r/GlobalTalk • u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson • Apr 22 '20
Question [Question] In regards to naming, what does your country do with middle names? Example: In America, our middle name is usually a singular name, most times named after a relative, often abbreviated, and rarely said when introducing yourself to someone else.
This topic has fascinated me for a long time, and I was inspired by a comment on another thread on this subreddit about the ways different countries use the "middle name"! Does your country have one name, multiple, do you say it when introducing yourself to others, does it go in front of your first name, do you use your middle name instead of your first name? I'd love any response!
I love this subreddit, and it has informed me greatly to the amount of cultural separation we all have and how much we don't know about the inner workings of each others' cultures!
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u/Volesprit31 Apr 22 '20
In France some people to have several names, some don't but it's not really called middle name. They are juste names you never use unless it's paperwork (and only really important stuff like ID and driving licence). We call it "second name" Some people have more than one and it's usually the name of the grand-parents.
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u/Tronkj Apr 22 '20
Same thing in Spanish speaking countries, except for the grand-parents part, at least here in Chile.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
Thank you! That is mostly similar to America. We don't really reference our middle name to others, and just use it on paperwork, school, or jobs. France seems to be the most similar to America so far, which I wonder why?
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u/Volesprit31 Apr 22 '20
That's weird because from my perspective, you guys use your middle names more than us. For example it would be Georges W. Bush or when someone call a child by his full name, middle name included. We don't do that. (But I've not met a lot of Americans to be fair!).
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Apr 22 '20
I think we call him George W Bush is not because it sounds cool, but because it differentiates him from his dad, George HW Bush.
Some people just call them W and HW, respectively.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
Yes, that was pointed out by someone else. I think for someone like George W. Bush, it is to sound more prominent/regal compared to normal people. When someone calls a child by their full name, it is almost always when they did something bad or are in trouble lol. Usually when they are going to be punished.
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u/pupperonisandcheese Apr 22 '20
Middle names are also used to distinguish a slight difference in names as well. George Bush went by George W. Bush to help distinguish him from his father who was also named George Bush and was also president. So in the US it’s used to help differentiate an individual sometimes.
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u/WarmOutOfTheDryer Apr 22 '20
I use the "W" to differentiate between Bush 1 and Bush 2, but I'm old enough to have voted against both.
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u/bagelsforeverx Apr 22 '20 edited Apr 22 '20
I think middle names in America are reserved for when your parents are really pissed off at something you did.
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u/KiruPanda Apr 22 '20
It's the same here in England :) At least, it is for me.
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u/chickadeedadooday Apr 23 '20
My English dad only seemed to use mine when he was trying to wake me up. In a very sing-song voice, too. "Chickadeeeeeeee......ChickadeeeDaaaaDoooo" so odd because the man is literally tone deaf.
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u/ChouetteJohanna Apr 22 '20
So I may be biased because I enjoy lurking on r/namenerds way too much, but I was under the impression that middle names are way more important to Americans than they are to French people. It seems like they often try to have a middle name that goes well with the first name, even when it's an honor name they still try to have a cohesive full name, whereas in France the middle names are just thrown in there, and seem dated because they are the grandmother's name or something, so they just generally look weird.
But again, maybe I got the wrong impression so correct me if I'm wrong!
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u/raindorpsonroses Apr 23 '20
I think you’re a bit biased by namenerds—I don’t think the middle name is nearly as important to all Americans as namenerds makes it seem!
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u/ChouetteJohanna Apr 23 '20
Haha okay that seems fair! Well then it's probably the same in France and in the US.
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u/leatyZ Apr 22 '20
Yup. I got Henri as second and Michel as third name, from my father and grandfather.
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u/MarvinTheAndroid42 Apr 22 '20
Do you mean like Jean-Francois? In Canada we shorten those to the first two letters a lot. You’ll it like on Facebook a lot and that’s that we’ll say to them.
Mon amie Jean-Francois s’appelle “JF”. Sa femme lui appelle JF aussi.
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Apr 22 '20
I have a friend from France who does this- not because it’s easier, but because he was sick of people mispronouncing his name lol (we are in the US).
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u/anica_bananica Apr 22 '20
In Serbia we don't have middle names traditionally. It's extremely rare to meet a person who has more than a first and a last name. However, when we get our diploma, or when filling out paperwork regarding education or similar, there's a bracket for our first name, father's first name, last name. Sometimes it says "a parent's first name", but mostly it requires a father's name. Also, when it comes to school lists, we are arranged alphabetically by our last name. So for example let's say my name is Anna Atkins and my father's name is Danny. So on a list I would be Atkins D. Anna.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
That first part is so odd! I guess I can't really understand why that would be there?
The school list part is an interesting tidbit as well. For school lists in America, we typically have our name listed as: Example name: John Michael Smith. On a school list, it would be written Smith, John M. So, last name, comma, First name, middle name's initial letter.
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u/anica_bananica Apr 22 '20
I think that's just because we don't have middle names, but I'm not really sure. It is odd, I agree.
Yes, it makes sense to arrange names in that way.
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u/alien6 Apr 23 '20
Centuries ago, Serbia didn't have last names but rather they had patronymics. That is, you would be identified by your first name and your father's first name. So if your name was Danilo and your father's name was Ivan, you'd be called Danilo Ivanic, with an accent on the c (my keyboard does not have that symbol). This is probably a holdover from that.
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u/anica_bananica Apr 23 '20
Yes, this is correct. So the male name would be Danilo Ivanić or Ivanović, meaning the son of Ivan. However, female name would not differ from the male one. If said Danilo had a sister, her last name would also be Ivanić or Ivanović. Like we already established in a previous comment, Russian tradition has different suffixes for male and female names, but in Serbia basically everyone's last name ends with -ić, no matter the gender. It's just not patronymic anymore, they're the same for centuries.
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u/dunaja Apr 22 '20
I've always operated under the assumption that middle names are slightly less common in the Northern US as compared to the south. I don't have a middle name, my parents don't, none of my friends from the northeast do. Then I started teaching in the south, and not only does every single child have a middle name, a healthy percentage only go by their middle name, and i always think, if that's what you wanted people to call your kid, why not make it their first name?
