When Americans are asked for their “full name,” they generally understand it to mean first, middle, and last name. First names can be literally anything at this point. Not everyone has a middle name, but most people born in the United States do. Last names have traditionally been passed down through a father’s family, but that convention has given way to all kinds of alternatives, from mom’s last name to hyphenated combos to last names couples choose for themselves.
Even with those variations, first/middle/last is the name norm in the U.S., Canada, and much of Europe. But that doesn’t mean it’s a universal standard. In fact, as self-described “word nerd” Rob Watts points out in a RobWords video, it’s actually an unusual naming convention compared to the rest of the world.
What we can’t tell from our ‘standard’ naming convention
We may think of a name’s purpose as identifying a specific person, but historically, names have done much more than that. In many places worldwide, they still do. Just not in what we call “the West.”
“Our names tell us surprisingly little,” Watts says. “From mine, Robert Watts, you can’t work out my parents’ first names, whether I’m the older or younger sibling, the precise year I was born, or where my ancestral home was.”
We don’t even expect our names to convey any of that information. But each of those details can be found in the traditional naming conventions of other cultures. Our largely uninformative names are a bit of an anomaly on the world stage. The only information our first, middle, and last names contain (with the exception of “junior” first names) is our family name. But even how our family name gets conveyed or carried on differs from other cultures.
Last name first, first name second?
In Japan, Korea, Vietnam, and China, the family name comes first, then your “first” name, or the name your parents chose for you. So if you meet someone from Japan and they introduce themselves as Watanabe Shinji, Watanabe is actually their last name, and Shinji is their first name.
“Japanese people have often, historically, switched their names around when dealing with English speakers or when moving to English-speaking countries,” Watts explains. “But that’s actually a practice that is dying out ever since, in 2020, the Japanese government recommended keeping the same order when writing Japanese names using the Latin alphabet. So, where our hypothetical Japanese friend Tanaka Yuki might have at one time introduced herself in English as Yuki Tanaka, just to help us out, she might be more likely these days to stick with Tanaka Yuki, perhaps capitalising TANAKA to show that it’s her family name.”
Names in those Asian countries differ from each other in other ways, though. As Watts shares, “A Chinese name can reveal which family you’re from, which generation in that family, what happened around your birth, or your parents’ aspirations for you.”
Old Arabic names tell us where someone is from and who they are related to
Watts points to medieval Arabic names as an example of a naming convention that gives even more information. As an example, he shares the full name of a 9th-century Islamic intellectual known as Al-Jahiz: Abu Uthman Amr ibn Bahr al-Kinani al-Basri.
The nickname Al-Jahiz actually translates as “the googly-eyed one.” In the full name, Abu Uthman means “father of Uthman.” Amr is his given name, and ibn Bahr means “son of Bahr.” The al-Kinani tells us his tribal affiliation, and al-Basri tells us where he is from.
Another Arabic example Watts gives is Saladin, the famous Crusades-era commander from Syria. His full name was Al-Malik al-Nasir abu’l-Muzaffar Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub. The first parts are honorific titles. Salah al-Din is where Saladin comes from, meaning “Righteousness of the Faith.” Yusuf was his actual given name, and ibn Ayyub means “son of Ayyub.”
There’s a lot that can be conveyed about a person when you keep adding onto their given name.
‘Son of’ and ‘daughter of’ instead of family names
The “son of” naming convention appears in many cultures. Nordic countries, for instance, have traditionally used patronymic surnames, meaning your surname would be your father’s name followed by “son” or “daughter.” For example, Karlsson would be “Karl’s son.” Olafsdottir would be “Olaf’s daughter.”
Norway, Sweden, and Denmark haven’t really carried this convention into the modern day, though the names remain. Iceland, however, still actively uses it.
“You know the Icelandic singer Björk?” Watts asks. “Well, the first fun fact about her name is that it’s Icelandic for ‘birch.’ But the second, more relevant one is that her full name is Björk Guðmundsdóttir…She is Björk, daughter of Guðmundur. And in turn, her father is Guðmundur Gunnarsson. That is, Guðmundur, son of Gunnar. In turn, his dad was Gunnar Guðmundsson.”
We also see this patronymic naming convention in historical English names such as Johnson, Jackson, and Davidson. However, they have become family names passed down as-is rather than changed each generation.
Names that indicate who your father, grandfather, and even great-grandfather are
We’ve already seen how the Arabic ibn, meaning “son of,” is used, but Watts notes that an Arabic name can include multiple ibns to indicate who your father, grandfather, great-grandfather, etc., are or were.
Some Greek surnames also use a patronymic formula that includes multiple generations.
“So Nikos Georgiou Konstantinopoulos would be ‘Nikos, son of Georgios, descendant of Konstantinos,’” Watts explains.
Somalia follows a similar formula, but a little more straightforward. There, you have your given name, your father’s given name, and your grandfather’s given name. There’s no family name at all, just a string of first names that come from your paternal lineage. Egypt is similar, even adding a great-grandfather’s name.
What about the mothers and grandmothers?
Watts concurs that naming conventions are largely male-centered, but some cultures also use matrilineal formulas.
“Spanish and Portuguese names, and therefore names across much of Latin America, usually incorporate the mother’s family alongside the father’s,” Watts says. “In both cases, it tends to be that the paternal family name takes precedent when people just give out what their name is, but that representation is there in the full names.”
In northeastern India, the Khasi people take their family name from their mother, which typically equates to the name of her ancestral clan.
But some places don’t use family connections at all when it comes to names. In Myanmar, people can have up to four given names, and they may not share anything in common with other members of their family.
“The fact that this is so different from what other parts of the world are used to can create issues at, say, international borders,” Watts shares. “That’s why the British Passport Office has special advice for its workers on how to handle Burmese names that don’t fit easily into its systems.”
Naming conventions are part of culture
Watts didn’t even get to other naming conventions, like how various Native American tribes have traditionally named children. There’s even a village in India where names are melodies that are sung. The reality is that, even though there are as many ways to name a child as there are children in the world, cultural traditions generally dictate how a child is named.
It’s good to remember that what’s normal here is not normal everywhere. Understanding the differences in how we are named can help us avoid pitfalls that might embarrass us or offend someone else. After all, our names say something about us, and often about our families. But at the same time, it’s nice to know there’s no right or wrong formula for naming humans.
You can find more fascinating facts about names on the RobWords YouTube channel.
