ebony
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@ebony
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Post by ebony on Apr 24, 2021 4:50:21 GMT
Sasha, Misha, and Vanya can all be dudes for all I care.
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ebony
Sophomore
@ebony
Posts: 615
Likes: 176
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Post by ebony on Apr 24, 2021 5:30:43 GMT
Dana is a very common one.
What I find odd is that parents will give their girls a male name. But they never give a boy a traditional girl's name.
For example, there are women named Michael and no one thinks it odd. But there are are no men named Jessica.  My boyfriend had a nickname that ends with -ya that he used back home. Of course, no one calls him that here. And I joined a Russian-speaking campus "club" (in these pandemic times, just a chat group) where there's a guy who goes by a name that ends with -a and he mentions men trying to pick him up thinking he's a girl. lmao. To be fair when I look up that name Google Images shows 6 women and 1 boy in the top row.
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Post by Ass_E9 on Apr 25, 2021 2:40:26 GMT
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Post by Jep Gambardella on Apr 25, 2021 3:32:34 GMT
My boyfriend had a nickname that ends with -ya that he used back home. Of course, no one calls him that here. And I joined a Russian-speaking campus "club" (in these pandemic times, just a chat group) where there's a guy who goes by a name that ends with -a and he mentions men trying to pick him up thinking he's a girl. lmao. To be fair when I look up that name Google Images shows 6 women and 1 boy in the top row. English may have gotten the 'a' as a feminine ending from Latin. And remember in Romance languages like Spanish and Italian, 'a' is always feminine. But I know from reading Russian novels that the Slavs don't stick to the Latin "a" rule. They were also never ruled by Rome. But the English were. There are many male Russian names like Sacha and Alyosha.
Sacha is not a Russian name. It is a nickname for “Alexander”, like “Bob” for “Robert”. I don’t know about Alyosha but it is probably also a nickname. Although “Nikita” as far as I know is an actual name.
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ebony
Sophomore
@ebony
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Post by ebony on Apr 25, 2021 4:43:04 GMT
English may have gotten the 'a' as a feminine ending from Latin. And remember in Romance languages like Spanish and Italian, 'a' is always feminine. But I know from reading Russian novels that the Slavs don't stick to the Latin "a" rule. They were also never ruled by Rome. But the English were. There are many male Russian names like Sacha and Alyosha.
Sacha is not a Russian name. It is a nickname for “Alexander”, like “Bob” for “Robert”. I don’t know about Alyosha but it is probably also a nickname. Although “Nikita” as far as I know is an actual name. Sasha is a nickname for Alexander and Alyosha is a nickname for Aleksey. There are proper masculine names that end in -a though, like Nikita as you pointed out, and also Danila and Ilya.
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Post by poelzig on Apr 25, 2021 4:51:32 GMT
Dana is a very common one.
What I find odd is that parents will give their girls a male name. But they never give a boy a traditional girl's name.
For example, there are women named Michael and no one thinks it odd. But there are are no men named Jessica. I have a male friend named Kim. Kim is his first name not his surname. Also he's a white guy not Korean so I think that counts as a traditional girls name.
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Post by Stammerhead on Apr 25, 2021 8:39:20 GMT
Dana is a very common one.
What I find odd is that parents will give their girls a male name. But they never give a boy a traditional girl's name.
For example, there are women named Michael and no one thinks it odd. But there are are no men named Jessica. I have a male friend named Kim. Kim is his first name not his surname. Also he's a white guy not Korean so I think that counts as a traditional girls name. There’s also the British writer and presenter Kim Newman. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Newman
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Post by kls on Apr 25, 2021 10:45:41 GMT
Joshua is one of my favorite names for a male.
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Post by Jep Gambardella on Apr 25, 2021 11:30:28 GMT
Sacha is not a Russian name. It is a nickname for “Alexander”, like “Bob” for “Robert”. I don’t know about Alyosha but it is probably also a nickname. Although “Nikita” as far as I know is an actual name. My point is that in cultures exposed to Latin, the 'a' is considered feminine. The Russians were never conquered by Rome. Even in the West, it's rare for a boy's nickname to end in 'a'. In Russia that's not true. The ‘a’ is still very much feminine is Slavic languages. In Western European languages surnames are immutable; in Slavic languages most of them have a male form and a female form, which consists of the male version with an ‘a’ at the end. Romanov/Romanova, Gorbachev/Gorbacheva, Kowalski/Kowalska, and so on. Not to mention so many common first names, like Natasha, Svetlana, Tatyana, Elena.
