Posted by xoobdev 4 hours ago
> "Well, I wish you every joy," Miles went on [...] He managed a wink. "Name the first one after me, eh?"
> [She] grinned. "I'm not sure she'd appreciate that. Milesanna? Milesia?"
> "Milesia sounds like a disease," Miles admitted, taken aback. "In that case, don't. I wouldn't want her to grow up hating me in absentia."
-- Memory (1996) by Lois McMaster Bujold
In the series, Miles having a name meaning "soldier" is, er, persistently thematically significant.
Interestingly, the first few books are about Miles' parents, but it's neat to see what the most popular character does/doesn't inherit.
"John" or "Matthew" are probably never going to become female. Nor will "Elizabeth" or "Katherine" become male.
"Spencer" was male when Spencer Tracy was a big name. Today it could go either way. As a family name it relates to the profession of a steward.
In Polish '...ski' is masculine and '...ska' is feminine. The prefix stays the same, so a brother and sister have slightly different surnames. (Like 'Wolski' vs 'Wolska.')
In the US some immigrants forgot this, so you get American women with a '...ski' surname.
So the whole family may just have taken the male head of house’s surname to avoid problems, or even been simply assigned his surname by immigration officials.
Many a name were changed at Ellis Island, for example.
Is it common in these cultures to use surnames as given names?
I wouldn't be surprised if it was related to the character[0] portrayed by Beth Riesgraf[2] on Leverage[1]
[0] https://leverage.fandom.com/wiki/Parker
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leverage_(American_TV_series)
e.g. “Pat” is cited, but doesn’t specify whether that refers to Patricia or Patrick.
Another interesting analysis would be the movement back and forth between full names and their associated common diminutives.
Source: The expandable "How we measured it" section at the bottom of the page
I've wondered if the women that have carried the name have liked it? In my mind, it's always sounded very blunt so as to be feminine, but I recognize I'm heavily biased when it comes to my own name.
for people from languages that mark gender with an ending (romance languages for instance), putting the "wrong" ending something like a noun would sound odd or change the meaning
Or maybe it’s a good way to get your foot in the door in todays job market.