RE: Unusual first or given names of children who havebeenphysically abused or neglected.

["Kathy Wood" <kathyw@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

** High Priority **

hi michael, some years ago we had an unofficial look at first names of children who had been subject to abuse, following the comment by a group of social workers, who were discussing kids names, and how the most "notorious" kids all seemed to have the same names.  for example, many of the workers had worked with a "jason". this phenomena crossed generations of families and workers, with older workers all having had a "wayne"  and younger workers ben etc

i cannot remember all the details now, but i do remember that one of the most common names for physically abused boys was michael, i remember this as i later had a son called michael.

the other thing i remember was that the names seemed to reflect socio-economic groups, with names popular lower socio-economic groups being more common, inlcuding unusual ones.  this would makes sense because people in these groups are more visible to "welfare" etc.
there is obviously no scientific judgement that can be made, i thnk names reflect the groupings of families etc.
but it is very interesting.

just an aside, i find the difference in naming children across countries interesting, eg australians tend to shorten names, have nick names or add an i or y, eg barbara becomes barbie, sandra becomes sandie, etc

while with friends in the states,their kids seem to have their names reduced to letters, eg, cj, bj, dj etc


>>> Marsha Runtz <runtz@uvic.ca> 6/05/99 01:17:31 >>>


----------
From: 	Steven Kairys
Sent: 	Wednesday, May 05, 1999 6:38 AM
To: 	Child Maltreatment Researchers
Subject: 	Re: Unusual first or given names of children who have beenphysically abused or neglected.

Michael

 We used to always remark on the same thing. For us it was names like
However, the name Crystal is not so unusual now.  So there is definitely a problem in identifying what names would be truly unusual, given cultural (and even subcultural) and generational variations.  For instance, my preschooler has had friends named Chya and Kaylia (two different families) and while these may be unusual names (at least I'd never heard them before), they are certainly not bizarre names (whereas something like "moonbeam" might be considered strange).  I do think this issue may be worth looking at, however, in terms of how parents may objectify or sexualize (or potentially isolate) their children through their choice of name. So it is not just the name, but rather what the choice of name may reflect about the parent-child relationship.

M. Runtz

Chastity or Crystal or Precious and   concerns about sexual abuse.

-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Ryan <MichaeR2@nch.edu.au>
To: Child Maltreatment Researchers
<CHILD-MALTREATMENT-RESEARCH-L@cornell.edu>
Date: Wednesday, May 05, 1999 9:05 AM
Subject: Unusual first or given names of children who have beenphysically
abused or neglected.


>Has anyone ever looked at the link between
>children who have strange or unusual first or given
>names and the incidence of abuse or neglect.
>
>I have had a preliminary look through our units
>registrations and found that 25% - 30% of children
>presenting with physical abuse or neglect have
>strange or unusual names.
>
>Dr. Michael G. Ryan
>The Child Protection Unit
>The New Children's Hospital
>PO. Box 3515
>Parramatta NSW  2124
>Australia
>Tel +61 2 98452493
>Fax + 61 2 98452495
>E-mail : MichaeR2@nch.edu/au 
>
>