IS THAT A BOY'S NAME OR A GIRL'S NAME?
Are there unwritten rules that
boys need to have boys' name and girls need to have girls' name on them when
registering for a birth certificate? Or are there really names that existed in
this world created purposely to fit for a man and other names specially made
for women? Can you even tell the gender differences between both names?
Honestly, I can't really tell but after
arriving in England for the first time, I found out that most of the girls I
met or made friends with had boys' name while a few of the boys I met had
girls' name on them. Co-incidence? Since I don't believe in co-incidences, let's
a have a go with this one.
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| What you will get when you click the Google Images for Tracy Morgan and Tracy Chapman. Without the images, someone would be clueless as to which names belong to which gender. Image credit goes to Google. |
The thing about British
English names that I went through many types of media especially films and
television shows is that it doesn't share the same universe with American
English which I had so many influences and references from. Let's take American music industries for example. Singer names like
Justin Timberlake, Bobbi Brown and Tracy Chapman are all American Grammy Awards
Winners that might just give you a good impression that Justin and Bobbi are
100% fine being boys' name, but Tracy tells the story a bit differently.
As soon as I met my
Residential Lettings Manager, Bobbi Lee, I thought Bobbi Lee is an English man
but instead a young, long blonde haired tied in a ponytail, with nice and neat
office attire sitting at her desk in the Lettings Office waiting for me to sign
the tenancy agreement.
And, Justin my workmate on my morning
shift. When she was first introduced on my first day's job at the university's
residences I thought I heard a wrong name spoken to me by my supervisor, but it
was indeed, her righteous name, Justin Adams or according to her in one of our conversation
during work it's Justin ‘Awesome’. A bit cheesy but I'll take it. I had never
really known any girl Justin before I met the girl version of Justin myself and
this is followed by many girls Justin I met afterwards.
But then comes a tie
championship when there is a first name that reflects a boy's name in my mind
but shared by both genders and these people are the Comedian, Tracy Morgan and
the Soul Singer, Tracy Chapman. Hearing both names for the first time without
any knowledge or images of the person, I would say that both names belong to a
male gender but they’re not. Tracy Morgan is a male African-American stand-up
comedian cum film star while Miss Tracy Chapman is a female singer with multi Grammy’s
win.
Now let me take you to my home
country, Malaysia a country with a rich hundred years history cross-culture of
Malay, Chinese, Indian, Portuguese, Arab and the list keeps on going. One of
the common misconception that I always went through was an Arabic word widely
used here among the Malays and somehow the origin of the word itself does not
signify any gender symbolism.
One of the word is Nurul or Noor-Al
in Arabic which simply means 'light of the'[1]
and is commonly used by Malays with female gender and I couldn’t find any man
that I met or known personally donning that name. While in Middle Eastern
countries, the name is commonly heard being used by both genders comfortably.
And the same reasoning goes
for the name ‘Farrah’ an Arabic name which translates as ‘Happiness’ and this
name is widely used among the Malay females while not being a problem if it is
used by a male as it is a modest name with a beautiful meaning, but here in
Malaysia, it is just politically incorrect. But that wasn’t the case in an Arab
speaking country like Somalia where Arabic being its National Language (Wikipedia,
2013)[2],
‘Farrah’ is a popular male name. Take the late Somali Political Leader ‘Muhammad
Farrah Aidid’ for example, the name itself somehow fits to be a male name
perfectly but despite all these logical and light-hearted reasoning, these are
however my personal views on the matter.
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| My first name and its meaning based on Arabic characters. Image reference credit goes to hamariweb.com |
In short, I would end this with a saying that I made up
myself while writing this which sounds like this; ‘It is not the name who makes
the man, but it’s the man who makes the name’. That is why I’m not just proud
of my name for nothing, well not because of what’s behind the name but more
like the man who’s been holding up that name all this while.
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