Manasi and I have been thinking through names to give our daughter. I thought that writing out the framework that we’re working with would help. These are not meant to be an objective list of criteria, just a codification of my preferences. These are roughly arranged in the order of preference (e.g. having an easy to pronounce name is more important than having a two-syllable name). Feedback, comments, and name suggestions are all welcome. Please submit them using this form. Thank you!
- Easy to pronounce and not butchered by either English and Indian speakers
- e.g. Sarwadnya (hard to pronounce for English or non-Marathi Indian speakers)
- e.g. Pooja (often pronounce Poo-ha in California because of the spanish influence)
- e.g. Theo (the fricative “θ” doesn’t exist in Indian languages)
- Meaning should not be weird, offensive, etc in English, Spanish, Hindi, Marathi
- e.g. Hardik: Hard Dick
- e.g. Laura: when pronounced the Spanish way, sounds a lot like लौडा
- Two syllable names preferred
- I have empirically observed that people with both longer and shorter names end up getting two syllable nicknames
- e.g. Aditya → Adu; Cleopatra → Cleo
- This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, just not my preference
- Prefer simple syllables over consonant clusters (जोडाक्षरे नको)
- Prefer “classic” names over “unique” ones
- e.g. prefer Kunal to Krunal; prefer Katie to Kassiani
- This also helps somewhat with internet anonymity, which is a good thing in the modern world
- Prefer names with some ethnic ambiguity - e.g. Tanya or Nina could be Indian or Russian