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Naming a Generation
426 Plays1 year ago
What's in a name? Actually quite a bit. Episode 44 features a conversation with Sophie Kihm, Editor-in-Chief of Nameberry and baby name expert, where we discuss how names play a role in our identity and how names showcase the culture of a generation. We dive into how names have evolved with Generation Z and how Gen Z continues to shape trends related to names as they start to pick out names for children of their own.
Follow along with Nameberry and Sophie Kihm.
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Transcript
Introduction and Theme
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to hashtag Gen Z. I'm your host, Megan Grace.
00:00:18
Speaker
Hello and welcome back. This is episode 44 of hashtag Gen Z. This episode will be the last of the season. Don't worry. It's a great one. If you started this episode with hopes that it would finally share how Gen Z got their name, I regret to inform you that is not fully what this episode is about. I'm happy to share about that later, but this episode focuses on the role of names and identity and understanding the values of a generation.
Diversity in Gen Z Naming
00:00:41
Speaker
As we know,
00:00:42
Speaker
Generation Z is a diverse generation. In just about every way we can look at diversity, Gen Z is leading the way in making diversity and diverse identities feel welcomed and included in society. And names are no different. As my guests will share in more detail, we're seeing more diversity in names among Generation Z as the babies being named, but also in the names of the very oldest of Generation Z are giving their own children.
00:01:07
Speaker
My guest this episode is Sophie Keem, a baby name expert, consultant, and name berries editor in chief. She's advised celebrities and other parents about choosing baby names since 2015 and has been widely featured in the media and quoted in places like Washington Post, People, and more.
00:01:25
Speaker
In addition, her job is a name expert. Sophie's a therapist in Chicago specializing in perinatal mood disorders, including anxiety, depression, and OCD.
Introduction to Sophie Keem
00:01:34
Speaker
She primarily works with parents on issues related to pregnancy and parenting, which occasionally means talking about baby names. Sophie takes an interdisciplinary approach to names and naming, and she considers psychology, history, sociology, statistics, and creativity of naming, which informs her work as a baby name expert and consultant.
00:01:55
Speaker
Please help me in welcoming Sophie to the conversation. I'm very excited to welcome my guests today, Sophie. We are going to have a great chat today about names and the role that names play in identity and culture. So welcome to the podcast, Sophie. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to be here. Oh, so you have a very cool job. I know we were able to kind of chat a little bit before.
00:02:23
Speaker
But tell us a little about your journey. First of all, what do you do?
Sophie's Journey as a Name Expert
00:02:26
Speaker
I think you're going to share a lot of really wonderful insights with us today. But tell us a little bit more about what you do and your journey of how you got to where you are. And if I'm correct, you are Gen Z. So we really leveled up on this one. I'm very excited about that. I'm an older Gen Z. I was born in 1997. Yeah, I'm the editor in chief of Mayberry, which is the world's largest website about names. You know, normally people come to us looking for baby names, but
00:02:54
Speaker
You know, we also see a lot of people who are searching for names for themselves, for a pet, you know, anything else. And I got started working at Newberry a long time ago. I was really interested in names as a child. I think a lot of young girls can be interested in
00:03:17
Speaker
pregnancy and babies and parenting as that translated into names as this more interdisciplinary approach to all of that, maybe a little bit more academic because you can look at it from the statistics, history, psychology, sociology perspectives. And yeah, I started just working with Nate Berry when I was in college and eventually went on to have this role
00:03:48
Speaker
First of all, I love an interdisciplinary girl like me because you truly, I think to understand some of the like kind of strangest trends, you have to like understand lots of different things. I think that's absolutely true in trying to understand a generation. And you probably similarly have to look at lots of different things that drive different trends within names. And I think it's such an interesting concept that we just like, we have a name and we're conscious of it. We love it or we hate it.
00:04:17
Speaker
that is really working it in today, not if we hate
Names and Identity in Society
00:04:20
Speaker
our names. I think mine's pretty great. Yours is also very lovely. But I love that you take an interdisciplinary approach to that because it's not just, and I think that's a big misconception on trends is that there's like one driving factor. Like all of a sudden we're, this is cool because blank. Like there's a lot of different things that contribute to that. I do have to ask you, have you read for economics?
