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Baby names

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Original poster

American names. . . on Americans?

56 replies

janiejones5446 · 31/08/2020 02:45

"American" is often thrown around as a pejorative on this board for surname-names (not by everyone, of course). Though, I'm curious -- do you dislike these sorts of names on Americans as much as you dislike them on Brits?

I thought of this when I was reminded that the current US Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden has a son who goes by Hunter (Hunter is actually his middle name, which was his mother's maiden name, but he seems to go by it exclusively).

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NotAnotherHelen · 31/08/2020 08:02

There's a really sad story behind Robert Biden's use of his mother's maiden name, Hunter. She was killed in a car crash when he was two. He and his brother Beau were in the car but survived. Incidentally, Beau was also a nickname; his given name was Joseph III.

MikeUniformMike · 31/08/2020 07:58

It's not unusual for an American to have the mother's maiden name as a first name.

I know some americans and canadians with fairly unusual first names but they suit them.

I'm not so keen on them for brits but I'm not a fan of using names from outside one's culture.

MrsSchadenfreude · 31/08/2020 05:43

I think a lot of “American” names on Americans are a class thing. The DDs went to American schools and their friends all had names that would be unremarkable in the U.K: Katherine, Sophia (lots of these!), Jessica, Nicola, Anna, Sonia, Brianna, Karen, Meredith (so what a PP has said about slightly outdated names). The only, what I would say were very American names, were things like Peyton, Mackenzie and Kamryn, but they were in a minority. Boys tended to be Andrew, Steven, John, Ian, and the odd surname type name.

len1234 · 31/08/2020 05:35

I don't mind the surname as a first name thing at all, but I can't stand the name Hunter. It's like naming your child Fisher or Butcher. I just think of the photos of hunters next to a dead deer.

ShyTown · 31/08/2020 03:24

My DD has attended American daycare for the past 2 years and her classmates all have normal, possibly even a bit dated, names. To name a few: John, Brian, Martin, Jack, Sam, Claire, Alison, Olivia, Kirsten. I’ve never actually met any children with the sort of names often deemed American on here and know very few adults with them either.

So I wouldn’t particularly associate surname names with Americans, since in my experience, they’re not particularly!

Kokeshi123 · 31/08/2020 03:18

Some US name trends make me a bit eye-rolly in general, if I'm honest. I hate boys' names on girls, ugly WASP surnames as first names (not Hunter--I think Hunter is OK), made-up names with "lyn" and "leigh" on the end.... although to be fair, the Americans do not have a monopoly on those.

That said, Brits also have some ghastly name trends, especially the "cutie-pie" names like Teddie, Alfie, Tillie, etc. In the States, boys in particular tend not to get given names that sound "cute."

Neither of these groups is really statistically representative of either Americans or Brits, mind you. If you look at the "most popular" name lists, they are actually surprisingly similar--Olivia, Sophie, Isabella, Ava, Emily and the like.