What's in a name?

From the records of the Social Security Administration, the popularity of names for US born babies, by year. Only Michael survives in the top 5. (It's probably my favorite boy's name, too).
Boys' names seem more conservative. David and James survived 30 years. In 2008, top five are all Biblical names. Interesting. Sounds like a group of Massachusetts Puritans!

For girls, no crossovers, more change. Look at #4 in 2008. Madison?

1950
James	Linda
Robert	Mary
John	Patricia
Michael	Barbara
David	Susan
1980
Michael	Jennifer
Christopher	Amanda
Jason	Jessica
David	Melissa
James	Sarah
2008
Jacob	Emma
Michael	Isabella
Ethan	Emily
Joshua	Madison
Daniel	Ava

I was just provoked on Facebook by an entry about names. The trends noted here just sound to me like an increase in attempts at elegance or pretentiousness. Totally subjective reading.

Two American groups seem to have had some issues about names. The white middle class hippie trend of naming kids things like Autumn, River, Apple, Moon Unit or other such silliness seems to have played itself out for the most part. But the black fashion of creating names that sound faux French, or faux African or Arabic still apparently continues. Both of these behaviors strike me as embarassing pretenses which wind up giving human children labels better suited to a new line of automobiles or a rock group. Read 'em and weep.

And if you want a good laugh:

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