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HelpRe: Names vs. Time
in reply to a message by meena
I think that there will always be some form of creative spellings amongst the lists: for every Maddyson we have today, there was a Debra or a Maggye in the past. However, I think we won't ever see the control that some of the names you listed (mainly John, Mary and Robert; Ruth has never been as widely popular as these three) had for hundreds of years. John and Mary had dominated the English world from the Middle Ages until, the twenties when John lost his place to Robert (although Robert and James--his predecessors until Michael came in the sixties--were very popular during this period too). As the baby boomers began to have children themselves, they wanted to be special and so the old standby names became less and less popular, and new exciting names such as Jennifer, Christopher, etc. came into common usage.
I think the trend that you wanted to mention is what I like to call "make your own baby name": you take common elements and sounds and when combined they make a baby name such as Jayden, Cayson, Bailey, Kayla, etc. I'm not a fan of this names...I often say that they have no complexity: they lack history, they lack aesthetical interest, they're just phonetic names that sound "good". However, you can't lump all the trends together: Addison is a "surname name", Noah is a "Bibilical name", Brooklyn is a "place name" and all these names represent different trends and different trends will always exist, no matter if you're looking at babies from 1910 or 2010.
Another trend, which is rather muted amongst the mainstream but may rise in the next few years, is resurrecting so-called "old lady" and "old men" names. We've seen this with names such as Emma or Ava, names that seemed so blatantly dated 15 or 20 years ago but seem fresh and youthful now because parents today haven't spent a lot of time with that generation. If you look at popularity graphs, you can see that quite a few names experienced a fair amount of popularity at the turn of the 20th century but have skyrocketed into popularity again today. Sure, Ruth may not be the name du jour for new parents right now, but plenty have already used names that have been popular in the past: my cousin just named his child Isabelle Ivy, a name that would be as common in an obituary as a birth announcement. What I have noticed about these "vintage" names is that they were rarely particularly popular: when Mary was hanging high at #1 in 1880, Ava was low down at #466. Violet and Stella were very low down the list, and are in pretty common usage today; Helen and Agnes are still viewed as "stuffy" by most people and they were right at the top. To go back to your question about Ruth seeming out of place, I don't think that would too, too out of place. In fact, your Ruth may someday be thankful that she didn't have a trendy name such as Addison or Brooklyn.
Personally, I adore the old favourites: John, Ruth, Mary and Robert are all gorgeous names and I would have no qualms about using a single one of them. However, I would be more concerned about something more recently popular such as Barbara, Patricia or Dolores: these names seem so dreadfully stuffy and bland to me yet my children may think they are fabulous. When it comes to names, I always think that the best names are those that aren't flash in the pan names that can go back to one particular time. Jessica will always be a child of the 90s, Sandra will be a 60s girl. Outside of the 30s or the 40s, it would be harder to place a Ruth.
I think the trend that you wanted to mention is what I like to call "make your own baby name": you take common elements and sounds and when combined they make a baby name such as Jayden, Cayson, Bailey, Kayla, etc. I'm not a fan of this names...I often say that they have no complexity: they lack history, they lack aesthetical interest, they're just phonetic names that sound "good". However, you can't lump all the trends together: Addison is a "surname name", Noah is a "Bibilical name", Brooklyn is a "place name" and all these names represent different trends and different trends will always exist, no matter if you're looking at babies from 1910 or 2010.
Another trend, which is rather muted amongst the mainstream but may rise in the next few years, is resurrecting so-called "old lady" and "old men" names. We've seen this with names such as Emma or Ava, names that seemed so blatantly dated 15 or 20 years ago but seem fresh and youthful now because parents today haven't spent a lot of time with that generation. If you look at popularity graphs, you can see that quite a few names experienced a fair amount of popularity at the turn of the 20th century but have skyrocketed into popularity again today. Sure, Ruth may not be the name du jour for new parents right now, but plenty have already used names that have been popular in the past: my cousin just named his child Isabelle Ivy, a name that would be as common in an obituary as a birth announcement. What I have noticed about these "vintage" names is that they were rarely particularly popular: when Mary was hanging high at #1 in 1880, Ava was low down at #466. Violet and Stella were very low down the list, and are in pretty common usage today; Helen and Agnes are still viewed as "stuffy" by most people and they were right at the top. To go back to your question about Ruth seeming out of place, I don't think that would too, too out of place. In fact, your Ruth may someday be thankful that she didn't have a trendy name such as Addison or Brooklyn.
Personally, I adore the old favourites: John, Ruth, Mary and Robert are all gorgeous names and I would have no qualms about using a single one of them. However, I would be more concerned about something more recently popular such as Barbara, Patricia or Dolores: these names seem so dreadfully stuffy and bland to me yet my children may think they are fabulous. When it comes to names, I always think that the best names are those that aren't flash in the pan names that can go back to one particular time. Jessica will always be a child of the 90s, Sandra will be a 60s girl. Outside of the 30s or the 40s, it would be harder to place a Ruth.
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