The Sociology of Names

Deciding what to name a child might feel like a personal decision, it’s actually a decision that is shaped
by social forces.- Tristan Bridges

In this assignment, you will consider how history, social factors, and biography influence naming.

You may want to explore the Social Security Baby Names page https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/babynames/
where you can see how popular your name is, how the popularity has changed, and even look at popular
names by decade.

In an informal, open reflection of 1.5 -2 pages, students will discuss how naming our children in society
is influenced by social factors, as well as discuss the Sociological Imagination. An Outline for the Paper is
included below:

Part 1:
Introduction:
The concept of the sociological imagination is one of the most important ideas in sociology. Explain what
the sociological imagination is and its origin. Then, provide a few examples that can be used to
understand and apply the Sociological Imagination. You may wish to use the same event that you
discussed in the “Sociological Imagination in Your Life” assignment as one of your examples.
Part 2:
Discuss:
Discuss how we name our children. You may wish to discuss the origin of your name, or a friend or
family member’s name origin. You may discuss a few or all the social factors below:

Consider how a person’s name may be related to:

 Their identity as a person and member of a family1

 Social class
 Gender2
 Ethnicity & culture
 Race
 Trends in media3 and pop culture4
 Popularity of the name5

1
What’s in a Name? via Everyday Sociology https://www.everydaysociologyblog.com/2020/02/whats-in-a-
name.html
2
Why Popular Boy Names are More Popular… via the Society Pages
https://thesocietypages.org/feminist/2016/02/25/why-popular-boy-names-are-more-popular-than-popular-girl-
names/
3
On Game of Thrones Names via Bored Panda https://www.boredpanda.com/game-of-thrones-baby-names-
khaleesi/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic
4
Nobody Wants to Name their children Karen Anymore via Fatherly https://www.fatherly.com/news/karen-baby-
name-unpopular-2020
5
The Science of Baby Name Trends https://daily.jstor.org/science-baby-names/
I have linked some short articles about the topic in the footnotes. These are meant to get you curious
and inspire you and are not required reading. You may read one or all of them to get you thinking
sociologically about names. If you use ideas that come from the articles, be sure to cite them properly,
whether or not you are using a direct quote.

Part 3:
Apply:
In this section, you will apply the Sociological Imagination to how we name our children. How do you
think that larger social forces or historical patterns help to explain how we name our children? How do
structures in society impact the individual story of how we got our name?

This assignment will be evaluated using the Sociological Imagination Paper Rubric.