In India, names are a marker of caste. To avoid such judgements, one man names his children entirely outside of the normal schema. Click here to read the story.

In an effort to unshackle itself from its history of human rights abuses, many states in the American South have begun to remove symbols that are commonly associated with slavery, segregation, and hatred. The most recent example was the momentous decision of the South Carolinian government to remove the Confederate flag from outside of the State House.

Hold-overs of the peculiar system are not only to be found south of the Mason-Dixon line. Behind the ivy-covered, brick walls of Yale University, debate has ignited over the university’s refusal to change the name a residential college named after John C. Calhoun, a 19th century valedictorian who was also an ardent defender of human slavery and a flaming white supremacist.

Yale’s naming controversy does not end there. To date more than 1000 signatures have been gathered on an online petition to rename Calhoun College. While supporters of the petition argue that removing the name is essential to creating a welcoming and respective campus environment, some critics warn that the removal of such symbols may inadvertently cover-up an ugly but important part of the university’s and the nation’s history.

For more information about the controversy, click here.

Iceland is not only world famous for its awe-inspiring volcanoes, majestic geysers, and haunting northern lights. Among linguists, it is also well-known for its energetic language preservation policies.

Like the legendary Académie française, which was designed to protect the French language against unwanted foreign influences, the Icelandic Language Council, or the Íslensk Málnefnd (IM), is dedicated to preserving the integrity and ensuring the longevity of the Icelandic spoken, written, and signed language. On the one hand, the work of this IM is credited with making sure that Icelandic remains the first language of the island nation’s ca. 300,000 inhabitants and is not de-throwned by powerful foreign languages like English. On the other hand, some observers worry that the country’s restrictive language policies may impede upon its citizens’ rights to express themselves.

In recent years, for example, the prohibitive language policies concerning the names which parents can select for their newborns has fallen under repeated attack. In a recent case, the Icelandic authorities refused to renew the passport of a 10 year girl named Harriet on the grounds that the English name was not on the official list of the Icelandic Naming Committee. The Committee’s hard line has not only been felt by parents who have tried to give their offspring foreign names. There are also numerous cases in which the Committee has prohibited Icelandic names that they considered contrary to Icelandic onomastic traditions (e.g. Blær ‘gentle, light breeze’).

According to politicians like Óttarr Proppé, MP for the liberal party aptly named Bright Future or Björt framtíð, enough is enough. In an article featured in the Iceland Monitor, Proppé and his supporters have introduced a formal bill calling for the abolition of Iceland’s Naming Committee. If the proposal wins, it will be interesting to see what affect the decision might have for other nations with similarly restrictive naming policies (e.g. Denmark, Germany, and France).

You can read the list of approved boys’ names and girls’ names.

All Nippon Airways (ANA), Japan’s largest airline carrier, just announced the arrival of a new, sleek, futuristic set of planes inspired by the legendary film series Star Wars. The first of the themed vessels, a Boeing 787-9 Dreamer was inspired by and named after the quirky blue-white-and-gray mini droid, R2-D2. The first of three planes to be produced in the ANA’s upcoming Star Wars series, the R2-D2 is scheduled to fly between Tokyo and Vancouver before expanding its flight route to include major cities in Australia, China, Europe, Indonesia, and the United States.

For more information see the following article from CNN, Tech Times, and Telegraph.

The Zimbabwe political landscape has always been characterized by political parties that frequently go on to spawn new parties.

In cases of party break-ups, the names of the political parties have also undergone commensurate changes. For example, borrowing from the original name of the political party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), several splinter groups affixed the abbreviation with the first letter of a place name. There was the MDC-T for a group centered in Tsvangirai and MDC-M for Mutambara.

A similar process now seems to have taken place with the name of the Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front (ZANU PF). After the former vice president of the party and country, Dr. Joyce Mujuru, and her sympathizers were fired from ZANU in 2015, they formed a rival ZANU PF. However, according to the organizers, the final two letters do not stand for the phrase ‘Patriotic Front’ but ‘People First’.

This onomastic spin seems to be catching on. For example, Zeb Shumba, a former Tsvangirai advisor, is currently organizing a new break-away party from the Tsvangirai party, the MDC-T. Inspired by the new PF name, Shumba plans to name new party ZimFirst.

One of the hardest tasks facing a fictional writer is finding appropriate names for characters. Before the advent of the personal computer and the internet, authors often resorted to running their fingers down tattered telephone books. Today, many modern authors on the lookout for the perfect characteronym hold online naming contests in which they invite the international net community to name their figures.

When these and other methods fail, some authors simply decide to leave their literary brainchildren completely nameless. Although this strategy may at first seem odd, there are in fact many excellent examples of works in which the main character remains stubbornly and utterly nameless. As classics like Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” and Philip Roth’s “Everyman” demonstrate, in the hands of a skillful writer, a figure’s namelessness may either encourage readers to identify with the main character’s experiences or create a sense of emotional distance.

This versatility may help to explain why nameless narration appears to be trending in the 2015 book market. As Sam Sacks, of The New Yorker, quips, this year we have seen a veritable “epidemic of namelessness”.

Basketball legend and billionaire, Michael Jordan, has just become quite a bit richer. A federal jury in Chicago decided that a supermarket chain in Chicago misappropriated the sports star’s name and number. Lawyers representing Jordan reportedly asked for $10 million from the retailer for the illegal usage of Jordan’s name. The attorneys for the retailer argued that, with all due respect, the sum requested to compensate for the one-time unauthorized use of the athlete’s name and number were beyond all common understanding of “fairness and common sense”.

According to a recent report in The Wall Street Journal, Federal Judge, Milton I. Shadur, the first judge to preside over the dispute before voluntarily removing himself from the case after Jordan’s team accused him of bias, reportedly agreed that the sum requested by Jordan’s legal team was “excessive”. However, after reviewing the facts of the case, the jurors decided that the now defunct retailer should pay the athlete $8.9 million for using his identity without his permission.

When asked for a reaction to the jury’s decision, according to the New York Daily News, the basketball Hall of Fame player answered: “This shows I will protect my name to the fullest […] It’s my name and I worked hard for it […] and I’m not just going to let someone take it.”

For more information see this article and this article.