Do names die of success? When fashion exhausts Marco, Paz, or Sofía

PalmOne of the headlines that always appears at the start of the new year is about first births. The lucky parents, with their newborn in their arms, usually answer the same question: what name? And it's true that a name is a linguistic element, a simple word, that seems to become ingrained in our DNA. Some people believe that names can be linked to a person's personality: "Marias are calm, Juans are energetic." Due to a lack of evidence, however, we will limit ourselves to discussing names from a (socio)linguistic point of view.

The National Institute of Statistics publishes data on newborn children's names every year. In 2024, in the Balearic Islands, the most popular boys' names were Marco, Pablo, Leo, Hugo, Martín, Mateo, Lucas, Enzo, Thiago, and Martí, and the most popular doll names were Sofía, Martina, Julia, Emma, ​​Laia, Aina, Paula, Olivia, Mia, and Lucía. These two lists of the ten most frequent names for newborns share two commonalities: the increasing popularity of non-Catalan names and a preference for simple, short names. At the same time, they demonstrate how ever-changing the world of names is.

There are winning names. Marcos has remained at the top of the ranking since 2004; it has been the preferred name for Balearic Islanders for over twenty years. The same cannot be said for doll names. Sofia is currently the most popular name, but it has only topped the list in 2014, 2018, and 2016. In contrast, the name Paula, which currently holds seventh place in the ranking, was the most popular name from 2007 to 2012, except for 2012. Is this a sign of success?

It's reasonable to assume that the most common names eventually become overused. If everyone is named Marc, naming your son Marc isn't original, no matter how fashionable it is. Looking at the year-by-year trends in name popularity, we can see that, broadly speaking, the declines tend to be abrupt. It's rare for a name to drop from the third most common to the fourth. Usually, what happens is that names fall to much lower positions, as if people have simply grown tired of them.

Tell me your names and I'll tell you roughly how old you are. If name statistics show anything, it's their distribution over the years. Specifically, the INE (National Institute of Statistics) data runs from before 1930 to the present. With this range of years, the names of children born in each decade have changed considerably. This change is likely due to several factors, primarily the decline of family names (children no longer take their godparents' names) and demographic shifts. Until the 1980s, there was a strong stability in the most common names. For boys, they were usually Antonio, Juan, Miguel, Carlos, Francisco, Jaime, José, Pedro, Gabriel, Rafael, Sebastián, Guillermo, Vicente, Bartolomé, Luis, Ramón, Salvador, Lorenzo, Andrés, or Mateo; for girls, María, Catalina, Margalida, Antonia, Francisca, Juana, Magdalena, Isabel, Aina, Bárbara, Esperanza, Rosa, Ángela, almost all of which could be combined with María. However, from the 1990s onward, names like Daniel, Marc, David, Iván, Sergi, Alejandro (or Alejandro), Adriano, Pablo, or Hugo for boys, and Martina, Paula, Julia, Carla, Sofía, Emma, ​​Laia, Marta, Sara, Alba, Núria, Sofía, or Clá for girls, proliferated.

Do we prefer shorter names? With the evolution of names, it's also noticeable that it's becoming increasingly difficult to find a boy with a compound name. Names like Francisca María, Juana Aina, Juana María, María Catalina, Francisco Javier, Juan Ramón, or Juan Antonio seem to have lost ground to names like Marco, Pablo, Laia, Emma, ​​or Aina. We've gone from names composed of two names and many syllables to names with only one name, and, if possible, no more than three syllables. The trend seems to be toward simplification and shorter names. Whatever the reason, this trend may reflect our usual tendency to simplify names. Many people are called by names that aren't exactly their own. We love to shorten names: Tomeu for Bartomeu, Xisco for Francesc, Lida for Margalida, Bel for Isabel, and so on. We seek simplification when a name is long. This process is common and consists of truncating the word: cutting it to shorten it. We do this mainly with people's names, but also with some nouns like TV, microphone, police, etc. These are all ways to avoid the effort of pronouncing such a long name.

Difficulty in studying them

The main difficulty we encounter when analyzing data like that from the INE (National Institute of Statistics) is the language of names. The registry too often contains names in Spanish. That's why we come across Pedros, Jaimes, Anas, and Juanas, which are perfectly and usually Peres, Jaumes, Aines, and Joanes, but have been registered in Spanish. In the past, before democracy, this had a specific reason: the prohibition of registering Catalan names for newborn children. All names had to be changed to Spanish. Currently, we are heirs to this practice, and we find people who use Llorenç but have Lorenzo on their ID card, or a María who always signs with the accent mark María because that's how it appears in the registry. Fortunately, the change is simple, and the UIB (University of the Balearic Islands) is working to raise awareness of the importance of standardizing names. Because, if at home we are Paus and Peres, isn't it a bit much to have to be Pablos and Pedros when we go out?