into gender distinctions for the most part also, but it's really about convention for me. And conventions change, so I have to change my definitions of what names indicate gender depending on how people around me are named.
BtN has Rowan listed as unisex, and I have grudgingly accepted that at face value -- until today, that is, when I noticed that Ryan had been changed to unisex! I know it reflects current usage, but the site is supposed to be at least somewhat about overall history, and at least the entry should indicate that the name has been (probably close to completely) male until extremely recently. To list this name as unisex without qualification is just misleading.
So now I have my doubts about trusting that Rowan is really unisex too. It's a boy's name, gosh durnit! :-P
At any rate, most usage of the name Rowan, as far as I know, is almost entirely within the last sixty or seventy years - so it's not like you have this huge historical precedent for it being male; but there is a significant precedent.
Sorry about the rant. I'll come to accept the unisexing of male names, although at first it's disappointing when your favorite masculine names get unisexed and you can no longer use them to clearly indicate a boy. At least I think the associations with femininity that a unisexed name brings to male bearers (like a male Rowan) are fairly easy to make into a positive, compared to the forcible associations with masculinity for females named male names (like a female Ryan).
- chazda
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