[poll] Names!

[pne]

To clarify slightly (hopefully): the "more than two middle names" was meant to read "more than two given names (i.e., more than one middle name)". And the "human" option is for those who would prefer to answer neither "male" nor "female"; I take it for granted that most people who chose "male" or "female" also consider themselves "human".

[Poll #482803] [Poll #482804]

Comments

"given name" in Germany

[pne.livejournal.com]

I haven't come across an equivalent of "given name" in Hungarian.

I don't think German really has a word for that, either; the common words I can think of are "Vorname" (forename) for given name and "Nachname" (aftername) or "Zuname" (byname, roughly, or additional name) for family name. You could also use "Familienname" for family name to disambiguate, but I can't think of a version for given name that unambiguously (i.e. without regard to position) means that.

Re: "given name" in Germany

[pthalo]

Does German have an equivalent of "Christian name"? if so, and if my German didn't suck, I'd probably end up using that. Or I'd go with Vorname and Nachname when talking about English or German names because that wouldn't confuse me. But if I had to talk about Hungarian names in German I'd want to avoid "first/last"

Re: "given name" in Germany

[pne.livejournal.com]

Does German have an equivalent of "Christian name"?

I can't think of one.

There's "Taufname" (baptismal name), I think, but I'm not sure exactly what it means -- whether it only refers to an additional (saint's) name that you receive at baptism, for example.

Ah! Looking "first name" up in dict.leo.org brings up "Rufname" (calling name, or name you call someone by), which I had forgotten about -- that should work unambiguously as "given name", at least for people who go by your first given name, as you do.

So, "Rufname" and "Familienname" should work.

Rufname

[pne.livejournal.com]

BTW, "Rufname" is also used to designate which of your given names you are called by, so someone whose birth certificate says "Johannes Erich Paul Kindt" and whose friends call him Paul would have have "Paul" as his "Rufname", even though it's not his first given name. (But it is a given name.)