00:04:42
Speaker
Yeah. I love that one chapter where they go into the names and deck about like the economy and like how the population is apparently in economics. Yeah. When I was in high school, I think I wrote my junior year research paper based on that entire chapter. So it was right up my alley. I absolutely love economics in general.
00:05:07
Speaker
What I just feel like you and I could talk about, girls who love fun stats. People think stats are really boring and dodgy and old and rigid, but you're out here writing your junior paper on the stats of names, which I just think is fantastic and lovely. I'm the same person. Weird stats. I love weird stats.
00:05:29
Speaker
but truly statistics, not just random percentages. A good, nice statistical model of something strange is my favorite. But that's not what we're here to talk about today. I mean, maybe it'll come up.
Parental Values vs. Individual Identity
00:05:41
Speaker
So let's talk about names. You've already started to allude that there's so much importance to our name. What do you think from your perspective, and I know you worked a lot of clients on this, how do our names play a role in our identity and then even a larger sense thinking about a generational cohort?
00:05:59
Speaker
Absolutely. Names are really our first sense of identity. So it's interesting that babies recognize their name around the same time that they realize that they are a separate person from their primary care. So that happens for babies, you know, within the first four to seven months typically, depends on the on the child. But that is happening at the same exact time. And so names are really
00:06:27
Speaker
what we think of ourselves as. And they can really shape who we are. You know, people may treat us certain ways because we have our name, you know, you think about a child named Maverick versus a child named Elias. Now those two names are right next to each other on the popularity rankings. But just our perceptions of what those names, you know, who might wear those names can affect how we treat someone and then
00:06:56
Speaker
you know, can affect your behavior if someone is treating you differently because of your name.
Personal Anecdotes on Name Bias
00:07:01
Speaker
But I think what's interesting about names is that, you know, most of the time they tell us much more about our parents than they tell us about ourselves. So our parents are the ones who name us and we need children based on our values. And so you may have a really traditional name and not be a super traditional person.
00:07:21
Speaker
it says much more about who parents are. But this is really changing with Gen Z as the generation that's more likely than any other to change their own name and shape their own identity. They're saying, oh, no, I don't have to live with this name that doesn't fit who I am. You know, this name that my parents gave me, I can make my name match my identity. That is, I've seen so many things
00:07:50
Speaker
Um, first of all, I'm so guilty of treating people based on like a preconceived notion of a name and just funny little thing. Like, uh, in high school I taught tennis camp and there was this one sweet soul that just gave me a really hard time. Like from like a little kid perspective, just like wasn't the nicest kid. And I held onto that name as a name that like I did not love. And like, you don't want to typecast people, but I'm sure that everyone can talk about this one name.
00:08:19
Speaker
rubs them the wrong way. We come back around 15, 20 years later and
Trends in Gen Z Naming
00:08:24
Speaker
one of my husband's best friends has that name and I'm really writing that name in my mind, right? So it's just funny that you can unlearn, right? We can unlearn our bias. Like I admit I had bias towards this one name because like the way that that one person treated me as a kid or like as a teenager. But it's so funny you say that like, yeah, you do, you think of the name Robert versus Elias. I think Elias is like a nice, scholarly, young,
00:08:48
Speaker
child that reads poetry and is very emotionally tuned, I think of Maverick, the kids flying planes, right? Like I think of top 10, you know? And so it's just funny how we hold that, the weight of that name. But that is really also your point around parents and the ways that like those who raise us and name us are what it says about them. But there's a really interesting parallel because the value
00:09:15
Speaker
that when we think about generations, we learn so much. We learn so much initially of our value set, as you know, from our parents and our immediate, think like, social circle, you know, friends, parents, and your educators usually, and the people right in your community, before you start to think of like this huge world view. And that's how generations, we tend to look at it as like the parenting styles. And then we also think about the
00:09:40
Speaker
what's going on in the world at this time and how those things shift. And we're seeing that play out certainly within some names. I would love to know a little bit more because I know that named very soon all the school research and kind of tracking the trends and the findings around names. What are some of the interesting things that y'all have found about, let's say, Gen Z that have been named the children of Gen Z right now? What are some trends that we're seeing among Gen Z-ers related to their own names?