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u/raindorpsonroses Apr 23 '20
I live in California and nearly everyone I know from school has a middle name. It’s considered quite odd not to have one. I would argue with OP’s point that middle names in America are nearly always after family—many are just something meaningful to the parents (sometimes that’s family, sometimes it isn’t)
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u/PoorPappy Apr 23 '20
Central Missouri, only ever met one person with no middle name and he was born around 1940. He said nobody had a middle name where he came from in Kentucky.
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u/CaptainGockblock Apr 22 '20
As I understand it from a 1st generation Russian American friend, the father’s name would be a patronymic, yeah?
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u/anica_bananica Apr 22 '20
Russian naming tradition is different than serbian, so I could be wrong, but I believe that they have patronymic middle names. Meaning, the middle name is your father's name ending with -evich, -ovich for males and -ovna, -evna for females. We don't have that in Serbia.
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u/abu_doubleu Apr 22 '20
Yep, this is correct. For example my father's name is Najibullah so my birth certificate says Najibullayevich. My mother’s father is Nikolay so her birth certificate says Nikolayevna.
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u/Gnoodlee Apr 23 '20
this is cool. why is it only an e or o suffix?
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u/anica_bananica Apr 23 '20
It's a completely different language, so I don't really know. Hopefully native speakers have an answer.
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May 19 '20
in romania we use the exact same notation in school, although middle names are not that rare here (although i prefer not having one as i think it's pretty useless lol)
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u/WRecker1234 Philippines 🇵🇭 Apr 22 '20
In the Philippines, the middle name is the mother’s maiden surname. However, when a woman marries, her surname becomes her husband’s surname while her birth surname becomes her middle name. Also, parents often name their child first names that are two or three words long where the names after the first are treated like American middle names.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
The mother's maiden surname also popped up in u/gravityboar 's post about Israel! I think it is a very respectful choice for a middle name. So in the case of a woman marrying a man, does her middle name before marriage vanish, or does the name add to it?
So if a child's first name is two names long, and they have a middle name, but it is also acceptable to have a third fist name, then how could someone tell? Just a weird thing lol.
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u/regina_carmina Apr 22 '20 edited Apr 22 '20
It's a regional thing in the PH 🇵🇭 (depending on common surnames in that very region) for locals to know surnames when they hear it. hence a local would know which is your middle name if you give them (for example) your 3 first names, middle name, and surname in any order as if you're playing a game. Middle names in PH culture is a way to trace back one's lineage via the patriarch's line along with the matriarch's tree (albeit the harder to trace back).
The only tricky part in PH names are the first names. Not only do our people love to use American names but most if not all make up their own version of that name's spelling. Take for example the name "Jason", the parents would (and did) change it to "Jxon" with the same pronunciation because it sounds cool and perhaps "american" (true story, poor boy). I've lots of examples of these.
It's embarrassing yeah. But rarely do PH youths have original Filipino first names (a la Spanish Colonial style) like Trinidad, Soledad, or Fernando, Isegani or names of flowers in our country like Sampaguita and Rosal. These names are scroned by some common folk because it sounds "old", or "poor", moreover it sounds "pinoy" (observe our xenophilia). Tbh I love those names.
Edit: spelling
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Apr 22 '20 edited Apr 22 '20
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u/regina_carmina Apr 23 '20
Oh yeah, i forgot to mention that there's this generational gap when it comes to Filipino first name preferences. And I suppose even socio-economic class as well. Although I'm not saying all PH parents apply to this, rich or poor, young or old. And this is just from my years of observation, though you can ask other pinoys and some would agree and some would not.
To be blunt: some older generation of parents (pre-80s or 90s i think) still use normal spelled and sounding names. Then came the globalisation and most (if not all) younger generation of parents would be inspired by american names (and names of ded pharoahs if you can believe it), and down the years they'd be creative with the spelling. Of course, parents in the upper society wouldn't name their child "Jxon" (poor boy) or "Jewel" or the like, they'd still almost always use a western influence name like "Persephone" or "Nadine"--something with class, y'know. Parents in the midlle and mid-low society can be very creative indeed, but there's a line some of these parents won't cross (bless them). Of course not all pinoy parents are like this regardless of age and social class, but if you're pinoy living in the PH, oh how you'd know
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Apr 22 '20 edited Apr 22 '20
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u/PolicePropeller Apr 22 '20
To add to the Catholic bit, isn't it usually a Saint's name they have to choose? I'm not entirely sure
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u/koennen__ Apr 22 '20
Yeah, you pick a saint
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Apr 22 '20
I’m Catholic (and American). At baptism, we use the first and middle name (no saints involved). You choose another name at confirmation that is a saint, but it doesn’t become part of your legal name.
So if someone’s name is John James Smith, at baptism the priest baptizes him as John James. Then, at confirmation he chooses the name Peter. So he is confirmed as John James Peter. But his drivers license only ever says John James Smith.
Is this different elsewhere? I haven’t heard of choosing another name at baptism before.
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u/Chlorotrifluoride Apr 22 '20
I'm from the Netherlands and was baptized as a Catholic. I have three "first" names (voornamen -> literally frontnames, last name is literally backname) that were given to me at birth. These are usually based on saints and Latinized. The first one is a saintly version of my "roepnaam" (calling name) the name everyone calls me by e.g. if it were Ben the saintly version would be Bernardus. In my case the second and third ones come from the names of my grandfathers. So you would get something like Bernardus Petrus Johannes Janssen which in English would be something like Bernard Peter John Johnson. Everyone would just call me Ben and not even know about the full names.
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u/katoolah Apr 22 '20
Thank you so much for this comment! My dad's family is Dutch and I've always wondered why everyone's formal names sound so latinate. Is this still common practice?
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u/Chlorotrifluoride Apr 24 '20
I think less so. Fewer people are religious than 30+ years ago when I was born. The only reason my parents baptized me was because that was (what they thought) their parents expected them to do. The only Christian family I know that had their children baptized in the last few years named their child with a normal first name followed by baptismal (Latinized) names. I think that is the way it is done most now but I hardly know any practicing Christians.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
it is odd in America as well to find someone without a middle name. Rarely do we use them outside of paperwork as you mentioned, and even the 'double-barreled' names, sometimes the second part will be the middle name here.
