Unisex baby names: Even splits of 2009

pink and blue bricks

Hundreds of unisex names were given to both baby boys and baby girls last year. But only 65 were split evenly between the two genders, according to SSA data.

NameBoysGirlsTotal
Michel5555110
Michal484896
Storm434386
Haydyn323264
Avry272754
Adi262652
Indiana262652
Kemani262652
Clarke222244
Riyan202040
Samar171734
Amori161632
Bradie131326
Carlisle121224
Oluwadamilola121224
Angell111122
Eaden111122
Maika111122
Nur111122
Chesley101020
Dacoda101020
Mattia101020

Fewer than 20 babies total: Agam, Aidynn, Amadi, Armahni, Arrington, Ecko, Elim, Elyah, Grae, Jarae, Jasyiah, Jiayi, Keighan, Kumari, Lakshya, Lanny, Lean, Mako, Marcelle, Money*, Nyel, Oluwanifemi, Oluwatomisin, Omega, Phynix, Psalm, Qamar, Rayen, Reyhan, Ryian, Santanna, Shadow, Shyler, Siah, Sinclair, Skiler, Starling, Stellar, Thanh, Ugonna, Windsor, Yali, Yareth

*I’m pleased that Money made the list. There may be a gender-based income gap in the U.S., but at least men and women are named Money in equal measure. That has to count for something, right?

Image by Erol Ahmed from Unsplash

9 thoughts on “Unisex baby names: Even splits of 2009

  1. I’m fascinated by Oluwadamilola. It’s pretty easy to figure out that it’s a Nigerian name… but just how many syllables does that name have? 7?

  2. Some of those names are huge, aren’t they? Here are a few more:

    Oluwadarasimi
    Oluwademilade
    Oluwatamilore
    Oluwatimilehin
    Oluwatimileyin
    Oluwatobiloba

    The “Oluwa” element in Yoruba names refers to God. Oluwadamilola means something like “God has blessed me with wealth.”

  3. Clarke? That surprises me. Is it about the America’s Next Top Model contestant?

    Most of the others – Avry, Bradie, Indiana – seem like fair game for boys or girls.

  4. Many of those are variant spellings of more common unisex names (e.g. Haydyn, Avry, Dacoda, etc.). The smaller the overall number, the more statistically likely there is to be a tie (e.g. there is unlikely to be an exact tie for a unisex name in the top 1,000, although the possiblity for one being very close is possible). A good comparison is with elections; when electing a class president in school a tie is a real possibility (with only 20-30 or so voters) while a tie for an election of a governor (for example) is very unlikely since the voting base for most states would be in the hundreds of thousands or even millions (although a candidate winning by less than 1 percent or so is realistically possible).

  5. @Abby – There were 17 female Clarkes in 2008, and 15 female Clarkes (and 7 female Clarks) in 2007. So it looks like, for the last few years anyway, baby girls have just been getting this name.

    ANTM has influenced the list before, but I think winners have the most impact. Naima, winner of Cycle 4, gave her name a boost. Same with winner of Cycle 8 Jaslene:

    2004: <5 Jaslenes
    2005: <5 Jaslenes
    2006: 5 Jaslenes
    2007: 500 Jaslenes (ranked 598th) - Cycle 8 aired Feb-May, 2007
    2008: 872 Jaslenes (376th)
    2009: 429 Jaslenes (670th)

    I'm sure non-winners have influenced the popularity of their names as well, but their influence was probably dependent upon how many episodes they were able to last.

  6. I actually know of a male Shyler. For some reason the Sh names on boys appeal to me, so I like it. Nice to see Indiana charting for guys, however given the popularity of Indiana Jones, one would expect it to be way more popular for boys.
    Chelsey however surprised me. Is the normal spelling Chelsea unisex then? Or are they different names?

  7. I was kind of happy to see Chelsey on the list, but when I compare it to the master list of boys names at Nameberry for 2009 they have CheSley and not CheLsey with 10 names. Chelsey does not appear on their list for boys.

    I guess this is a typo but I wonder whose list is correct?

  8. Going back to the raw data it does appear that there is a typo in the table here. It should be CheSley with an equal split of boys and girls and CheLsey is female only with 233 recordings.

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