Reykjavík Grapevine - 16.07.2010, Qupperneq 18

18
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 10 — 2010
Article | Names
Within six months after a baby in Iceland is born,
parents must submit their newborn’s name to
the National Registry (Þjóðskrá). If their name of
choice is not already in use and previously regis-
tered by someone else, they must fill out an ap-
plication and pay 3.000 ISK to have the proposed
name evaluated by the Icelandic Naming Commit-
tee.
Over the course of a year, the committee re-
ceives about 100 applications. Last year, com-
mittee head Ágústa Þorbergsdóttir told me they
received 105 applications and rejected 46 (for
context, there are about 5.000 births per year in
Iceland).
Some of the committee’s most recent rejec-
tions include Konrad, Hector, Cara, Kelly, Bót,
Ralph, Villy and Werner. For those applicants, it’s
back to the drawing board with a copy of law num-
ber 45/1996, the Personal Names Act.
PRESERvING THE ICELANDIC LANGUAGE
“There is a common misconception that we, the
committee, choose names or that our decisions
are based on personal taste,” Ágústa Þorbergs-
dóttir said. “On the contrary, the task of the Nam-
ing Committee is to evaluate applications accord-
ing to provisions of the law.”
According to the law, “forenames shall be
capable of having Icelandic genitive endings or
shall have become established by tradition in the
Icelandic language,” and “names may not conflict
with the linguistic structure of Icelandic.” For ex-
ample, names must work with Iceland’s grammati-
cal case structure: nominative, accusative, dative
and genitive. The name Njáll, becomes Njáll, Njál,
Njáli, and Njáls in the respective cases. So, if a
proposed name cannot do that, forget about it.
The law also states, names “shall be written in
accordance with the ordinary rules of Icelandic
orthography unless another orthography is estab-
lished by tradition.” Of the provisions, Águsta says
names are most often rejected for this reason.
So, because the letter “c” cannot be found in Ice-
land’s 32-letter alphabet, it’s no surprise that ap-
plications for Cara, Carla, Carolina, Cesil, Christa,
Christel, Christiana, Christín and Conny have all
been rejected.
However, alternate names are sometimes sug-
gested to fit the criteria. For example, many of
the above names have been accepted with a “K”
instead of a “C”, and applications for the names
Wanderley and Raymond were approved respec-
tively as Valur and Reynisson.
PROTECTING KIDS FROM IvANA B. PICKE-
DON TyPE NAMES
In addition to preserving Icelandic language,
which has afterall enabled Icelanders to read their
old sagas to this day, the committee is charged
to protect kids from those Ivana B. Pickedon type
names. Specifically, the law states, “a forename
may not be such as to cause its bearer embarrass-
ment.”
Now, this part of the law is not as straightfor-
ward as preserving the language part. Although it
is an old Icelandic name, one would think giving a
child a name like Ljótur (“Ugly”) would be down-
right abusive, even if once upon a time it meant,
“the light one.” However, this is an accepted name
in Iceland and there is at least one man walking
around with that name today.
So I naively thought I would gather Ljótur’s
thoughts on the matter and hoped he might share
his opinion on the Names Committee and the Per-
sonal Names Act. However, as soon as he caught
on to the nature of my phone call, he quickly told
me that he was very busy and that he was always
very busy and that it would probably never be a
good time to call, leaving me to wonder wheth-
er the committee might have failed to follow the
law in Ljótur’s case.
Yet, Ágústa Þorbergsdóttir said the committee
does not often reject names based on this crite-
rion. Although she did offer that the committee
once rejected a parent’s request to name their
daughter Satanía, for the girl’s sake.
Anyhow, despite the law’s intention to prevent
the name bearer embarrassment, dank-smoking
hippy parents or astronomy enthusiasts can still
have some fun with their kid’s names, such as
calling them Venus, Neptúnus, and Úranus for in-
stance.
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR FOREIGNERS?
These days, foreigners who gain citizenship in Ice-
land can keep their name as is, without having to
add an Icelandic name to it. While their future chil-
dren are required to have one Icelandic forename,
they are also allowed to have one that does not
meet Icelandic standards.
However, this was not always the case and
prior to 1991 every citizen was required to have
an Icelandic name. The law has been relaxed over
time, but even until 1995, a foreigner granted citi-
zenship was required to take an Icelandic name in
addition to their given name. What’s more, their
children 15 years and younger were forced to fore-
go their given name and adopt an Icelandic one.
But, do know that if you are a foreigner who
was forced to take an Icelandic name under the
previous laws, you can dump it in accordance with
the current law.
LASTLy, A WORD ABOUT LAST NAMES
In Iceland, everyone’s on a first name basis, as
they say. People are listed in the phonebook by
first name and you can respectfully address the
president or your teachers by first name. This is
quite logical considering Icelandic last names,
which largely follow a patronymic system, simply
state that you are your father’s son or daughter. In-
terestingly, in line with Iceland’s progressive views
on gender, a growing number of people are using
the also legal matronymic variation, in which you
call yourself your mother’s son or daughter.
Meanwhile, the law makes it illegal to adopt a
new family surname instead of using the patro-
nymic or matronymic system. In reaction to their
growing popularity, family surnames were banned
in 1925, but they were not effectively enforced un-
til 1991. As a result, some families, including mine,
managed to acquire them illegally so to speak. In
my case, my dad tells me his mom thought it would
be horrible for her kids to be Húnbogason and
Húnbogadóttir, so she decided to adopt Andersen,
which belonged to her Danish ancestors.
You will notice that there are still some fam-
ily names in use though. That’s because, one, for-
eigners can keep their last name and two, the law
states that anybody whose ancestors used a fam-
ily surname prior to 1991 are permitted to go on
using that name and passing it on to subsequent
generations. So, it looks like I don’t have to worry
about being forced to switch to Bogadóttir now
that I have taken up residence in Iceland. But, if
you’ve become say, the Jónsson family while liv-
ing abroad, don’t think you’ll be keeping your last
name (unless you are all the sons of Jón) upon
returning to Iceland.
Getting Personal With Names
Words
Anna Andersen
Illustration
The 20 most popular names for
females and males in 2005.
Size indicates popularity.
Felicity Shagwell, Robin Swallows, Cin-
dy Fook “Mi” and Sally Fook “yu” are
of course fictional names from Austin
Powers. However, while they could very
well be legal names in the UK or US, they
wouldn’t stand a fighting chance of be-
ing accepted in Iceland. The Icelandic
Naming Committee (Mannanafnanefnd)
wouldn’t have it.
“There is a common misconcep-
tion that we, the committee,
choose names or that our decisions
are based on personal taste” –
Ágústa Þorbergsdóttir, head of the
Personal Names Committee
Do you guys think it's odd to operate a committee that decides what you can name your
offspring? Or is it maybe a smart move for a language that constantly needs to defend itself
from foreign influence? Your thoughts on e-mail would be appreciated.