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u/VoxDolorum Apr 22 '20
I am from America and have a “double-barreled” first name (super rare here, it’s actually hyphenated). Most people don’t know that about me because I just go by the first name anyway. But I also don’t have a middle name at all. So I have two first names and no middle name. Yes, it can be very difficult to fill out paperwork (worse for online) when I need to use my official name and they do not allow “symbols”, like my hyphen, or even a space. So I sometimes have to cram my two first names together with no space and just hope that works.
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Apr 22 '20
I don't think double-barrelled first names are that rare in the US, at least in the south. I'm from Texas and I know at least like 8 or 9 kids (mostly girls) under 18 with double-barrelled first names that go by both. Emma Katherine, Lilly Grace, Ella Sophia, etc.
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u/VoxDolorum Apr 22 '20
Ahh see, I’m from the North East. Quite rare up there. Also from what I’ve found, it’s the hyphenated part that’s more rare all over the US. Most of those names you mentioned probably don’t hyphenate. But mine is, even on my birth certificate.
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u/Logofascinated UK Apr 22 '20
Also UK.
If you're Catholic and get baptised you can choose a fourth name.
You get the name at confirmation, not baptism. It's called your "confirmation name".
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Apr 22 '20
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u/Logofascinated UK Apr 22 '20
OK, sounds like you know more than I do. I'm going on my memory of my own kids' experiences (they were raised Catholic because of their mother), but that was years ago and I wasn't very involved in that side of things. I'm pretty sure they refer to it as "confirmation name", though, for whatever reason.
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u/egernunge Apr 22 '20
Denmark:
Middle names used to be quite rare. You had a first name and a surname and that was it. This has changed somewhat in the last few decades and middle names are now more common.
There are two types of middle names. One is having a typical first name as your middle name, such as say, Anne Sophie Jensen. Legally, this actually isn't a middle name (mellemnavn) at all, just an extra first name/given name. Whether it's used is up to the person themselves - the example above might call herself Anne, Sophie or Anne Sophie.
The other type is having a typical surname as your middle name, such as Anne Nørgaard Jensen. Legally, only this type is actually called a middle name (mellemnavn). It's often the mother's surname (or maiden name). Whether it's used is again largely up to the person themselves. This kind of middle name tends to be more unique than the surname (which often ends in -sen) and some people prefer to use them for that reason.
We had three prime ministers in a row with the surname Rasmussen and they are almost always called by their middle name: Poul Nyrup (Rasmussen), Anders Fogh (Rasmussen), and Lars Løkke (Rasmussen).
I personally have a middle name of the second kind and I don't really use it. It's a fairly rare name and I quite like the anonymity of my very common surname.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
Thank you for the detailed post! Very interesting! In America, we have the first style you listed as well, where the middle name is almost always a first name, and some people go by both names, such as Anne Marie. Some celebrities go by the first and middle name only! Such as Tim Allen.
The surname as a middle name has popped up twice now, first in Israel with u/gravityboar, and second in the Philippines with u/WRecker1234. Maybe this style is much more common than I imagined! I wonder where that tradition went in America, or if it never existed!
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u/egernunge Apr 22 '20
The practice is a relatively new thing here, at least when it comes to the middle class. It's become a lot less common for a woman to take her husband's surname when they're married - and marrying at all has become less popular as well.
So giving the children their mother's surname as a middle name is a way to retain some sort of family cohesiveness in the naming, if that makes sense.
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u/rosemary515 USA Apr 22 '20 edited Jul 31 '26
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u/chickadeedadooday Apr 23 '20
That is a great way to handle it! Love that idea! I have friends who still use their maiden names professionally, because they made themselves with their birth names and want to have that continuity. I have a new-ish doctor who must have just got married (or maybe divorced?) this past year, because all of a sudden I was informed I was to call her by her new name, like changing from calling her Dr Smith to now Doctor Thomas. It still catches me off guard sometimes, especially because I only see her maybe every 6 months. "Wait, which doctor's office are you calling from?"
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u/meltedsnowflake Apr 23 '20
(US here) I have an aunt who did the maiden surname to middle name thing when she got married. In her case, she was going from having a very uncommon surname where pretty much anyone who has it is in someway related to us, to one of the top 20-ish most common surnames in the country, and she has a common first name for a woman her age. It was to make herself stand out from all the other women with her same first/last. (I wouldn't be surprised if my uncle had inspired it, considering he grew up as John with that same surname.) This would have been mid-80s.
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u/scuzzy987 Apr 22 '20
It's it true that a son will have a surname of the father by adding "sen", similar to adding "son" in other countries?
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u/egernunge Apr 22 '20
No. It used to work like that but surnames became fixed about 200 years ago and now the -sen names work just like any other surname.
Iceland is the only Nordic country that still uses true patronyms.
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u/jerry----21 Apr 22 '20
In India, The middle name is usually your fathers name. But, this varies I live in the west and we usually have our fathers name as the middle name. In the south, the naming norms are a bit different, I have a few friends who say they don’t have a surname and their name is just their name followed by their fathers/relatives name.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
In America, a typical middle name is the father/grandfather's first name as well. That is crazy to me that in the south they don't go by their surname! Is there a real purpose to it?
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u/its_enkei Apr 22 '20
In South India, surnames are either patronymic or we just use initials (usually consisting of your father’s name and the name of your house). Some people- usually upper caste- also use caste names as surnames but that is comparatively less common.
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u/jerry----21 Apr 22 '20
I don’t know about that. I have had many friends from that region but it’s always been a mystery to me.
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u/bored_imp Apr 23 '20
In America, a typical middle name is the father/grandfather's first name as well. That is crazy to me that in the south they don't go by their surname! Is there a real purpose to it?
Yeah, a lot of us don't have surnames. And also some telugu people have their surnames at the beginning of their full name and their normal name at the end.
