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On the 11th, the New York City Health Department released, finally, its statistics for baby names in 2005. I know the world has been holding its breath. I love these lists and really look forward to them for reasons that are mysterious to me. I love the fact that 242 families who probably never had anything to do with each other named their daughters "Gabriella." Why is "Jayden" is so much more popular than "Jaden"? Why is "Phoenix" a boy's name? (It doesn't appear as a girl's name at all, in spite of the popularity of all of the X-Men movies.)
Emily remains the number one girl's names after it unseated "Ashley" which clung to the top position for way too long. But nothing compares to the tenacity of "Michael" which has apparently been the number one boy's name in New York City for 20 years. New names to break into the top ten are "Rachel" (which kicked "Brianna" down to number 14) and "Nicholas" (which bumped "Ryan" into the 11t h spot) otherwise, little changes.
Because they don't shift around that much, I don't find Top Tens particularly interesting, but I have always been intrigued by the longer lists that the City also offers. As long as 10 babies receive any name, that name appears on the Big List. This year the Big List for boys has 162 names on it, starting with the inevitable "Michael" and winding up with "Zain" and the Big List for girls has 149 spots: "Emily" to "Zaniyah".
The Big Lists are then broken down by vague ethnicity (after the "All" categories you can see statistics for Black, Hispanic and Asian & Pacific Island names). I would have been more interested to see a name breakdown by borough or even neighborhood (since I spent so much time in Morningside Heights, I am snarkily curious about academic kid naming tendencies).
Do other cities offer this sort of extensive reporting? Of course the annual round-up press release is reluctant to just provive entertainment without the frisson of worry, so it also comes with information about window guards, avoiding second hand smoke, SIDS and lead poisoning prevention.
posted by Elise at 7:24 AM
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