A recent Vox article explores why so many US true crime shows include ‘American’ in their title. Our very own Laurel Sutton suggests its both an attempt to emphasise the distinctively American nature of the crimes under discussion, but also to draw on the deliberatly large audience for whom ‘American’ means different things.
You can read more on this story here.
“Hello, My Name Is:” (Photo by Travis Wise, CC-BY-2.0, via Wikimedia Commons)
Prof. I.M. Nick, a past ANS President and current Editor-In-Chief of Names: A Journal of Onomastics, appeared on the NPR program 1A from Washington, DC station WAMU last Wednesday. The show, titled “What’s in a Name”, asked two important questions about the personal names that we use: “what role do names play in society today? And how should we think about what we call each other going forward?” Listen to the full show, including Prof. Nick’s interview, online over at the1A.org.
Dr. Cleveland Evans writes about names for the Omaha World-Herald. In his March 9th column, he discusses the name “Lionel”.
Lionel Richie, born 1949, has been a judge on “American Idol” since 2018, which begins its 23rd season on March 9. Richie became famous singing with funk/soul group Commodores in the 1970s.
His duet of “Endless Love” with Diana Ross in 1980 is a top 20 bestselling single of all time. He’s sold more than 100 million records, and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2022.
Lionel’s a French diminutive of Leon, from Latin for “lion.” It became well known because of Sir Lionel, a cousin of Sir Lancelot introduced in anonymous Lancelot-Grail tales written in French in the 13th century. Lionel, a knight of the Round Table, was hero of a ballad in which he slays a huge wild boar.
King Edward III was a fan, role-playing the fictional Sir Lionel in Round Table tournaments. Edward’s second son Lionel, Duke of Clarence (1338-1368), was named after him.
Though never common, Lionel remained in regular use among English nobles. Lionel Sackville (1688-1765), created Duke of Dorset by George I in 1720, was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland 1730-1737 and 1750-1755.
Lionel Wafer (1640-1705) was a Welsh ship’s surgeon who lived with the Guna people of Panama in the 1680s, adopting their customs, including body paint and nose rings. His 1695 book about this adventure was popular across Europe.
“Lionel and Clarissa”, a 1748 comic opera by Isaac Bickerstaffe, in which Lionel and Clarissa overcome their fathers’ objections to their marriage, was popular for two centuries, with its repeated line “O what a night for love!” quoted by Willa Cather and others.
American author James Fenimore Cooper published novel “Lionel Lincoln” in 1825. There Lionel, a British major during the American Revolution, rejects his friends’ arguments and refuses to join the American cause, symbolizing Cooper’s view of corrupt English nobility.
The U.S. Census of 1850 found 111 Lionels, while Britain’s 1851 census included 590, when the two countries had similar size populations. Lionel’s lesser American use was linked to its “effete British aristocrat” image, reinforced by Cooper’s novel.
When Social Security’s yearly baby name lists begin in 1880, Lionel ranked 718th. It steadily rose, ranking 295th in 1934. It was probably helped by actor Lionel Barrymore (1878-1954), who won an Oscar for “A Free Soul” playing an alcoholic lawyer defending his daughter’s fiancé on a murder charge. Today, he’s remembered as Mr. Potter in “It’s A Wonderful Life” (1946).
Lionel, along with other names like Percy and Reginald with British upper-class images in America, appealed more to Black than White parents during the 20th century. Richie’s early career reinforced this, helping Lionel rise from 550th in 1979 to 387th in 1984.
Want to learn more? Read on to learn more about the name “Lionel”!
Date: 26-Nov-2025 – 29-Nov-2025
Location: Clarens, South Africa
Contact Person: Chrismi Loth
Meeting Email: kongresETFB@ufs.ac.za
Linguistic Field(s): Sociolinguistics
2nd Call for Papers:
Join our LinkedIn group: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/10047495/
Submit your abstract (250 words) by 4 April to kongresETFB@ufs.ac.za
The Department of South African Sign Language and Deaf Studies at the University of the Free State (RSA), in partnership with the Joint ICA/IGU Commission on Toponymy as well as the ICOS Working Group on Toponymy, is pleased to announce the next biennial international symposium on place names – ISPN 2025.
Place names serve a dual purpose. On the one hand, they are geospatial indicators of physical locations and geographical features. On the other hand, place names are artefacts of cultural heritage and serve to connect people to places. This two-fold function creates tension from a place-names management perspective. Standardisation is required for effective public communication and record-keeping. However, standardisation inherently requires a selection of one or limited forms of names. This is in contrast to the reality of most societies, whereby multiple names are assigned to one location by different socio-lingual-cultural groups. The challenge is to create an internationally-recognised standardisation system, while retaining the colourful local diversity. With the theme for this symposium, we wish to explore issues around standardisation and toponymic diversity. We need to consider the symbolic importance of place names, and examine the challenges of developing best practices for research and management that are sensitive to local diversity. Papers with a focus on minority and indigenous names, including sign languages, are encouraged in particular.
Potential subtopics
Only a limited number of papers can be accommodated, as all sessions will be plenary. Abstracts (250 words) can be submitted by 4 April 2025 to Dr Chrismi Loth at kongresETFB@ufs.ac.za in the following
(but not limited to) categories of research:
•Recognition beyond standardisation, especially for indigenous and minority place names.
• Best practices for the standardisation, management, and research of multiple place names.
• Diversity in place names stemming from multiple socio-lingual-cultural groups.
• Harmonising toponymic heritage in multicultural and multilingual societies.
• Adequate representation of place-name diversity in texts and on maps.
• Approaches towards standardisation.
• Other dimensions of place names: administrative, commercial and/or economic, cultural and historical/commemorative, physical, political, and linguistic.
Keynote speakers
• Prof Sambulo Ndlovu (University of Eswatini, Eswatini)
• Bill Watt (PlaceNames Australia)
Workshop
Signed Toponymy: Conducting Ethical Research in Deaf Communities
Presenter: Dr Patrick Sibanda (University of the Free State, RSA)
Language of the symposium and workshop
English, with professional South African Sign Language interpreting available. Please indicate requirement for SASL interpreting with abstract submission and registration.
Publication
Depending on the number and quality of papers an accredited publication in our regular proceedings series will be considered: https://ujonlinepress.uj.ac.za/index.php/ujp/catalog/series/ISPN.
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