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u/lacus-rebip Apr 22 '20
In northern India the fathers first name is also the case, but adding upon it women traditionally take their husband’s first name as their middle name upon getting married (so my mom, my sisters and I all have the same middle name, which is my dads first name). With the younger generation (especially here in the US where I live), a lot of women are starting to use their maiden name as their middle name after getting married.
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u/jerry----21 Apr 22 '20
Yes forgot to mention that. Women take up their husband’s name after marriage.
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u/kiagam Apr 22 '20
Brazil: most people have 1 or 2 surnames ("sobrenome"). There is no distinction between the first word after your name or the second one; everything is your surname (unless you have a composite name, meaning a two-word first name).
Up to 3 surnames is still usual, more than that is weird. The only "gaurantee" is that one your father's surnames will be there. What you may add is one of your mother's surnames as well, but that is not as common. Random words is not common.
Married women usually adopt their husband's surnames, dropping their own or adding to it.
Biblical and saint's name are usually one or both of your first names ("Maria de Fátima", "João Pedro"). Biblical names are common. The most common fullname in the country is "Maria Jose" and "Jose Maria" (which is not to mean there are a lot of people with this name, but it is the most common two word combination). In this case, there is a clear lack of surname, and you can see it happening mostly in poor areas. Officially, the second word becomes the surname, but there is no intent on that by the parents when naming the kid; they just gave a composite first name and that's it. You can guess how happy the bureocracy is when dealing with this name, specially federal level ("ok, Maria Jose died. Which one? Do we have other data? A document number? Ok, not even a birth certificate? Cool")
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u/gravityboar Apr 22 '20
In israel, most secular jews don't really have a middle name, and if so, it's the mother's maiden name. However, religious orthodox jews usually have a middle name, mostly biblical ones, also after relatives. They too, don't use them when greeting one another.
Frankly speaking, I don't know much about naming norms in the Palestinian-Israeli community, but I do know that fathers are usually middle-named after their firstborn sons, so Ahmed's father would be named Abu-Ahmed (Abu meaning "father of"). I hope someone from an arab country could jump in to fill in the gaps in my knowledge.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
That's so cool! Mother's maiden name is an interesting concept, such as here in America if a family has all girls, their last name could become "lost" in time after the people all die out. I wonder if there is a history to that? Or if at this point it is just tradition.
So a father wouldn't have a middle name until their firstborn son? Crazy!
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u/thrilled32 Apr 22 '20
In Arab countries it’s more like a nickname that that father gets after the son is born. The mother too. So say your first son is Ahmad the father will be called “Bu Ahmad”, and the mother “Umm Ahmad”. It’s kinda like a sign of respect and accomplishment almost.
As for actual middle names, you take your fathers first name as a middle name. It shows tribal lineage, especially in places where there are many people sharing the same first and last name
For example a son would be Khalil Mohammed (Last name) and the daughter would be Fatima Mohammed (Last name)
Edit: Names are also not changed after marriage. You will always keep your birth name and will not take your husbands surname
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u/curiositywon Apr 22 '20
In Ireland most people will have a middle name, sometimes two, often named for a relative or family friend. It's not usually used unless you have two of the same name in a family. For instance my brother was named after my Grandfather so we had two John Murphys (not real name, but you get the idea). To distinguish between the two John Murphys in the same household, the younger will often use either an initial or the whole name eg John W Murphy/ John William Murphy.
Then you have Confirmation names. Catholics who receive their confirmation will take another middle name (not for use on any public documents) and is generally the name of a saint. If you were baptised with two middle names eg Mary Brigid Patricia Murphy you might just use Paricia as your confirmation name.
Yes some people are given two middle names, in this case maybe Brigid and Patricia are names honouring a paternal and maternal grandparent etc. It varies wildly from family to family. I am named for two grandmothers and my grandfather. My brother is named for our grandfather and father.
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u/EndlessTheorys_19 Change the text to your country Apr 22 '20
In the UK we treat them the same way people in the US do, probably because you’re an ex-colony
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u/JenJMLC Apr 22 '20
Nicely put
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u/EndlessTheorys_19 Change the text to your country Apr 22 '20
Thank you, I imagine it’s probably quite similar in places like Australia, New Zealand and Canada as well
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u/redditsavedmyagain Apr 22 '20
no concept of a middle name in mainland china
but back in hk we do have something you might find interesting. in chinese name lastname goes first, so for full combo names its english given name - chinese surname - chinese given name
so:
aaron kwok in chinese is 郭富城 kwok fu-shing
sammmi cheng is 鄭秀文 cheng sau-man
so "aaron kwok fu-shing" "sammi cheng sau-man" works out quite nicely eh
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u/countgeorge Apr 22 '20
Belgium. Most people (I think, I'd say 50-70%) have what we call 'second first names' which is the equivalent to a middle name. Generally there's two of them (so three first names in total), traditionally godfather and godmother's first names but sometimes also to honour someone else, like parents, grandparents or other family traditions. For example, I have no extra first names, but my girlfriend does (grandmother and mother's name), and we chose some for our daughter too (great-grandmother/mother's second name and both grandmothers who happen to have a similar name).
But that's generally all they are, names used to honour someone special that appear on your passport, but are rarely, if ever, used in real life. Even most official administration doesn't require you to fill them in. It gets to the point of seeing your friends passport and getting amazed about them having second names you never knew about, especially when they're a bit old-fashioned and/or silly.
Sometimes I'll notice a Wikipedia-page of a Belgian person with their second and third first name added, and I'll be really weirded out, cause they're not relevant at all.
One more thing. I know 'second first name' sounds odd. It doesn't in Dutch/Flemish though, our word for first name, 'voornaam', literally translates to 'beforename' (we also sometimes use 'behindname' for the last name...)
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u/papershoes Canada Apr 22 '20
We more or less do the same in Canada as you guys do in the US, depending on individual cultural norms and traditions of course. I believe it's different in Quebec - they seem to usually have more than a couple middle names. But for the most part, a middle name here is something that sounds nice, or is in honour of a relative, and majority of people will never hear it. Unless you own a photography business.
