When we decided to name the squeaker Maeve, we knew that we'd picked a name a little less widespread than Emily or Susan, but we also thought it was a name people would recognize. There is at least one famous person with that name, Maeve Binchy, the Irish writer. We even chose the most widespread Anglicized spelling, instead of the Irish Medb or other variants. For more on the name, visit this page: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medb.
We were wrong about people recognizing the name, at least most people we've met casually. Typical exchange:
—What's his name? (The default assumption that our baby is a boy, even when she's wrapped in a pink blanket or wearing a pink hat, never ceases to surprise us. In our non-scientific observations, this practice seems most common among women over 60.)
—She's a girl. Her name is Maeve.
—Maze?
—No, Maeve. M-A-E-V-E.
—Oh, like mauve?
—Well, no. It's an Irish name.
By that point, we've usually finished buying our groceries or whatever, so we have a reason to separate.
I wonder whether the parents of professional boxer Evander Holyfield ran into a lot of people suggesting that his name was really Lavender when he was a baby. The scenario seems to follow the same logic as associating Maeve with mauve: A person hears a name that's not familiar but that might sound like a somewhat unusual color term, then assumes that the parents named the child after the color term or that the name must be related to it.
Of course, we know that people aren't trying to get her name wrong; they just don't know any Maeves. And despite the numerous conversations like the sample above in the past six months, we've had plenty of friends and family who, upon hearing her name, have immediately said, "I love that name," or "That's my favorite Irish name." We just never expected to have so much explaining to do to everyone else.
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I have to admit that I am one of those people who's never met any "Maeves" before...but I fell in love with it when you told us that was the baby's name!
ReplyDeleteBy the way, 99.9% of people assumed that Kana was a boy during her first year of life. I was almost proud when I managed to get people say "What a handsome boy!" when Kana was wearing a pink dress.
On the Evander Holyfield connection--perhaps he got sick of people thinking his name was Lavender and thus became a boxer? Does that mean Maeve is destined to (a) go into some super-macho field or (b) become a fiddler in some Celtic band, all to end the confusion? I'll bet no one gets Evander's name wrong any more....
ReplyDeleteOh, and people *still* assume Sadie's a boy, unless she's wearing a dress.
Deb
I guess this goes to show that the general public is a bit slow. I can see a quick stumble on the name (not your avaerage Joe) but the boy / girl mishaps are plain silly. In general I would have to assume that babies in pink are girls, blue boys...What the heck does yellow = ?? See you in August!
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