to use James on a girl?

[AyGirl]

Am overdue. Baby has not arrived. Do not know gender. Have finally after much indecision, decided a girl will be Iris James. Mentioned to DB who got very upset and kept on saying it's not a girls name. Mother has rang me this morning and said he was so upset because he wants to name a son of his James. Keep in mind he is not married or having a child. I do think they are TTC. But I want to use Iris James!!!!! She said that I shouldn't and should save it for him because it will be his first child and a son. So what, the two beautiful little girls I've delivered into our family are nothing. A boy will probably be Gage Theodore.

My older DDs are Hattie Juniper and Cleo Annika so we use quite different names.

Well personally I think all of the OP's name choices are awful, so I'm certainly not adding a vote to the James for a girl is awesome bandwagon.

If James is a lovely name for a girl, I do wonder why people can't use Sophie or Charlotte for a boy

Exactly this. It never goes the other way.

I wondering, if James has such lovely meaning for you, why you don't consider it for a boy?

Yanbu, my grandmother's middle name was a male name, though I believe the practice of using male family names as girl's middle names has gone out of fashion.

it's an absolutely dreadful idea, sorry OP

It's a perfectly good name, and as James will be your daughter's middle name, your brother can still use it for any son he might have.

If you don't use it and your brother has girls, you will regret it.

Hardly an unusual name tho is it?
It's not as if your brother will have the only James in the entire world, he's being a dick

Awful name for a girl. It's a boy's name or a surname.

Some people have said things like:
It's much easier generally for a girl to pull off a 'boy name' than the other way around (not that that should be the case but it's true).

I agree, it shows a continuing sexism in our culture: it's not "manly" for a boy to have a girl's name but a girl is OK to adopt the "superior" boy's name.

It does happen however. I went to school with a boy called Tracy. After the initial double-take no-one batted an eyelid.

I think it's a case that boy's names often migrate to girls names. Hillary used to be a boys name (and to Hillary Benn it still is). Other examples are Lesley and Ashley. Google throws up lots.

Find it harder to think of girls names that have become boy's names.

As for you OP. I think your family are BU. There is no son imminent to "bagsy" the name James. It sounds good with the other name. Do it.

It is also a middle name where I think the "rules" can be relaxed. My DDs have two middle names each. One has a middle name that is almost always male, the other a middle name that comes recognizably from a famous book. Maybe I am a bad parent, but they don't seem to have been scarred by this.

God, being that influenced by pop culture is just disgusting

Joe Bloggs or Jane Doe is not going to go and name a child Moon Unit, but exercising a historically accepted practice and blurring the arbitrary gender lines? What's the issue?

There's no real reason for names to be gendered other than the fact that historically that has been the case. Plenty of boys names have become perfectly acceptable unisex or even girls names as pointed out above, and you can bet each one faced backlash at the beginning until people stopped getting wound up over nothing and it became the norm.

Whether we like it or not pop culture affects people's lives on a daily basis, and a celebrity naming their daughter James inherently makes it more acceptable to the average person because they start hearing it more and more over time. Suddenly it's not a 'boys' name any more, it's just a name. Op isn't copying a celebrity because she wants to be fashionable, she's chosen a name that has meaning to her and people merely pointed out it's already in use for a girl. There might be plenty of others around but we won't know about them because they aren't in the news so how could we?!

I understand why your peed off OP, there have between some off key responses. No idea why people feel it's acceptable to call you stupid, say you're being ridiculous etc. I think you have to make your own decision, though. Why depend on the opinion of a bunch of strangers as the basis for your decision?
Also you might decide on something else entirely when you see the baby.

Awful name for a girl. It's a boy's name or a surname.

That's just factually incorrect.

As a middle name its ok. I would assume it was a family surname.

If the motivation was, I like the name James, it's meaningful to me, I want my child to have it regardless of sex, then you could say it wasn't a choice influenced by fashion, but naming only a girl the traditionally male name, seems to be driven by something other than solely personal meaning otherwise both would be given it.

I love it !!

He is BU to be upset because he hypothetically wants to use the name one day. Him having a boy is hypothetical as yet, he has no immediate plans and he doesn't own a name, especially such a common one. And you using the name as a middle does not preclude him using it as a first name if he has a boy one day. But James is a very masculine name, Jamie is a more unisex alternative.

I think it is fine. People often gave surnames as middle names. Giving a baby the name Gage is a far greater offence IMHO.

I love it.

Use it for sure. Good luck with the birth

My sister has Michael as a middle name. Our parents are not English and were misled by references to Princess Michael of Kent into thinking Michael was a unisex name in England.

My sister spent her entire school life claiming her middle name was Michelle and claims not to have a middle name these days, although it does appear on her passport.

So by all means use James but be prepared for Iris to one day turn to you and ask wtf were you thinking.

There's an American actress with the name Michael, so your sister's not alone BarbarianMum, I quite like it!

I'd be raging if I'd been given a boy's name as my middle name.

It sounds like Irish James when you say it together. Yabu.

Michael was a woman in the Bible. It isn't uncommon in the fundamental christian community in US.

So what if it's a boys name? She might be glad to have the choice later. Iris James is great, go for it. In many European countries, it's normal having an opposite sex middle name.

Call your child what you like. Tough luck for your db.