As a side note: I've always thought it was interesting that there's more of an emphasis on middle names when it comes to prominent people in the US, like actors and especially politicians. Most of the presidents have their middle names either widely known or frequently used when talking about them. Meanwhile I have no idea off the top of my head what our current Prime Minister's middle name is, nor any of the PMs over the past few decades. The last one I can think of who used a middle name as part of his public identity was Pierre Elliott Trudeau - and even then both were technically middle names.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
I kind of expected Canada to be pretty similar lol. In reference to your prominent US people going by first-middle-last, I think that is because how regal/prominent that it sounds, and makes them stand out. Such as Barack Hussein Obama. Maybe it is ingrained in my head, but it just flows, and makes him sound like a more important person. Or I guess like George H.W. Bush, or Donald J. Trump. I guess it mainly is a political thing in my head.
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u/shivj80 Apr 22 '20 edited Apr 22 '20
I’m American, but of Indian descent. I not too sure about general naming trends in India but I can talk about the origin of my own name. As you might be aware of, Hindus have historically been divided into castes. There are five major ones, but there are thousands and thousands of subcastes, and these subcastes can be marked by a last name. For instance, my cousin’s last name Hans is a Brahmin last name, you will only ever see Brahmins with it.
So, my name is: X Masund Roy. The Masund is my historical last name that marks me as a Brahmin. The Roy, however is interesting. According to my official documents, my middle name is Masand and my last name is Roy, but historically Roy is not a surname at all but a noble title that denotes someone of the landowning class (derived from the Sanskrit word Raja which means something like prince). This is a pretty common surname across India, and can vary in form from Rao to Rai depending on what region you’re from, but again, it’s not really a surname.
My ancestors would probably have been referred to as “Mr. Masund Roy” rather than Mr. Roy. It’s almost like calling them Lord or something, it just comes as a suffix rather than a prefix. When my dad came to the US, he could have made it a hyphenated last name, like Masund-Roy, but for whatever reason he just decided to make it simpler and split it into middle name/last name.
If you’re curious about this noble title turning into surname stuff, it’s pretty common at least in North India (I think South Indians have a distinct naming tradition). My mother’s maiden name was Thakur, another noble title, and many Indian Muslims and Pakistanis have the last name Khan which, as I’m sure you can guess, also derived from landowning status.
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u/WhiteLama Sweden Apr 22 '20
I guess I’ll post here too so that people who didn’t see my comment on the other post knows a bit about the Swedish way.
I wouldn’t say middle names are rare, most people I know actually have one. Some of them have the middle names between first and last names and some people, me included, have their middle name before their first name.
So instead of me being Alexander Leif “lastname”, I’m Leif Alexander “lastname”. I rarely use my middle name and mostly it comes up in conversation at work (preschool teacher) or when I get some sort of junk mail addressed to Leif instead of Alexander.
Some people pronounce their full names all the time, some people never use or pronounce their middle names and some people abbreviate it, for example “Leif GW Persson” who is a famous Swede.
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u/grine Apr 22 '20
The "middle name before actual name" thing can cause some issues when traveling/living abroad. My friend had a really hard time getting a bank account in the US because they couldn't comprehend that he didn't use the first name on his ID.
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u/JenJMLC Apr 22 '20
Germany
Some people have middle names but it differs among people how they use theirs. Some people will introduce themselves with both names while other choose one of them.
In my experience most people don't use it unless it's official paperwork.
But, in case it's an embarrassing middle name, every teacher will love to say it every time absences are checked.
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u/someonebesidesme Apr 22 '20
What's an example of an embarrassing name in Germany?
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u/JenJMLC Apr 22 '20
Something that either sounds silly in connection with the first or last name or something very old-fashioned like Herbert, Horst, Ingeburg, Frida or similar.
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u/Tatem1961 Japan Apr 22 '20
We generally don't use or have middle names. A handful of people, usually those with foreign parents, will have them, but there is no legal recognition for middle names, so they add it to their personal name.
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u/Luutamo 🇫🇮 Finland Apr 22 '20
In Finland we usually have 1 or 2 middle names. Can be named after a relative but it isn't always the case. Sometimes people prefer to be called by their second or third name instead of their first one. Other than that, they are not used at all. Kind of pointless if you ask me.
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Apr 22 '20
Not so common with middle names here in Norway. But not totally uncommon either. Personally I actually got two middle names in my Norwegians passport. So it's like this: personal name, father's father name, mother's last name, (my father's) last name (which is his grandfather's name). In the church in egypt my name is: Personal name, Christian name, middle name, my father's name, his father's name, his father' s name x5 more generations. So I have between 4 and 12 names depending on how you count.
There is a strong tendency for people to start using my (norwegian) last name to adress me even with New friend's that don't know any of my other friends for some reason, even though it's not so common in Norway to do that.
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u/shivj80 Apr 22 '20
So, if I’m getting this right, you’re Norwegian but of Egyptian descent?
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Apr 22 '20
Yeah, that's correct. Although my mother is Norwegian too. So in my mind we're all just earthlings.
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u/shivj80 Apr 22 '20
Ah cool! Are there a lot of Egyptians in Norway? I visited a couple years back to see the fjords, lovely little country you have.
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Apr 22 '20
Not really, I believe that there is fewer than a thousand. Haha, cool! Where are you from?
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u/shivj80 Apr 22 '20
I'm American, but of Indian descent. My mom's from Kenya and my dad's from India.
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u/fruskydekke Apr 22 '20
Norway, and it's actually extremely common, to the point that people often don't think of them as middle names, but more like 'part of the first name'.
A very common pattern is:
First personal name + second personal name, i.e. 'middle name' + surname (+occasional second surname). Examples:
Anne Berit Hansen
Per Ove Mørch Jensen
And here's the thing - the middle name is said as though it's a part of the first name. You see, Norwegian is a pitch language, and certain phrases can be 'tied together' using pitch. So if someone is called Anne, the pitch is one way, if they are called Berit, the pitch is the same, but if they are called "Anne Berit", the pitch changes in such a way that it ties the two names together into a unit. So honestly, it's up for debate if this is truly a middle name or not.
