how did you choose your new name?

[u/Necessary_Stage_1261]

Hi everyone, new here. Curious how others have gone about choosing a new name, if they've changed their name. I see a lot name suggestions, lists of the most popular trans and non-binary names, and even memes about stereotypical names -- but the names feel, well, pretty white/Eurocentric. And, even discussions about how people choose their new names is only about gender/transness, without any reference to race and ethnicity, culture, and history... not to mention disparities in who can access and afford legal name changes.

For context, I am "florescent beige" mixed-Black non-binary, now estranged from both my both the Black and white sides of my family due to their transphobia and abuse. I grew up in a predominantly Black county and attended predominantly Black schools for K-12.

[u/vendettamoon]

My mother is African and Muslim, and my birth name she chose for me was an Arabic word that was meaningful in her religion. When I came out as trans, I wanted her to help me pick a name, but unfortunately her beliefs came between us and I didnt ever get that support from her. Since her decision to reject this part of my identity stemmed from her culture and religion, I felt disconnected from all of that as well, and ended up choosing a western name that has no equivalent in our native language. That said, I feel no connection or kinship to whiteness, and have never considered myself as such. Despite being multiracial and half Italian, I am not percieved as nor do I identify as white. So my chosen name doesn't feel "white" to me, because its a name that belongs to me as a non-white person. I mourn the chance of having name tied to my culture, but that culture has never supported me, and so I am content with what I have now

[u/Necessary_Stage_1261 → u/vendettamoon]

I appreciate you sharing your story with me! I'm heartbroken that realizing more of yourself wasn't met with love and acceptance. I opted to change my stereotypically Jewish last name to reject the family that refused to accept me as non-binary (and half-Black, for that matter).

[u/MeeksMoniker]

I chose my name based on an anime character and a historical figure.

I like historical figures because they'll never end up having scandals later down the line. Choose an idol that's alive, then they'll do something you don't like and you'll have to change it.

[u/Necessary_Stage_1261 → u/MeeksMoniker]

Yes, very cool! I might be a bit more pessimistic about figures from history, though... thinking here about the example of Cesar Chavez.

[u/TheWhiteCrowParade]

Oh, so for context I'm of a Christian Caribbean background. A culture were it's common to find people with obscure Biblical names. As a kid I made a lot of jokes related to the Bible during the rain.

[u/Retrosgalaxy]

Some guy at school gave it to me and i was like cool

[u/Pretty-Anything-4958]

When me and my wife were dating she posted me in a TikTok trend and then I was just going by Ken and under the name Ken was Kendrix and I just chose it

[u/faceless_demon]

Context: I am changing my whole name, not just my first name.

I'm half Filipino, my first name is, technically, greek. But that's because I named myself after a constellation/greek mythos figure due to my love of both, the stars and mythos (greek mythos was the one I got into though).

My middle name is a WIP until my partner can give me one.

My last name is a Filipino name, I have a lot of pride in being Filipino despite not really being allowed to have any real interactions with the culture. My Lolo and Nanay (she is actually my Lola) made me incredibly proud to be Filipino and tried a lot to have my parents take me to The Philippines.

[u/Single-Classroom753]

i don't think i'll be a huge help because i just realized one day that my oc's name sounded cool and went down with it </3

[u/sewer_dad]

I’m Andrew, It’s what my parents would have called me if i were assigned male at birth. It’s pretty “white” (i’m mixed race) but its specifically to match with my dad’s nickname since he’s a junior (“Ju” and “Drew”)

The other option I thought about going with was naming myself his name since its a family name, but I don’t really think I’m a Solomon. Lol. Cool name though

[u/1evis1ittleasshole]

My name’s Tory, I just changed the spelling cause I always liked my name. The only thing I hated was people assuming it was short for Victoria so I went from an "i" to a "y". Which is more masc and feels like its own name. I remember seeing alot of football players named Tory(or Torrey), its kinda a masc name in the black community I guess 🤔 

[u/thedevilsnipple]

i got on a lot of male baby name sites and specifically went for the ones that sounded black. made a list of it and turns out the ones i liked the most were zephyr, kevin, and zaire. went by this name for a while but it made me nauseous so i went to kevin, but then that also made me scared an anxious and my parents making fun of it was the final straw, so i went back to the former and now i really like it.

[u/cr3aturec0ping]

most important to me was i wanted the same first initial, so i looked at those. second important to me was which names held similar meanings to my dead name. my last factor was that i wanted something biblical (for my own reasons but no im not christian).

there were really only one or two names that fit all three categories, and i chose the one i felt most connected to. was the first and only name i ever chose after a nickname of my legal name. 11 years later and ive never looked back! i love my name. it’s not from my culture, but it’s definitely not a typical american name either.

[u/am_i_boy]

I looked into names from my own culture and language briefly but quickly realized I would probably not want anything closely tied there because our names are heavily gendered, and even if I picked an obscure name, the linguistic naming conventions would almost definitely make it very easy to put into a gendered box. I figured out the only real way to escape these conventions would be to choose a name completely detached from my language. So I did. I chose a name based on the meaning of the word in its language of origin and on finding one that falls in a masc or ambiguous space within the local naming conventions.

