Active discussions

Help protect children from gaming harms.

Take our survey

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Baby names

Find baby name inspiration and advice on the Mumsnet Baby Names forum.

Original poster

Names that shouldn’t be considered classics?

65 replies

Thatgirl1990 · 14/12/2021 14:47

I’ve been having a debate about the name Emily. Emily is so early 2000s and dated now I worry it’s the Karen of 2040 especially because not many kids are being named it now.I get really confused why people call it a “classic” it was practically unheard of until it became the top name in America. For example emily doesn’t fit into the bracket of timeless names Elizabeth, Hannah, Sarah. Emily reminds me of a blonde mean girl in a American film. Does anyone else agree?

OP posts:
Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
Set a reminder
New posts on this thread. Refresh page
turnaroundtime · 29/12/2021 13:46

@TheHolyPotato

Names come and go. Except John and William which dominated (in England) for boys for centuries.
When was the last time you heard of a child being called John?
Mollymalone123 · 29/12/2021 07:37

Emily is definitely a classic English name

YourenutsmiLord · 29/12/2021 07:03

My DGM was Winifred Emily born around 1900.

I'm not sure there has been a 'Karen' before - the internet and rampant misogyny saw to that.

MerryMarigold · 29/12/2021 07:00

I would say Emily is classic. I know one who is in her 30s, one in early 20s and one who is 3!

tcjotm · 29/12/2021 06:52

I know loads of Emilys born in the 70’s. It wasn’t an old lady name when I was growing up. I have an old lady name. One that still isn’t back in fashion 😂

I don’t know what constitutes a classic but it’s a name like Anna or Sarah that you could use at pretty much any point for hundreds of years and it be considered normal.

PAFMO · 29/12/2021 06:31

I'd say Emma was "more" classic than Emily tbh, but it depends on your definition of classic.
I'd say classic is timeless, in that if I told you Emily was next door, she could be 200 or 3.

PAFMO · 29/12/2021 06:29

My great great grandmother may disagree.
Names come around and disappear then come back again.
I remember at primary school (1970s) meeting a Hannah and a Charlotte and thinking they sounded like something from a bonnety costume drama. Within ten years they were both top 10.

danascully96 · 29/12/2021 06:26

Actually, having looked at this link: www.britishbabynames.com/blog/2014/08/emily.html, Emily’s more of a classic in the UK than in the US since it’s stayed consistently popular in the 19th and 20th century except for one drop out of the top 100 in the 20th century from 1924 - 1974. So, I’d say it’s pretty classic in the UK. There are some different classics in the US v. the UK.

danascully96 · 29/12/2021 06:12

Emily’s not a classic. It would’ve been an “old lady name” in the 70s. The US charts show Emily hasn’t been consistently popular, which is a requirement for a classic, no? Elizabeth, Katherine/Catherine, Anna, etc. are true classics, but I’d say Emily’s a vintage revival.

Cleo8245 · 27/12/2021 07:52

Emily is definitely a classic

VanillaAndOrange · 18/12/2021 13:57

I don't think Emily will ever really go away. It's not excessively popular at the moment, but if I heard of a new baby Emily I'd think "oh, that's a nice name, not heard it for a while" rather than "oh now, how passé!" It has a soft, gentle sound and I think that will stop it from ever really being unpopular.

JenniferAllisonPhillipaSue · 17/12/2021 08:05

Controversial comment time - can America have classic names when much of its population is descended from relatively recent immigrants?

gofg · 17/12/2021 07:59

Of course Emily is a classic name!

DontKnowWhatToThink7 · 17/12/2021 07:07

@Flutterflybutterby

I don't think it's classic either.
But do you think it the "Karen" of 2040? 🤣
Heartdogs · 16/12/2021 22:28

Emily Bronte
Emily Dickinson
It's a beautiful classic in my opinion.

Flutterflybutterby · 16/12/2021 22:14

I don't think it's classic either.

TyrannosaurusRights · 15/12/2021 18:55

@Changechangychange you’re right. I’m muddling my Em-named women of history. My apologies.

Luredbyapomegranate · 15/12/2021 17:17

Emily Dickinson, Emily Bronte, Emily Pankhurst, Emily Post.. it was a popular and well known Victorian name like Emma and Sarah, and like them became popular again from the 70s in the UK (it wasn’t as popular as Emma then but certainly not unusual for middle class girls), before as you say getting super popular in the early 2000s in US and UK, but you do still get lots of baby Emily’s now (in the UK) so it hasn’t died away here anyway.

So it qualifies as a classic I’d say, and I don’t think you can say a name held by America’s most famous woman poet was barely heard of a few decades ago..

LemonMuffins · 15/12/2021 16:51

It's a classic for sure. I'm mid 80's born. It's one of my middle names and I went to school with a few.

thewhatsit · 15/12/2021 16:45

I don’t think you have this right at all.

Also that you don’t think it was even much heard of until it became popular in America… but from the perspective of someone in America!

CrispAndFrosty · 15/12/2021 16:29

Maybe thinking of Emily Davison, the suffragette who threw herself under the King's horse?

Changechangychange · 15/12/2021 01:52

@TyrannosaurusRights

Pankhurst (you’ve probably never heard of her but you should have), Post (American), Gilmore (popular fictional character).

Any of these ringing a bell for you?

That was Emmeline, not Emily.
Thedogscollar · 15/12/2021 01:45

You lost me when you said it was the Karen of 2040. How rude.

TyrannosaurusRights · 15/12/2021 00:56

Pankhurst (you’ve probably never heard of her but you should have), Post (American), Gilmore (popular fictional character).

Any of these ringing a bell for you?

SummerLew · 14/12/2021 20:04

Emily is totally a classic!
It's a beautiful name - I wish it were mine!