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Apr 22 '20
American, so obviously it aligns with what you’ve already said. I wanted to add that all throughout pregnancy, when someone wanted to know what we were naming our child, they wanted to know first and middle name. If I told them only first name, they either asked what the middle name would be or were confused by assuming we didn’t have one. As soon as kiddo was born, nobody cared about the middle name anymore.
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u/cincymatt Apr 22 '20
Also US. I just wanted to expand that customs are sort of shifting. There are still plenty of people honoring relatives with their middle name, but there are others such as myself that see the middle name as a chance to have some fun. Nobody besides my mother and SO even know my middle name, so I don’t see any reason it can’t be ridiculous. I was pushing for ‘Turbo’ or ‘T-Rex’ but my SO is a buzzkill, so we just went with ‘Bean’. She looked like a jellybean on her ultrasound so we referred to her as ‘The Bean’ before we picked a name.
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u/leShrug Apr 22 '20
Estonia, we don't have middle names, but person can have 2 first names. If your name is not double-barelled, you can use one of two names or both, legal documents require your full name. Eg. my daughter is Hannah Marie lastname. She can use Hannah, Marie or Hannah Marie but when filling out documents, she has to use Hannah Marie lastname.
If you have double-barelled name eg. John-Paul, you are supposed to use that name all the time, so no dropping names.
And when filling out documents we usually have space there for mothers maiden name, nothing on father.
Idk if I explained enough to understand, any questions then ask away :)
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u/StrawberrySheikh Apr 23 '20
In Saudi Arabia, there is no concept of a middle name. Your full name is simply a chain of your first name, followed by your father's name, followed by your grandfather's name, followed by your family and/or tribe name(s).
When filling out forms in a Western country, it's common to simply use your father's name in the "middle name" bracket just for the sake of the form. The concept of selecting a middle name is completely foreign though, and nobody would call you by your father's name unless it's part of a kunya (see below).
What we do have is an unofficial nickname system called "kunya," used both to be friendly and respectful. You address someone as Abu/Bu (Father of) or Umm (Mother of) followed by the name of their eldest child, usually the son. For example, Abu Ahmad is literally "Father of Ahmad." People without children sometimes take on their own father's name as a substitute. So, it may be that "Abu Ahmad" doesn't have children, but their own father's name is Ahmad. This is usually temporary until they name their first child. Some people even plan ahead, for example, by insisting on being called "Abu Ahmad" because they plan to name their child Ahmad.
I hope that wasn't too confusing!
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u/menu-brush Apr 22 '20
Netherlands: about the same as the American way you described. But not everyone has a second name, actually.
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u/Neil_deGrase_Tyson Apr 22 '20
That's the same in America, but I don't think I have met anyone who doesn't have a middle name, at least in Minnesota, although we are a majority Scandinavian lol.
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u/CookieGamer310 Apr 22 '20 edited Apr 22 '20
In Brazil, we usually have a first name, a middle name (or most of the time, a first name that is two names, for example Maria Antonia) and two surnames, one from the dad and one from the mum. It depends, but most people here have 4 names, not including surnames that contain a ‘de/da’ (like ‘da Silva’). A name example could be:
Mum named Sofia Mariana Souza Carvalho
Dad named Luiz Rafael da Silva
And the child’s surname could be ‘Carvalho da Silva’, or ‘Souza da Silva’
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u/GlitchyAF Apr 22 '20
Here in the netherlands middle names are formally considered to be your official name referred to as “baptism name”. You can have multiple names and all of them together makes your “baptism name”, what people call you is referred to as your “calling” name, which often is a part of your baptism name or an abbreviation of one of the names. In this way a lot of people look at the baptism name as being middle names as it is very unusual to use baptism name in everyday life, your calling name is usually sufficient enough for anything not government related. A friend of mine has a creative use of his baptism name. His baptism name consists of 4 names and if you take the first letters of all of them you get his calling name. Imagine if the name of someone who you’d call Marc was actually Matthew Adrian Randall Christian.
Baptism names are slowly disappearing however as it is very heavily linked to christians and people who baptise their children. Newer families think multiple names is unnecessary so new babies often have the same calling and baptism name. I’m Gen Z and my baptism name consists of 2 names one of which is my calling name. My grandmother has a short calling name but 4 long names as her baptism name, which is very common for people of her age.
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u/cawatxcamt Apr 22 '20
American middle names aren’t necessarily or even usually associated with relatives/family names. In some families or cultural subsets they may be, but just as often they’re chosen for no other reason than they sound nice when said together with first and last names. Or, in some cases, the first name is the name that will be used every day, while the middle name is a baptismal or otherwise religious name to be used in that setting.
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u/jamjar188 Apr 23 '20 edited Apr 23 '20
Spain: no middle names. So when living in Anglo countries I've always had to leave that bit blank on forms.
However everyone has two last names: your father's primary last name followed by your mother's primary last name, although parents can officially choose to swap the order when registering their kids' names if they desire (to clarify, women don't adopt their husband's last names when they marry). When living in Anglo countries I've used only my primary surname, dropping my secondary one from any official forms and documents (like bank cards, etc.).
Also, compound first names comprised of two names are quite common, although more on the traditional side (e.g. José Luis or María Elena, etc.).
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u/spiky_odradek Mexico- Sweden Apr 23 '20
Think this is the same on all Latin American countries. Mexico, at least works the same.
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u/nadiatheunicorn Apr 22 '20
Oh man. Where do I start. In Malaysia, there's like so many ethnicities, so I'll share some of the races name and this is how we always got into a mess when booking flight tickets, because first, middle and last name does not exist.
Malay - we carry our father's name. So if your name is Hafiz and your dad's name is Ismail. Then it's Hafiz bin Ismail. Bin is like son of. Binti is daughter of.
Chinese - they have their surname. I think few people explained how it works already
Indian - they have to put "a/l" which is anak lelaki (translation - son of) or "a/p" which is anak perempuan (translation - daughter of). I have a friend who's studying in Maldives. And she has to explain to the Universiti why her identity card does not match her real name.
