A couple of days ago, the New York Post printed this quote from actress Charlize Theron (pronounced shar-LEES THER-un):
There’s a baby-naming boon in my native South Africa. Parents giving their infants my name. I grew up on a farm outside Benoni, where large numbers of local girls, one out of every three, are now called Charlize.
It’s quite a claim. One out of three?
In the United States, the name Charlize debuted in the data in 1998 — following the release of The Devil’s Advocate (1997) — and saw peak usage in the mid-2000s.
But I can’t find any data to back up the claim about Benoni, which, it should be noted, is not a tiny place — it’s a city of 160,000 residents.
Here’s how one South African writer reacted:
Speaking of self-absorption… our very own Charlize Theron is not in the least shy of self-promotion. She’s just been gushing over how South Africans love her so much that we’re all naming our daughters Charlize. […] Yes, really, more than 30% of all girls in Benoni are named Charlize.
Has anyone seen any evidence of babies in the Benoni area being named Charlize after the actress?
Sources:
- Adams, Cindy. “Call him Chicken McBuffett.” New York Post 5 May 2011.
- Bitch & Famous, May 6 – iafrica.com
- Benoni, South Africa – Wikipedia
Image: Adapted from Charlize Theron by Gage Skidmore under CC BY-SA 2.0.
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