00:10:10
Speaker
Yeah, well, names are becoming more and more unique over time. And so this didn't just start with Gen Z, but this is definitely a trend that Gen Z is propagating with their own children. The percentage of children being given the top names decreases every year.
00:10:33
Speaker
And the Social Security Administration, which is where we get the national baby name data, records all names given to five or more babies in a single sex in a year. And the number of names each year that they are reporting is growing.
00:10:49
Speaker
And Gen Z is also choosing for their children names that are more culturally diverse, names that have very strong cultural ties, right, not ones that are intended to assimilate. So we see more distinctly Sanskrit, Arabic, Japanese, Latin American names making the charts, which is great.
00:11:11
Speaker
And then the big one is gender-neutral names. So this trend was already in the works. Gen Z was kind of when the fire really started under this trend. But the names that were given to the current generation of babies and Gen Z's older members of Gen Z are parents for some of those children.
00:11:39
Speaker
is that gender neutral names, which means names that are given to male and female babies pretty equally. You know, at name barrier we define that within, you know, a 30% margin rather than
00:11:55
Speaker
90% margin for unisex names. So gender neutral names, they're rising for both male and female babies. And historically, the trend has been once a male, a traditionally male name is adopted for a female baby, the number of male babies given the name goes down. Parents don't want their sons to share names.
00:12:20
Speaker
with girls, and so there's this misogyny, this sexism that comes through that, and we're
Community Influence on Names
00:12:29
Speaker
seeing less and less of that. More names are being introduced to the name pool that are used for both girls and boys in relatively equal numbers, and parents are not abandoning these names for their sons, as quickly, or at all, in some cases, depends on the name.
00:12:49
Speaker
Can you give us an example of one of those? Like I'm trying to like, I know that you know the self-tartered type because you're like a name genius. But what is an example of where we're seeing kind of that trend play out where we're seeing more gender neutrality in names, but not the abandonment of like, oh, girls, girls are more named blank. So now we're in the name.
00:13:09
Speaker
A big example of that is the name Charlie, which has been around the time that I was born. This was a strongly male name. My brother is named Charlie. He was named after our great grandfather. This is a historically male name.
00:13:26
Speaker
And so girls have really become the top bearers of this name now. Charlie is more popular as a given name for girls than it is for boys. And the data doesn't account for nicknames, right? So you see Charlie be used as a nickname for Charlotte for girls and Charles for boys. And Charlotte's the number three most popular name.
00:13:50
Speaker
for girls right now. So, you know, compared to Charles, which is much lower. So just thinking about, you know, the likelihood that a lot of those Charlottes are probably called Charlie as well. And Charlie, full stop, ranks higher for girls at points. It's a much more popular name for girls. But this hasn't, we haven't seen Charlie really decline for boys. Parents are still using it for their sons.
00:14:17
Speaker
a lot of, you know, it's still rising in popularity for daughters. People are okay with it that, you know, their son, Charlie, might have a girl named Charlie or two, quite possibly, in his class that shared his name. As a Megan born in 1990, I can tell you right now there was always so many Magens. And to this day, two of my very closest friends were also named Megan. Like, we had to get real creative in our nicknames.
00:14:43
Speaker
But you bring up a good point around, I think we're also seeing more intentionality around, and you could be like, maybe you're absolutely false. But I feel like people at least, because I have a lot of friends that are in this era of like, what is the name of this kid, right? And so they're being intentional around just like the Charlotte, Charlie, Charles, Charlie situation. What does it make me mean to give this kid?
00:15:09
Speaker
right? And or like, what is the nickname that we're not thinking of that could be given to this child? And thinking about that maybe more eventually? Is that like true false? Like, or is that has that always been around?
00:15:21
Speaker
Well, you know, I think parents are thinking more about all of the possibilities with the name for sure. But one thing that we're seeing less of is anecdotal. There's not good data to support this one way or the other, but children are less likely to tease their peers based on their names and are less likely to name their peers. And this is just because of the greater diversity in the name pool generally.