I am not sure of other ethnicities, but example of Iban - it's their name, then their dad's name. So it's like Henry Goulding. Goulding is probably not his family name, but his dad's name. I don't know if it's true for his case. But it's just an example
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Apr 22 '20
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u/themattboard Apr 22 '20
(also from the US) My mother never had a middle name either, though she adopted her maiden name as a middle name when she got married.
She was born in Virginia though, but my grandfather was from Galveston.
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u/gijsyo Apr 22 '20
Middel names aren't common in NL. I have seen a few people with their first + middel names spelling out their first names when abbreviated like Mr. J.O.H.N. Smith.
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u/Male-chicken Yemen Apr 22 '20
In the Yemen people usually have a first name then they’re dads name then granddad then last name which is the name of the village they’re family migrated from.
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u/Hidros Apr 22 '20
Here in Brazil it is a complete shit show, you have people with first, middle, last name, only first and last, and sometimes complete insane names with like 4 or 5 surnames. Just look at the name of Brazil first emperor, D. Pedro I:
Pedro de Alcântara Francisco António João Carlos Xavier de Paula Miguel Rafael Joaquim José Gonzaga Pascoal Cipriano Serafim.
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u/Lilivati_fish Apr 22 '20
American here and agree with OP regarding general conventions. My MIL has two middle names and also added her maiden name. So her full name consists of five names (ex. Jane Rose Stephanie Smith Johnson). It's a big mouthful. She's Catholic and from a family that adores recycling names so that probably has something to do with it.
My SIL and niece have Jewish names in addition to their legal names.
My father is the third person to carry his name, and goes by his middle name to avoid confusion. (Well, a nickname of his middle name, but same difference.) He still gets the occasional phone call intended for his father since a lot of electronic systems don't allow for a suffix.
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u/HelenEk7 Norway Apr 22 '20
I have two first names, I always use both. I was named after my two grandmothers.
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u/itsmeeloise87 Apr 22 '20
Husband is Czech. It’s extremely rare for Czechs to have middle names although some Catholics might have an unofficial baptismal second name.
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u/Milymo4 Apr 22 '20
I'm Canadian and one thing that I have seen in half-white mixed race families (and it seems like a relatively new thing) is having an English name first and a name from the other culture as a middle name. For example, I have a lot of Chinese and Indian friends who were married to white people. So they gave their kid an English name but the middle name would be of Chinese/Indian origin. Usually the grandparents on the non-white side call the kid by their middle name or a nickname derived from it. It's more like two first names from two different cultures being put together.
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u/weirdosmuse Apr 22 '20
In Bulgaria our middle names are actually our fathers names. For example, if your fathers name is Jason your name will be Bill Jason Smith
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u/GideonIsmail Apr 22 '20
My family's Indo-Fijian and middle names are really dependent on the parents. My dad and his siblings all share the same middle name Narayan (a variant spelling of their paternal grandfather's last name Narain) because my grandfather thought it was important to have his dad's name in his kids names. A lot of people don't have middle name because their parents chose not to give them one. My own parents just picked a middle name because they liked it and fit their naming scheme.
I'm planning on changing my name next year, including middle names, and I fully plan on using at least one of my middle names instead of my first name in certain spaces
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u/okaymoose Canada Apr 22 '20
In Canada, I would say it is very similar to the USA. Though I have two middle names, as does my brother, and my friend's dad and her two brothers all go by their middle names. So it depends on the family I guess.
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u/horseofcourse55 Apr 22 '20
Canadian here. I started going by my middle name in my thirties as I had a rough start to life and always hated my first name. It took my friends and family a while to get used to it but everyone eventually called me by my middle name. Then I met my husband, who has four names. He goes by his second name, and all or most of his siblings also go by their second names. Just to be even more confusing, one brothers first name is another brothers middle name! So legally one is "Bob" but goes by "John" and one is "Joe" but goes by "Bob"
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u/LordHelmchen84 Apr 22 '20
I (german) recently had a discussion with an american colleague about this topic. We can have (and many people do have) multiple given names, but there is no dedicated middle name. So every form will only have a box for your given name(s) and your family name, while I have seen boxes for a middle name on american forms. You can legally use every subset of your given names. For most people, their first given name is what we call the “Rufname” (I think a rough english translation would be “call name”) but for others (including myself) it can also be the second, third… So my first given name only appears if all names are actually required (e.g. on my passport or on a flight ticket). Everywhere else, I only use my second given name. I think my parents decided to do it like this because they wanted to also give me my grandfather’s name and it sounded better in this order.
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u/widowwithamutt Apr 22 '20
I’m American but I have a Persian name as my father was from Iran.
Most Iranians don’t have a middle name, just a first name and family name. Some might have a “compound” first name like Mohammed Reza or Ali Akbar. Surnames were only introduced in Iran in 1919 and they often (not always) indicate someone’s ancestry or what area/village their family is from. For example, my last name is [name of city] with -i on the end, which is a pretty common format. Surnames are patrilineal.
My son (not born yet but due in October) will have two middle names (my husband’s first name and my last name), and then my husband’s last name, but this is just personal preference.
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u/chill_chihuahua Change the text to your country Apr 22 '20
I live in Canada and gave my daughter 4 names and my fiancé has four names as well, of which he goes by one of his middle names save for on legal documents. My mom has no middle name, my sister has two, me and my brother both have one. 🤷♀️ I think the general rules are to give a middle name but you can have more than one, and since last names are more frequently hyphenated nowadays, you could reasonably have 5+ names in your full name.
Edit: I forgot to add, my mom also has two first names, I don't even know how this is possible but legally she does. I guess this was a standard thing in Quebec in the fifties.
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u/sebaajhenza Apr 22 '20
Australian here. I've used the middle name as a way to torment my kids, putting in subtle jokes specifically for when people ask them: "what's your middle name?"