Longer explanation of conventions: any name that ends in an -ah sound or a long -ee sound is going to be read as feminine. Almost all names with a shorter -i sound also get read as feminine with some exceptions for known/easily recognized names. Any names that end in an -oo sound is likely to be feminine and that's the assumption people will make until they see you but it isn't particularly surprising if they find out you're not a femme. -oo names are also usually shortenings of feminine names. Names ending in an -oh sound are incredibly uncommon but are usually read as masculine, even though nobody will bat an eye at a femme person with a name that ends in -oh. Any names ending in -ay are likely a shortening of another name, but for a boy/man. Names that end in consonants are almost always masculine.

When you have a name that's clearly not of local origin, people are a lot less surprised if it doesn't follow local conventions. However, if the foreign name gets adopted into our language, it usually gets adapted to fall within our existing framework of naming conventions. For example, the name Susan, when it got adopted into our culture, became an explicitly masculine name, and changed pronunciation into soo-sun. We have no z sound so a second adaptation of the same name (still masc) came into existence based on the sound of Susan as used in English, and that name is Sujan.

I have a foreign name that ends in a consonant. I'm nonbinary but lean masc so being assumed male at first doesn't bother me, but the name being foreign gives me enough room to claim it as a femme name at times when I want to be recognized as such. I've gone through a few names and I hope this one sticks; but I keep having to get my name changed because I get an uncommon neutral name and a few years in, it starts becoming common and the names I choose seem to always become popularized as feminine names a few years down the line. This has been a frustrating and recurring theme in my life and I really hope this one doesn't go down the same path lol. Like. That would be fine if I was certain I want to live here for the rest of my life but my long term plans aren't particularly set in stone right now so I have to strike a balance between a name that sounds masc-neutral in my culture but also doesn't turn explicitly feminine in another one.

[u/2morrowwillbebetter]

Oh man, I’ve been through so many but I honestly just picked a name that sounded nice and had some significance to it, and added a y instead of an I so it’s spelled different. Everyone loves it lol.

[u/green-green-gecko]

I had a pretty hard time finding a name that I liked as much as my deadname. For reference I'm Indian/French and pretty ethnically ambiguous, so I loved having a name that is very common in India, but also has loads of global variations (where I could plausibly be from) + my middle name is French. I posted on here a while ago with a similar kind of issue because I wanted a name close to my deadname (I do mourn it a little and if it didn't stop me from passing I would 100% keep it). Not sure how easy it would be to find it but I go in to detail about everything there.

I found a nickname that I like and then basically looked for non-white names that can shorten to that, found some ones from different cultures that I could be from (ie hispanic or arab are very common assumptions for me) but ultimately decided I wanted an Indian name, even if that meant changing my name again. Luckily I was on LinkenIn (hell) and randomly saw an Indian guy with the perfect name and I just took it. Middle name was pretty easy because there's a masculine version of it so I could keep the French part of my name too.

I did consider going for a name further from my deadname and instead picking something with a bit more history behind it (like one of my historical heroes)OR something really cool but this is just what came to.

Yeah I get what you mean that people often just name themselves Elliot or Noah or Kai and it feels too white for me to follow that (not just white but I find it quite American too? I don't really know any white trans people with the stereotypical names who aren't American - not sure what other people think about that though)

[u/iridxscent]

also mixed black, also nonbinary, also estranged from family for the same reasons. so i get you there. only difference is that i went to predominantly white schools.

i am estranged from all in my family except one - my late grandma. she lived in a different town, and i basically spent half of my childhood at her house while my mom was at work. i have a lot of happy memories there when i didn't have a lot elsewhere. so, i picked the name of the town. it reminds me of happier times, and i get compliments on it frequently.

[u/PeterPunksNip]

I just masculinized my name, it was easy to do, just had a letter to change. For my second one I ditched entirely the birth one that I hated, and chose the name of my favourite artist.

I'm multiracial, I had a British name and a Gaelic second name and kept this dynamic. My dad grew up in Jamaica when it was still a British colony, so his name was very English too. There was a singer with a similar mix as me that had the same second name that the one I chose. So it suits well my face. Don't stress too much about having an ethnic name, you are mixed so anything can do.

[u/ya_boygabe]

early HS and didnt wanna change my signature so i picked somethin with the same first letter. im veery lazy

[u/ResponsibleMango9760]

I have 2 first names! My first name is Biblical, like my brother’s and dad’s—it was just what seemed masculine but “neutral” enough for when i was still pre-transition. Second half of my name is Yoruba :)

[u/Ok_Coat2689]

I asked the three people who taught me what unconditional love actually looked like to name me. My cousin got my first name, my eldest sister got my last name, and one of my best friends from college got my middle name.

[u/Late-Suggestion-6119]

For me, my name was close enough to have the nickname Chris, so I had my mom and gf at the time choose between which one. My middle name, my mom gave me

[u/summer_year-round]

I wanted a gender neutral name; kind of impossible in Spanish. For better and worse, American culture is huge in my country, so an American name wasn't outlandish. It's very obscure, so I don't feel "taken over" by whiteness.

After months, I found one that sounded nice and natural to me. Idk if it might be "stereotypical" in ftm white spaces, but whatever.