Apostrophes in Baby Names for National Punctuation Day

In honor of National Punctuation Day, I thought I’d talk a bit about apostrophes.

In English, the apostrophe is commonly used to mark omissions and form possessives. In names, the apostrophe can be used…

  1. To indicate a glottal stop (Toa’ale, Hau’oli),
  2. When the origin of the name is a surname (O’Brien, D’Angelo), or
  3. For decoration (God’iss, Domi’nique).

The apostrophes in some names do mark omissions (i.e. Cam’ron instead of Cameron), but I consider these apostrophes more decorative than anything else.

Am I missing any other big reason an apostrophe might be used in a name?

Posted in Baby Names

One Comment

  1. Posted 24 September 2008 at 8:15 am | Permalink

    #3 isn’t really something I would advocate.

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