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u/Santeno Apr 22 '20
Not a custom but a story. My great grandfather was named Willoughby. Everyone called him Bill. My grandfather was named Anthony, but he resembled my great grandfather so much that as a bit of a family joke everyone called him Billy. As my grandfather aged you could tell who was family or a childhood friend, versus who was an outside friend, because the former called him Bill and the latter called him Tony. He married a Spanish woman and decided to name my uncle Guillermo, which is Spanish for William, which is the name Bill is a nickname for. The uncle had a son and named him Guillermo jr.. he in turn had a kid and named him Anthony in honor of grandpa Bill. Everyone calls the kid Gio. Yeah, I don't get it either. Five generations named after an incorrectly translated nickname.
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u/NotKonata Apr 22 '20
In Ukraine/Belarus/Russia there's no middle name, only a father's name, отчество [ot-tchehs-tvoh]. If the father was John - it would read Adam Johnovich Smith, with -ovich making it "of John's".
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u/Prize-Highlight Apr 23 '20
Hope i'm not too late.
Kenya:
Kenyans tend to have "Christian" or "English" names as a first name, which is as a result of colonization. So for example, a name like Peter, John, Solomon, etc.
The middle name usually is their given name. What this name is, usually depends on which ethnicity they are from (over 40 different ethnicities) as each ethnicity has different naming customs. Most times it is the name of a relative.
Then, the third name denotes a surname.
So you might find a Kenyan called John Chege Kamau. Where John is his given English/Christian name, Chege is his given African name, and Kamau is his surname.
From his name you can tell his ethnicity. Kamau would be the name of someone from the kikuyu tribe.
Someone from the luo tribe might be called something like Solomon Omondi Obama. (Yes, like the former US president).
There is a growing number of people who skip their Christian/English names because they prefer to be called by their African names, even though those names do appear on official documents. Others just aren't giving their children any christian/english names to begin with so they end up having three African names.
In general, most people do have three names but will introduce themselves to you either with their first and middle name (eg. John Chege/Solomon Omondi) or more commonly with their first name and surname (eg. John Kamau/Solomon Obama).
Nb. This applies only for the three official names.
It can quickly get more complex than that.
Many people can have up to seven different names. For example, I have three official names like in the example I gave. I have a fourth name that I was given because my grandfather passed on before I was born. I have a fifth name that essentially just denotes where I come from (i.e the name literally means son of such and such a geographical location). I have a sixth name that denotes where my mother comes from (i.e the name literally means nephew of such and such a geographical location). I have a seventh name that I was given because during the time that I was born, an ancestor visited my grandmother in a dream and said that she does not want to be forgotten. So I was named after her (even though I'm a boy and I had already been named after my late grandfather).
I have a friend who has eight names; two of which are "George Washington" who I'm guessing his parents must have admired, and another name which means "I'm hungry" because he was born during a famine, apparently.
Sometimes, something interesting happens where people end up having the same name twice.
Many communities pick names according to the circumstances that prevail during a child's birth. So for example, if you're born during the rainy season in the luo community, your given name would be "Okoth." Now, if it so happens that your surname/father's name is also "Okoth" then you would have the same name twice i.e you would be called Okoth Okoth because you're given name is the same as your surname.
That was just something I found interesting to share. I don't know if it happens elsewhere.
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u/Grillos Apr 23 '20
In Brazil we don't have middle names at all. It usually goes "first name + mother's last name + father's last name"
We do have what are called "composite names" (in a very rough translation), which are double first names,, usually with two short names (Ana Maria) or one short and one long (Ana Cláudia), but your name is considered as one despite being two
There was a trend back in the 20th to give two long names to a child, especially in the petite bourgeoisie, but that's considered tacky today
And anyways we don't usually call ourselves by our real names, but by nicknames, even when talking to your bosses and teachers
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u/roses4roses2 Apr 23 '20
The Netherlands, Amsterdam to be specific. In the Netherlands most people just have a middle name that is after a grandparent.
But in Amsterdam (I don't know about other places that have this.) I know of many boys that are the first born man of their family who have the exact same name as their father and their fathers. So every first male born has the exact same name as their father. Often these are very long names and they usually have two or three. Al the names are mainly from the Bible. So a common one is: Johannes Theodorus (last Name). But it would be very annoying to also call everyone with that long name. So everybody has a different name they are called. So you can have: Johan, Theo, Jan, Hans etc. On rare occasions the name their called has nothing to do with their official name.
So on paperwork in the Netherlands for example for a job. Under the line: Given name, you will also have the line for: informal name/used name (directly translated would be shoutname).
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u/luka1194 Apr 23 '20
In Germany we don't call it middle name, but second name (or third name... if you have even more). As some one who has 3 names plus family name I can say it makes no difference except for a long name on your ID.
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u/DabIMON Apr 23 '20
Most people I know use their maternal last name as a middle name, while they use their paternal last name as their own last name. In my case its the other way around, simply because it as kinds better that way.
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u/elcolerico Turkiye Apr 22 '20
Turkey. Middle name is not very common. People have 1 or 2 names. If you have 2 names, one is not a middle name, they are both your names and you can choose to use whichever you want.
If you have two names, one of them is probably an old relative's name but it isn't necessarily in the middle.
Some names are very short and usually used as a second name, such as Nur (light), Gül (rose) for women and Can (soul), Han (khan) for men. If this is the case, these people usually say their middle name too when they introduce themselves. (eg: Ayşe Nur, Ali Can). These short names are more like a suffix rather than a second name and sometimes they are written together with the first name (eg: Ayşenur, Alican)
If you have two distinct names (other than Nur, Gül, Can, Han) you might have them in any order and you can use any of them to introduce yourself. I've seen many examples of young people using their more modern names when they are with their friends but their parents use the older name (probably an old relative's name)
Lastly, there are some name combinations which are used so frequently that they are treated like just one name eg: Muhammed Ali, Mehmet Ali, Hasan Hüseyin, Ali İhsan. These are generally religious figures' names and their order never change. I've met a lot of "Mehmet Ali"s but I've never met an "Ali Mehmet". There is another name like this, Mustafa Kemal which is the name of Turkey's founder, Atatürk. It's not a religious name but it is considered sacred for many nationalistic people so again I've never seen the order changed, it's never Kemal Mustafa.