How popular is the baby name Senga in the United States right now? How popular was it historically? Use the popularity graph and data table below to find out! Plus, see all the blog posts that mention the name Senga.

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Popularity of the baby name Senga


Posts that mention the name Senga

Popular baby names in Italy, 2015

Flag of Italy
Flag of Italy

A few weeks ago, Italy finally released baby name rankings for 2015. According to the data from Istat (Istituto nazionale di statistica), the most popular baby names in the country last year were Sofia and Francesco.

Here are Italy’s top 10 girl names and top 10 boy names of 2015:

Girl NamesBoy Names
1. Sofia, 7,191 baby girls
2. Aurora, 6,687
3. Giulia, 6,222
4. Giorgia, 4,099
5. Alice, 3,845
6. Martina, 3,743
7. Emma, 3,690
8. Greta, 3,676
9. Chiara, 3,516
10. Anna, 3,322		1. Francesco, 8,763 baby boys
2. Alessandro, 6,708
3. Mattia, 6,402
4. Lorenzo, 6,389
5. Leonardo, 6,144
6. Andrea, 6,047
7. Gabriele, 5,469
8. Matteo, 4,941
9. Tommaso, 4,386
10. Riccardo, 4,351

In the girls’ top 10, Anna replaced Sara, and Alice jumped from 10th to 5th.

The boys’ top 10 is essentially the same, the biggest move being Mattia rising from 6th to 3rd.

Francesco has been on top since 2001, but it became even more popular in 2013 after Pope Francis was elected.

Here are a few more names from within the top 50:

  • Girl names: Ginevra (12th), Gaia (13th), Ludovica (32nd), Ilaria (46th)
  • Boy names: Nicolò (22nd), Simone (24th), Gioele (37th), Nicola (46th)

Nicolò is pronounced nee-ko-LO, whereas Nicola is pronounced nee-KO-lah. The feminine versions of the name are Nicoletta and Nicolina.

Finally, here are the top baby names among foreigners (mainly from Romania, Morocco, Albania and China) living in Italy:

Girl NamesBoy Names
1. Sara
2. Sofia
3. Aurora		1. Adam
2. Youssef
3. Rayan

Intriguingly, Kevin was ranked 8th for boys and 1st (!) among both the Albanians and the Chinese. I mentioned Kevinism in last week’s Senga post and already it’s coming to mind again…

Sources: How many babies are named…? – Istat, These are the most popular Italian baby names, Births and fertility among the resident population: Year 2015 (PDF)

Image: Adapted from Flag of Italy (public domain)

Scotland’s “Senga syndrome”

Leslie Hills worked as a teacher in Scotland for several decades starting in the 1960s. Writing about her experiences in the 1990s, she mentioned Senga Syndrome:

Years later I heard my experience summed up by a very senior official in Lothian Region. The Senga Syndrome he called it and when pressed for an explanation by his male east-coast audience, explained that Senga, a name found only among the working classes in the West, was Agnes backwards and Senga was the typical Glasgow working class girl from a state school, who goes to Glasgow University, does an Ordinary degree, goes to Jordanhill College and returns, if she has ever left, to live near and teach in her old school or very close to it. Unfortunately this cruel description was largely accurate.

Senga Syndrome reminds me of Germany’s Kevinismus and of Sweden’s y-name syndrome. In all three cases, a certain name or type of name emerged to symbolize (in a derogatory way) a particular group or class.

Senga, FWIW, might be Agnes backwards, or it might be based on the Scottish Gaelic word seang, meaning “slender, lanky.”

Sources:

  • Hills, Leslie. “The Senga Syndrome: Reflections on Twenty-One Years in Scottish Education.” Identity and Diversity: Gender and the Experience of Education, edited by Maud Blair, Janet Holland, and Sue Sheldon, The Open University, 1995, 51-60.
  • Senga – Behind the Name