(no subject)

[politicking.livejournal.com]

a customer today, a lady in probably her mid-to-late 30s, was named Jenni. i was like, "oh, just Jenni?" she said, "in my field sometimes it's hard to be taken seriously with a nickname as a full name... plus you'd be amazed at how many people say what? your name is just Jenni, not Jenna or Jennifer or something? haha, don't ask me what my parents were thinking!"

also, my bank teller: Laszheneah... and, probably like most of you, i have NO idea how to even pronounce that haha.

Comments

[quite-rosie.livejournal.com]

See, I don't have a problem with "nicknames" as full names really. I understand what she is saying, but on the other hand, if you want to call your child Jenni, and not Jennifer, then name her Jenni. If as an adult you have a problem with it, lol, change your name.

Lasagna, anyone?

[in-the-starlite.livejournal.com]

omg. I think that lady is named after food. :(

[tryyingtoevolve.livejournal.com]

Hey! Someone who agrees with me from personal experience!

[tryyingtoevolve.livejournal.com]

...Or why not name her Jennifer, call her Jenni, and let her make that choice without going through the hassle of changing it when she's older? It's fine to name a child something because you want to, but people also need to be considerate to how it's going to affect their child.

[quite-rosie.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I see that point of view, and I agree, that is what I would do to.

The way I see it though, no matter what you name a child, you run the risk of picking a name the child doesn't like. And I agree, parents do need to be careful. I just don't see why Jenni is less of a name than Jennifer.

My dad and brother are named "Randy", not Randall. It has never been a problem, although it is less difficult for those to fathom than Jenni and Jennifer. I also knew a girl who was just "Beth", and it was fine. I just think people get crazy with, "OMG THIS IS HOW IT HAS TO BE!!!"

Re: Lasagna, anyone?

[quite-rosie.livejournal.com]

OMG, I think you are right! I couldn't even figure out what that was!

[tryyingtoevolve.livejournal.com]

I think there's a difference between a name that CAN be a nickname, and a name that IS a nickname. For example, Beth: it can be a name on it's own, or a nickname for Elizabeth or Bethany. Naming your child Beth isn't going to be a big deal, because it could be either. However, naming your child Mike probably isn't a great idea, because it's exclusively a nickname. So when your child goes to apply for jobs someday, they're going to put Beth ______ or Mike ______ on the application; Beth is going to be okay because it's both a nickname and a standalone name. However, the person reading Mike's resume is likely to say, "He doesn't know that he should put Michael on an official form? Throw this one into the no pile..."

[tryyingtoevolve.livejournal.com]

I also think that there's a difference between picking a name that your kid might hate but that is a decent name anyway, and picking a name that is going to be hell growing up with. I think the liking of a name all depends on personal tastes; you might name your daughter Amelia, for instance, and she might grow up to hate it and wish that her name was Lisa. But people aren't going to make comments about it and she's not going to forever have to spell it or correct pronunciation, or have to deal with embarrassment over her name. But if you named your daughter Shithead (pr. Shi-thee-id), she's likely to endure years of comments and torment before she's 18 and able to change it.

So. While I agree that "no matter what you name your child, you run the risk of picking a name they don't like," I think there's a huge difference between picking a quality name and taking that risk, and picking an absolutely horrible name without thinking of how it's going to affect their life.

And while you might see no problem in using a nickname as a first name, it's likely to cause problems at some point in your child's life, and it's probably much much much easier to just name the fucking kid Jennifer and call them Jenny and allow her to make that choice for herself, instead of forcing your own choice of nickname on her and forcing her to go through the hassle of explaining, "No, it's really Just Jenny," for the next 70 years or having to go through the hassle (and expense) of changing it.

[rockstargrrrlie.livejournal.com]

I have a little cousin (she's 8 now) named Jessie. Just Jessie- not Jessica or Jessamyn. I've always felt like it was a strange choice since Jessie is such a clear nickname and I've never known anyone over the age of 12 to go by Jessie.

[quite-rosie.livejournal.com]

Right. To each his own. Like I said, I personally wouldn't give a nickname, but I don't mind when people do.

[freezemyazaleas.livejournal.com]

I have a friend who goes by Jessie and hates Jessica. She's 18.

[freezemyazaleas.livejournal.com]

A girl who used to go to my school had Jennie as her full first name.

[0o-faerie.livejournal.com]

You know what, if it weren't for this community, I wouldn't have known about the importance of full names v. nicknames in English speaking countries.
We don't have that here, at all. No-one would look weird here if someone was called 'just' Jenny. I think it's because Dutch names are originally very short =)

Re: Lasagna, anyone?

[0o-faerie.livejournal.com]

WOAH! I would have never figured that out! So bad.