As a parent, it’s a wonderful thing to watch your friends have kids. As a name and word enthusiast, it’s a fascinating thing to watch your friends make decisions about their kids’ names. First names are interesting enough—there’s more than I could say here about that. (It’s another post.) Last names hold their interest, too. … Continue reading On what last names tell us
Tag: names
On the star names of the Big Dipper
Until the other night, I'd given hardly any thought at all to the names of the stars, aside from the very brightest or most prominent. Polaris, Vega, Arcturus. The names of the constellations, though, was a different matter. On dark nights with my wits about me, I could easily locate Orion or the Big Dipper. … Continue reading On the star names of the Big Dipper
On the resistance in the A/E/C industry to new brand names
It’s not just the A/E/C industry—it’s most professional services companies. Designers, engineers, accountants, advertising professionals, creatives, lawyers—they all love to name their companies after themselves. There’s ego in this, of course. What better than naming a company after yourself? But there’s also an obvious business development case. As a small firm, it makes sense to … Continue reading On the resistance in the A/E/C industry to new brand names
On the rules of scientific naming
After looking up so many trees and plants last week, I was struck with a question: What’s up with scientific names? Binomial nomenclature, or Latin naming, as it’s widely known, is the naming convention that provides each species with two names. (Bi as in “two,” nomial as in “name.”) In the example Homo sapiens, Homo … Continue reading On the rules of scientific naming
On the story of your name icebreaker
One of my favorite library finds of last year was Creative Acts for Curious People—a Stanford d.school publication that compiled dozens of icebreakers, group activities, and creative exercises. The icebreakers were more than the typical single question variety. My favorite one in the book is “Story of Your Name.” Find someone in the room you … Continue reading On the story of your name icebreaker
On making good use of your name
When I was growing up, my mom taught me how to answer the phone: Hello. This is the Coe household. Who am I speaking to? (If you were good at this, you could say the above as if a single word—HellothisistheCoehouseholdwhoamIspeakingto?—prompting callers to either say "Excuse me?" or ignore you altogether—"Is your mother there?") There … Continue reading On making good use of your name
Taylor Coe 