00:15:47
Speaker
that children are just used to having classmates with names they may have never encountered before or, you know, the fashion in their class that goes by their full name. We all don't need to nickname it. So I think just culturally in America, we're not just naming names as much. And if a parent does want to use a nickname, they get to dislike that one. No, that doesn't work in every case. You know, sometimes
00:16:15
Speaker
you know, maybe your middle schooler will go to the nickname from their friends or something like that. But generally, this is the direction that we see that going. That is really interesting. And also shout out to Sebastian, that's our dog's name. And I'm surprised he didn't like, he just kind of like, I'm a part of this conversation. Absolutely not a part of this conversation. But shout out to Sebastian's out there. It's a cute name. But it's also very hard to nickname. Like all of his nicknames are nothing related to his name.
00:16:43
Speaker
as most dogs are, is what happens. But I do think that's really interesting because I think back on my time, again, there's like a bajillion Megan's, Megan's and Jessica's and Emily's and Samantha's. We were ruling the world in the 90s. And with Bean, there's so many Megan's. I can't believe I'm sharing this out loud.
00:17:01
Speaker
So many niggas, again, we had to get creative in the nicknaming, and my nickname did not come from my parents. Historically, up until about college, I went by Gracie, because my last one was Grace, but Grace felt too demure, too calm for me. And so I went by Gracie by literally everyone, or the solid two initials, M-G, and I'm still to that day rocking that one out. Yeah, I think it's really interesting that what you're observing is that young people, children, are not nicknaming their
Variable Name Popularity
00:17:31
Speaker
their peers. And it might also be because there's just more name diversity that we don't have to discern between multiple Michaels, multiple Nagans, multiple Saras in a class because there is a greater diversity of those names. And that you might be the only Emily in your class. And that's true, but like you might be the only Emily in your class. So you don't need an identifier. Yeah. So, you know, parents will come to me and say that they grew up with a really popular name. There were
00:18:00
Speaker
three other Michaels, two other Jessica's in their class, and they don't want their child to have that experience. And I always tell them that names are much less popular, even at the top, than they were when their generation was born. And that this isn't something that they have to worry about. You know, that they could name their child Liam or Olivia, which are the two most popular baby names right now.
00:18:28
Speaker
And they may not encounter another one in their class or their grade at school. It totally depends. You know, a lot of this is really dependent on community. Certain names will be popular in certain social circles that are not popular nationally. I live in Chicago, and I know two little girls, same age, go to the same school. They're both named Asha, which is a very rare Sanskrit name. It's on the rise now.
00:18:56
Speaker
uncommon it would it's very unlikely that two girls would have that name in the same class and yet that is the name that repeated not something like Eva or Emma or Sophia of one of the one of the top names.
Historical Naming Trends
00:19:12
Speaker
That is really interesting because I think I haven't really heard the name Asha maybe twice and once was like name of thrones right so like in to see that name kind of rises really looks beautiful name
00:19:23
Speaker
Um, and to see it kind of become more common is awesome. And I think what is, you know, like I love the name Olivia. I think it's so beautiful, but again, I would be the same person, but I know a jillion Olivia babies, but there might not be an Olivia in my future child's class. Right. And so that's a different, a different setting. And stats girls unite. We know that when there's more players in the pool, popularity is harder to achieve. And so if you all have your basis of popularity being five or more names.
00:19:51
Speaker
or five or more babies with that name, but there's more of those. To get to the top is a little harder, but it's almost like it's saturation. Like it is created by more, and not in a bad way, saturated with more names that are popular because of that. So instead of just having Sarah Jessica and Megan and Emily, there are multiple other things that are also contributing in terms of popularity. It's so fascinating.
00:20:18
Speaker
So you've kind of walked us through some of the trends you're seeing in the last few decades, certainly as Gen Z has become, they've been named, they're all born at this point. We're kind of naming Gen Z. But since you've been able to look at that and look at those things, what are some things that I know we talked about? There's more names for people within Generation Z. They're less likely to have a, appear with their name. We're seeing a rising gender of neutral names. Kids are not bullying about names anymore, which is very nice of them.