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Post by Raimo47 on Apr 25, 2021 12:37:43 GMT
There are many Finnish male names that end with the letter a. For example:
Pekka
Jorma
Mika
Ilkka
Esa
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ebony
Sophomore
@ebony
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Post by ebony on Apr 25, 2021 14:37:40 GMT
My point is that in cultures exposed to Latin, the 'a' is considered feminine. The Russians were never conquered by Rome. Even in the West, it's rare for a boy's nickname to end in 'a'. In Russia that's not true. The ‘a’ is still very much feminine is Slavic languages. In Western European languages surnames are immutable; in Slavic languages most of them have a male form and a female form, which consists of the male version with an ‘a’ at the end. Romanov/Romanova, Gorbachev/Gorbacheva, Kowalski/Kowalska, and so on. Not to mention so many common first names, like Natasha, Svetlana, Tatyana, Elena. I hope to adopt a -ova surname down the road. 
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Post by Jep Gambardella on Apr 25, 2021 14:59:46 GMT
The ‘a’ is still very much feminine is Slavic languages. In Western European languages surnames are immutable; in Slavic languages most of them have a male form and a female form, which consists of the male version with an ‘a’ at the end. Romanov/Romanova, Gorbachev/Gorbacheva, Kowalski/Kowalska, and so on. Not to mention so many common first names, like Natasha, Svetlana, Tatyana, Elena. I hope to adopt a -ova surname down the road. You know, I was wondering about that the other day. Not so much about married women, but about children. If a Russian couple has a daughter here in Canada, would they be allowed to register her with the surname ending in -a, as per the Russian costume, or would it have to be the same spelling as the father's surname? |
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Post by cooly44 on Apr 25, 2021 19:08:35 GMT
Dana is a very common one.
What I find odd is that parents will give their girls a male name. But they never give a boy a traditional girl's name.
For example, there are women named Michael and no one thinks it odd. But there are are no men named Jessica. I couldn’t agree more. Ryan Reynolds and his wife named their daughter James. I’d like to see them name a son Sophie.
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Post by cooly44 on Apr 25, 2021 19:11:32 GMT
I hope to adopt a -ova surname down the road. You know, I was wondering about that the other day. Not so much about married women, but about children. If a Russian couple has a daughter here in Canada, would they be allowed to register her with the surname ending in -a, as per the Russian costume, or would it have to be the same spelling as the father's surname? I can answer that. I have a friend whose husband has a Polish last name. They were not allowed to give their daughter the feminine version of the last name, at least not in Quebec. I don’t know about the other provinces.
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Post by cooly44 on Apr 25, 2021 20:26:34 GMT
I couldn’t agree more. Ryan Reynolds and his wife named their daughter James. I’d like to see them name a son Sophie. So the unisex crowd will never admit it, but they consider male names superior to females names. Yes they do.
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ebony
Sophomore
@ebony
Posts: 615
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Post by ebony on Apr 25, 2021 23:22:12 GMT
You know, I was wondering about that the other day. Not so much about married women, but about children. If a Russian couple has a daughter here in Canada, would they be allowed to register her with the surname ending in -a, as per the Russian costume, or would it have to be the same spelling as the father's surname? I can answer that. I have a friend whose husband has a Polish last name. They were not allowed to give their daughter the feminine version of the last name, at least not in Quebec. I don’t know about the other provinces. Quebec also has laws against women taking their husband's surname. I don't see how that would apply to the rest of Canada. I'd personally hyphenate my surname with the feminine version of my future husband's last name. I was on the fence about it but after seeing the genocide of Turkic peoples in China and similar treatment by the USSR and its successors I'd be totally on board with taking a name from an oppressed ethnic group. My boyfriend does not speak the language in which his surname originates due to Soviet assimilation policies that Putin is continuing to this day.
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Post by alpineflower on Apr 26, 2021 7:14:53 GMT
Stacy and Tracy are unisex as are Courtney, Kendall, Lindsay, Leslie and Ashley
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