Srsly?

[sunnyskywalker]

Home Depot thinks 'Lorem Ipsum' is Spanish. Good one, guys. You couldn't ask one of your employees' kids to ask their Spanish teacher?

Sweden disapproves of naming children after bands. It seems odd to me that the Tax Board can refuse to register a name it doesn't like. Is it trademark infringement? Even more peculiarly, they also object to it because it is associated with the word "metal." Do they not have the equivalent of names like Summer, River, Autumn, Crystal, Rose, etc. in Sweden, or are only certain words allowed to be used as names? Which words and why? Could you name a child just plain "Metal" in Sweden?

Of course, I come from a country in which at least three people have legally changed their names to Obi-Wan Kenobi (one getting approval despite having the not-so-"good and sufficient" reason of wanting to win $1000 in a contest), so maybe I shouldn't talk.

Comments

[baleanoptera.livejournal.com]

Could you name a child just plain "Metal" in Sweden?

Nope, and until two years ago you couldn't do that in Norway either. In fact the Norwegian name laws were so strict that some names could only be given to children if they were family names, IOW if an uncle, grandfather or someone was already called that, This included a lot of the old norse like name, but by no means all of them. One of the names that was not allowed was "Bjørn" or bear, and Stein, which means stone. The reasoning was that these were objects or animals and a child could be teased for having a name like that.
Then the law changed, but Sweden - who had essentially the same law - kept theirs. They'll probably change it soon as well.

The reason for the law change in Norway was the increasing number of immigrants, especially from Pakistan. they had huge problems with the name law, and eventually the government just said: "oh well, bugger this for a lark - have a new law" Then everybody was happy and a talkshow host promptly changed his name to: "Thank-you-very-much". He now insists on being called this in every interview. :D

As for names like "summer", "crystal" etc in Sweden and Norway (the cultures are so close I'm just using my Scandinavian right to lump them together) they are not very popular. The naming culture is very conservative and tend to focus on established names. Right now the big vogue is old names - either old norse (not so much Thor, but quite a lot of Freyas) and old 19th Century names.

and yep, that was a long reply. ;)

[sunnyskywalker]

Thanks for the long reply! I love names. Usually I focus on meanings, but naming culture is interesting too. Are "Bjørn" and "Stein" some of the old names in vogue now that the law's been changed?

I know US naming culture was a lot more conservative until recently - sometimes it seems like 90% of middle-aged men are named Dave, John/Jack, Rob/Bob, Jim, or Steve, with the occasional Chuck for diversity. Now Irish names like Aiden are popular (non-traditional for most of the US), and some boys' names are being used for girls (eg Jordan, Morgan, and Taylor). A lot those boys' names are the results of surnames being used for personal names. There are occasional revivals of old names, too - my parents were worried mine would be too old-fashioned when they named me, but it turned out I was right at the beginning of a trend. Now about half the little girls have my name. (Well, maybe not quite that many. But it's a lot!)

I just realized I don't know if we ever had stricter naming laws here. Probably nothing at the federal level, but I bet a lot of states and cities have had them. Some still might. I suspect California has just about the loosest possible restrictions, if any, because we have both tons of immigrants and Hollywood. I know people named their kids wacky things like Shadow Wolf Pack and Deja Vu in the 60s and 70s. I think Patch Adams named a son "Atomic Zug Nut," and of course there's the Zappa kids (Diva, Dweezil, Ahmet, and Moon Unit), so any laws must have been repealed a while ago.

[sunnyskywalker]

Ah, interesting - I just googled "Dweezil," and found this on Wikipedia:

Dweezil's registered birth name was Ian Donald Calvin Euclid Zappa [in 1969], although this occurred only because the hospital at which he was born refused to register him under the name Dweezil. The name was a nickname coined by Frank for an oddly-curled pinky-toe of Gail's. He was always called "Dweezil" by his family and was unaware that this was not the name on his birth certificate. Upon this discovery at the age of five, he insisted on having his nickname become his legal name. Gail and Frank hired an attorney and soon the name Dweezil was official.

So the hospital could refuse, but the state couldn't, I guess.