What name would you love to use but you feel you can't because it's from another culture?

[Wavyheaded]

Just for fun... I'm not even close to having a kid but love thinking about names.

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Serafina (my all time favourite name!) but I'm not of Mediterranean or French descent and so it would be weird to use it - unless I marry a French man.

I also love Ettyenne, another French name (I think), it's just so elegant.

What do you wish you could use?

Orla

I'm expecting a boy and love Mateo but chances are he will be blonde, pale and blue eyed like me, his dad and sister. With a very English surname. It's been vetoed for being too "exotic". DD has a French name though and it works fine.

My husband loved the name Hawa for a for a girl (Arabic version of 'Eve')

Katarzyna, I absolutely love it, but am not polish

Luka or Johann for a boy. Saoirse is so very pretty too, but I remember a bit of a backlash over the popularity of Irish names in the 1990s and accusations of being “plastic paddies”, so wouldn’t have used it without genuine Irish links.

Idris (autocorrect tried to change it to Doris🤣).
Blessing and Naeemah.

I love Welsh names but couldn’t persuade Dh to use the more Welsh, Welsh names. However, manage to choose more ‘English’ Welsh names. Eg. David or Owen rather than Gweirydd

I love Bebhinn. I had a friend in uni from Northen Ireland with this name and she pronounced it "beh-vinn" which I love. I think it's usually pronounced "bey-veen" but if I could I would use it the way she did.

It'd need a fada over the e to be bey-vinn so your friend was right

My daughter is Naomi but I love the spelling Noémie - I'm not french so I didn't think I should use it.

We wanted something Basque, but none of my family would be able to spell/pronounce most on our list:
Unax
Nekane
Edurne
Eneko
Izaskun

Although DH is Basque and we live in Spain, our surnames are extremely non-Spanish, think Unax Blythe MacKintosh, or some such totally bonkers!

I love our son's name, but sad about the non-Basqueness.

Aneurin / Nye, or Edwin. But it'll never happen - DH comes from one non-UK culture, I come from another, we live in London. Names that reflect both cultures and "work" here are tricky.

I also don't agree with "use whatever name you like" - a childhood friend (white, Jewish) had a very common Zulu first name, and it just came across as odd (and got mispronounced a lot in the circles she moved in). Likewise names like Sven or Yusuf - so heavily associated with a particular culture or religion that it seems (imo, anyway) an odd choice unless you have an affiliation.

when I was pregnant I loved the Flaming Lips "Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots" and was sorely tempted by Yoshimi but didn't have the bottle that Yoshimi herself did....

I've always liked the name Seraphina and it's never occurred to me that I shouldn't use it because I'm not French

Dimitri. Would have been Dimitri Smith. Which would have been absurd.

Oh and also I'm 100% English but my son has a very, very Welsh name. Absolutely no Welsh blood at all from either side so who says you can't use seraphina? I'd go for it. Its beautiful.

All3 of my children have biblical names. We're not religious.

@Siablue I have a Naima (middle name) but she’s the least Arabic looking of the bunch

Amarachi - gorgeous name. We have no Nigerian ancestry but had we had a girl I’d have loved this.

My name is French. I am not French. I honestly don't see the problem.

Just call your kids what you want.

Easy.

It's the bringing up part which you will find hardship with... ;-)

Raphael, Simeon and Fabian.

We have a very English 3-syllable surname with the same emphasis on the first syllable. They all would have sounded daft.

But we had a girl anyway.

Love Eli, Ira and Anastasia. Also love Luna, one of my DS friends from uni's name, going back a few years, but unfortunately a colleague called her dog Luna, kinda spoiled it

I always liked the name Jacyntha which apparently is Spanish (heroine in a boarding school book ) My dh is from another culture sour dd have pretty ethnic names (not Spanish!)

doh! so our not sour (Freudian slip???)

I love Khadija but I'm not Muslim and haven't produced a girl child anyway