00:20:47
Speaker
Anything else for you to know about? Gen Z is being named. So Gen Z, I mean, basically Gen Z started a lot of the trends that we're seeing now. More diversity of names, more unique names, right? Fewer kids being given the top names. And just a trend towards more gender neutrality.
Microtrends in Gen Z Naming
00:21:11
Speaker
I mean, like I think I wrote in this article,
00:21:17
Speaker
Gen Z, you know, the time when Gen Z was born was not really a time of gender reform, but people were starting to think a little bit differently. You know, we see even in the biblical names that are popular for boys, right, the millennial generation had Matthew and David and Daniel at the top and Gen Z started to, the parents of Gen Z started to look toward
00:21:41
Speaker
names like Noah, Elijah, and Isaiah, which have this softer ending, right? These are still traditionally masculine names, but the A ending sounds softer, a little bit more feminine, right? And you see the rise of a lot of more androgynous girl names like Madison, Alexis, and Taylor, which got their start in the millennial generation, but really peaked during the Gen Z years.
00:22:09
Speaker
I think it's so interesting that we went New Testament biblical names. Now we're going Old Testament biblical names for my fellow Bible-following humans. We just went a few pages back to find different names, which is also fun. Those Old Testament names are really cool and have it on a completely different other nod to the fact that there's ties to the influence of Judaism as well. So a little bit more multicultural in some cases. Yeah, and I was wondering when we were going to get to the New Tailor in the sense of that is, I think, the most
00:22:39
Speaker
general or I don't think gender neutral but like androgynous like to good everybody which is so nice it's a nice theme too. Well now it's actually overwhelmingly feminine it's going down but because of the popularity of Taylor among millennials and and Jet Z it
00:23:00
Speaker
It was, you know, I think it reached number six probably at its highest point. And it's, you know, you need someone named Taylor, they're most likely female if they were born a later millennial earlier Gen Z, right? That's kind of the peak of the name Taylor. Now as it's falling for girls and staying kind of stable for boys, it's evening out a little bit. But Taylor, overwhelmingly girl.
00:23:32
Speaker
So now I know that this is like very early and I'm like struggling to wrap my head around this that Gen Z is old like old enough to be parents but some of them are I mean like some of them are parents not like the majority yet. It just also feels like my babies are having babies kind of mindset in the sense that like I feel like I've been trying to understand Gen Z since they were about 18 and so like for me to be thinking like
00:23:56
Speaker
They're making big kid decisions, like in the sense that they are having kids and making them swell. What are some things you're seeing from Gen Z as big parents? Like this is the first time I even thought about that. Not really, like the first time I've ever talked about it. So what are we seeing from Gen Z themselves naming their what would be Gen Alpha big kids?
00:24:15
Speaker
Yeah, it's really interesting. So we're seeing a lot more microtrends. And what I mean by that is that Gen C parents are really zooming into their personal interests. So it could be anime or regency literature or mythology, anything. And they're choosing names based on that. These really resonate on a personal level and feel very connected.
00:24:37
Speaker
to their identity as parents. This is something that I'm passionate about, a time period that I'm really interested in.
Creativity in Naming
00:24:43
Speaker
This is related to something that makes me really happy, and they're passing those names down to their kids. We're also seeing names that are, we call these traveling light names, they're very international, these
00:24:58
Speaker
travel well to be translated into many languages. They tend to be short. Gen Z parents are liking those. Strong sounds like X, spiky, these spiky butters. Gen Z parents are really using those. I think one of the biggest trends that we've witnessed is that Gen Z, they are creating more names. They are using words that may not have been named historically.
00:25:26
Speaker
for their babies. So if we think of celebrity examples, we have Stormy from Kylie Jenner, right? That had been used as a name sometime in the past, but it was never very popular. Bindi Irwin named her daughter Grace Warrior. This has this personal connection to her father, Steve Irwin, and Warrior. We've never heard that as a name before, but it's cool, it works.
00:25:54
Speaker
And Gigi Hadid, who named her daughter Kai, spelled K-H-A-I, and this came from her grandmother's name. So Gen Z, they're getting really creative, right? They can honor people in creative ways rather than just passing down someone's name in full and creating new names that didn't exist a generation ago.
