When my second oldest sister was born, my parents had to make a quick decision on what to name her. After a bit of discussion and review over names they liked, Mom and Dad determined what her name would be. Then Mom called up her family in Illinois who were all in my grandmother’s house, waiting for the news.
“It’s a girl!” she told them. This was met with cheers and general merriment.
“What did you name her?” everyone asked, eager to hear a response.
“Rica Brower Wiersema,” my mom said. There was silence. Honestly, I can’t blame my mom’s family for not saying anything. If I’d been there, I probably wouldn’t know what to have said either. However, one person spoke: my Aunt Jane.
“That’s a nice name,” she said awkwardly, her voicing going falsetto.
Where did Rica get her name? Well, the first name was one my parents heard in the movie Lethal Weapon 2. No, I’m not kidding. The middle name is my paternal grandmother’s maiden name. And, of course, Wiersema is my dad’s last name. As strange as Rica’s name may sound, she’s not the strangest name I’ve heard. Not by a long shot.
According to The Mother Tongue: English and How it Got That Way, by Bill Bryson, “the study of names is omnastics.” How do most people get their names? Well, it depends on the person. Obviously, not everyone gets their names from action movies starring Mel Gibson (what a weird world that would be).
Some people might get their names from kin, such as a father or grandfather. Other people get a name because it has a special meaning. Yet others may receive names that were simply made up by their parents.
Some causes may not even be made consciously. In the scientific study “From Karen to Katie: Using Baby Names to Understand Cultural Evolution” (http://jonahberger.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Cultural-Evolution_1.pdf) it was actually proven that the more famous a name of a hurricane was (such as Hurricane Katrina), the more popular names with similar sounds became. This wasn’t done knowingly, of course. It was an effect caused by increased usage of the name.
My personal favorite reason to choose a name is because of meanings. As one who hopes to have a future writing fiction, I keep a close watch over names I like, especially if they have profound meanings.
Interestingly enough, many authors purposefully give their characters names that connect back to the character’s story. J.K. Rowling, for instance, named one of her characters Remus Lupin after Remus, one of the mythological founders of Rome who was raised by wolves, and lupis, part of the scientific name for the gray wolf (canis lupis).
Since this matter interests me, I’ve decided to include a chart of character names, divided into three categories: character names with appropriate meanings, character names with inappropriate meanings, and character names with completely unrelated meanings. The meanings are found from the Online Etymology Dictionary (http://www.etymonline.com/) and the Internet Surname Database. (http://www.surnamedb.com/)
Well, except for anyone named John Smith. That’s just unfortunate.