Some years ago I read an article that claimed that when a name that was most-commonly a man's name started being given to girls, parents dropped off giving it to boys. I've tried to think what this would be called but all my attempts haven't turned up anything.

Does anyone else know about this?

Do you have any idea where you read this (Psychology Today, for example--it would be up their alley)?

This might be a start: https://inequalitybyinteriordesign.w...ar-girl-names/

By the way, I must observe that your thread title, "Women taking over men's names," seems to imply that little girl babies name themselves. I don't think the little girl babies are doing the taking over or that they can be implicated in some kind of plot to rule the world as a result of their parents' choice of names for them.

Just a thought.

No. I don't read 'Psychology Today' either.

I wrote that ironically. If the phenomenon I broached exists, it reflects proxy-cowardice of parents for their boy babies.

When I was growing up, there were a few androgynous names, but they were always spelled differently for boys and girls: Leslie/Lesley or Francis/Frances. Now that I come to think of it, the female versions were somewhat upper-class. And the one completely androgynous name, Evelyn, was definitely upper-class. Nowadays, gender ambiguity seems to have gone down-market.

You have heard of 'a boy named Sue', surely.

Gender names are a cultural artifact, and both gender indicators and name cores exist differently (when they exist at all) in different cultures and languages. English, being somewhat of a creole, adopts name and language parts from French/Gallic, Celtic, Germanic, Russian, and other language and culture sources. In the U.S.A. there are no national guidelines regarding names, and they can even contain numerals and special characters unless restricted by state or local law. This, as one might imagine, can cause terrible difficulties when using Federal and State software, or business software, to fill out forms that do not take potential name content into account properly.

I HATE, in particular, forms that require to you affirm that you understand that if any answer is not accurate that the entire form is invalid and you may suffer legal consequences, yet it does not ALLOW the accurate answers. These are increasingly common, and frustrating.

There is, to my knowledge, nowhere in the U.S.A. where names are restricted by Gender, but I have not studied law, nor researched that specific subject. I have some SMALL knowledge of the subject as a result of my family tendency to occasionally give children 2, 3, or 5, middle names to honor significan ancestors. Most software does not allow for more than ONE middle initial. Federal offices have manually modified data and forms to allow the extra initials(for which I am VERY grateful), but the software still does not handle it properly.

Historically, names in one culture may tend to wander from one gender, to the other, back, and then be generalized to both before starting the entire process over. I am not sure if there is any important cultural or historical significance, but it can be a very interesting study.

There are always ambiguities. Evelyn Waugh said he found USians frequently expected him to be a woman, while Marion Bradley had the opposite problem. Robin seems to be female in the US but male in the UK — certainly for those of us who grew up reading about Christopher Robin, or who can still recite "Who killed Cock Robin?" In medieval English, there was no real difference: think of Mother Julian of Norwich.

As to the original question, I haven't forgotten it: I just don't know the answer. Does the phenomenon, if it exists, need a name?

Thanks to Mr frankbell I found 'The Instability of Androgynous Names: The Symbolic Maintenance of Gender Boundaries' which finds

There's a Ph.D. in there somewhere for whoever can explain--explain, not just describe--the latent male misogyny and insecurity that leads to that effect.

Men are so terribly afraid that women might be stronger than men are, or, perhaps more accurately, that women will realize they are stronger--which, of course,they are.

Just ask a man if he can imagine giving birth, then being up and at it the next day.

A long time ago, I read a sci-fi story called, I think, "The Twenty and Four." The gist was that a crew was assembled to journey in search of new planets and galaxies. At the very end, we learn that the name of the crew--"The Twenty and Four"--related not just to the number, but to the composition. The "Twenty" were chosen because they were the stronger and more resilient, whereas the "Four" were the weaker. The "Twenty" were women . . . .

I did a web search for the story and could not find a direct link to it.

Survival Ship by Judith Merrill, 1951.