00:26:18
Speaker
You've mentioned some celebrity popular names. What are just some, like, if you're like, this is a Gen Z parent, what are some of those names that we're seeing kind of like feel very unique to this?
00:26:29
Speaker
That's a very good question. So, you know, unfortunately, the national data does not split up by age in the US, although we have data on this. Give me a second. First of all, I love this because I'm a Lisa girl. It's like, I have data on this. Give me a second. So, okay. So name very, we do look at the data of the names
00:26:54
Speaker
that we split up by age group and we look at the names that each age group are visiting on our site. So this isn't necessarily names that people are using, things that people are interested in, but as we always say, our internal site stats are really predictive of future trends. So visitors age 18 to 24, so that's all within Gen Z.
00:27:21
Speaker
They are loving mythological names right now, so some of the top names that are unique to Gen Z visitors on our site, Andromeda, Persephone, we have Calypso, Phoenix, Echo, a lot of Greek mythology names.
00:27:40
Speaker
A lot of very, very long names too, you know, millennial parents have been drawn to shorter names historically, you know, because some of the top names, Lea, Emma, right, those were really popular for millennial parents. And, you know, Gen Z, they're looking at names like
00:28:02
Speaker
Allister and Aurelius for boys. For girls, you know, we have Amalillas, Ellewyn, Serafina, right? These really long, kind of dramatic choices, which I think are so fun and pretty unique. Say something else, again, kind of strong letters. Nix, enix, nox, so all of those have an X in them.
00:28:28
Speaker
And a lot of names that start with A, that just seems to be a popular letter among Gen Z right now.
Challenges of Unique Spellings
00:28:37
Speaker
We have a bunch up here on the site that Gen Z loves. This is incredible. I'm going to have to talk to you offline because I want to name my child something very historically in like heritage-aligned Celtic heritage. And I don't know if you've tried to spell like a historically Celtic name.
00:28:57
Speaker
Instantly, there's like a lot of hidden letters. And like, I'll just like find a really weird image that way. And he's like, absolutely not. Why are there so many extra letters in the name Eva? I don't know. I didn't, I didn't write the, I did not write this language. Okay. Um, but yes, I, we will talk offline, but exactly that of like this long spelling name, but short. I also think that that's the exact opposite of like the name, like, per se. Like, right. Like.
00:29:24
Speaker
Baby Persephone, I live for you. I hope that you have a good time learning how to spell that. Shout out to those Persephones out there. You're killing it. I do believe that as someone who has an extra letter that was unnecessary to some degree in my name, it builds character. When you gotta learn extra letters as a kid, it builds character.
Openness to Naming Change
00:29:44
Speaker
is something that I believe. Well, Sophie, I could sit and have this conversation for 100 hours, but I realize that we both have to go do other things. But before I let you go, what's your favorite thing about your Gen Z Pierce, whether it's naming related or just general observation of humans that you interact with in your peer cohort? What's your favorite thing?
00:30:06
Speaker
Yeah, I really love our capacity for change. We've seen a big societal shift, or we're kind of at the forefront of it right now, from names are one and done, you get a name, you can't change it, that it's yours forever, to names are something that you can change if it's not the right fit for whatever reason. That's really in your hands.
00:30:29
Speaker
you know, there's a lot more openness about gender identity and names. I'm noticing this even among my friends who, you know, for the most part aren't really having children yet, but are thinking about
Acceptance and Creativity
00:30:42
Speaker
names. I'm like, yeah, I want something that's gender neutral. I don't want people to be able to assume my child is male or female just based on their name.
00:30:52
Speaker
And I also really love the creativity and acceptance that Gen Z has, you know, the name pool is expanding because of Gen Z parents. And, you know, I think Gen Z is really teaching people to be more accepting of, of names. And, you know, anything can be a name. And I think that's really cool. I will agree that there's just an element of like, just being who you are. It's awesome, which Gen Z is like, and there's sort of a medium, no matter what, which is great.
