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> parents jump on the bandwagon, only to peak and decline as everyone on the playground starts answering to the same name Is the USA more individualistic when
by alister 12y ago
> parents jump on the bandwagon, only to peak and decline as everyone on the playground starts answering to the same name
Is the USA more individualistic when choosing names than, say, China or Brazil?
Brazilians regularly give their date of birth in mundane situations because first+last name is not nearly unique enough:
http://brazilsense.com/index.php?title=Giving_birth_date http://brazilsense.com/index.php?title=Giving_birth_date
It's a shame the chart is US names only. I'd like to see common names ranked by country, to see if it says something about a culture's desire for either homogeneity or individuality.
It would be interesting to see changes in conformity over time as well. In the USA, Sophia and Noah peaked at 1% each -- which seems like parents slavishly follow fashion -- but John was actually 9% back in 1880! Maybe conformity was more important a hundred years ago, and the USA has actually become more individualistic.
- kijin 12y agoAnother possibility is that there is greater diversity in the US now than a hundred years ago, people are more aware of it, and are okay with it, so there's a much larger pool of names to choose from. A hundred years ago, it would have been unthinkable for a white, English-speaking family to give their children a name that sounded even remotely non-Anglo-Saxon. Nowadays, nobody looks at you funny if you're named Mila or Declan.
- adventured 12y agoSeems pretty likely. John (M) for example was perhaps at 9% circa 1870. That's pretty dramatic, and definitely speaks to the lower cultural diversity.
- MakeUsersWant 12y agoCommon names in Germany (in German): http://www.beliebte-vornamen.de/jahrgang http://www.beliebte-vornamen.de/jahrgang