00:31:23
Speaker
I couldn't agree with you more on that. Sophie, thank you so much for being here and sharing so many really cool insights. And I think some people are like, pop their baby memes, there's no sign of that. And you're like, please hold for the data. Which I love about, I love that about not only the work that you do, but name very soon. If people want to follow both your work as you as Sophie, but also name very, can you direct them and kind of where's the best place for them to keep up with some of the great stuff that y'all are doing?
00:31:50
Speaker
Yeah, definitely our website nameberry.com is going to be the best place to find everything. We're also on social media at Nameberry. We're very active on Instagram and Twitter and Facebook. We also have a TikTok that is getting some work, which we're trying to figure that one out, older Gen Z here.
Episode Wrap-up and Reflection
00:32:17
Speaker
And then you can find all of my personal channels through my website, sophiekeem.com. Wonderful. And I will make sure to link all of that so that people can get all the name goodies, really all the insights. So if you're working on naming kids or just interested, I find names to just be fascinating. I love looking at people's names. I know that nameberry has that, like you kind of have like this or
00:32:42
Speaker
research that you can do on stuff. And what does your name mean? Which is so, I think that's a really fun name. A really fun thing to do. So, Sophie, thank you again. It has been a delight. I'm going to come into the program just to take you off and talk about all the names. But thank you for being here. It's been wonderful. Thank you so much. This was so great. And it was so lovely to talk to you.
00:33:03
Speaker
I want to say thank you to Sophie for such a fun and insightful conversation. I know I don't sit and think about naming trends often, but names are such an important thing to think about. It's who we are and how we navigate the world. As Sophie shared, names speak a lot to the values of our parents and what they want for us. And this isn't too different than the way we think about how parental generations play a role in handing down values and perspectives through parenting and child raising practices.
00:33:30
Speaker
What is interesting is that the agency and an acceptance that Generation Z is role modeling though. If they find their given name doesn't align with who they are, they're willing to change it to be more connected with who they are. But we're seeing that young people are also being more accepting of different names and appreciating and celebrating names that come from special parts of who they are, like their heritage, interests, or passions. Names are much more than just we write on our school assignments and formal documents.
00:33:56
Speaker
Names are often the first thing we say when someone asks, who are you? As personal identity and value of expression play a huge part in culture, I'm so glad we could explore this facet of Generation Z's cohort culture. And finally, thank you for tuning into this episode. Before we formally wrap up, I will finally answer the question, how did Gen Z get its name? First, there isn't any one person or group that gets to decide the name of a generation. Our best guess is that Gen Z got its name stemming back from Generation X.
00:34:26
Speaker
Gen X got its name because of an article that was written about how they were stuck in the middle, i.e. the X, between two larger generations, but also between social movements, between technological advancements, et cetera. Millennials were originally and still sometimes referred to as Gen Y to follow Gen X, but their name took to the Millennials when the turn of Millennial took place in the year 2000, which was during their formative years and was a big historical event that would mark their cohort.
00:34:55
Speaker
which leads us to Gen Z. Because they follow Gen X and Gen Y slash millennials, Z made sense. Many have tried to rename or give this generation a new trendy name, but it always keeps coming back to Gen Z because letters are honestly just more inclusive to the fact that there's many defining factors that shape this generation. That is the short explanation, but if you'd like a longer version, we cover that in our books, Generation Z, A Century of the Making, and I also have a blog
00:35:23
Speaker
uh, article on my website, Megan M grace.com. As always, if you enjoyed this episode, please rate review and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts. It is truly helping other people listen and find the show, but, um, it also helps them determine if it's a good fit for them.
00:35:40
Speaker
This episode does mark the end of season four. While I'm looking forward to a bit of a break, I'm always looking forward to the next season and what the slate of topics might be. So if there's something you want to explore together, you have an idea of something you want to learn about, or someone that I need to chat with, please reach out via my website, MeganEmbrace.com.
00:35:59
Speaker
or on social media, you can find me on those platforms at Megan M. Grace and be sure to catch up there. As a listener of this podcast, you're part of the learning adventure and I'm always happy to look more into something you want to learn about. Thank you again for stopping by for this episode and this season. Let's continue this conversation. We'll chat soon.