Why the trend towards Anglo names with prefixes among African-Americans?

Question

As a black man I am absolutely baffled at the popularity of taking a name of common Anglo heritage and adding a prefix to it. This seems to be part of several overall trends among African-American names (the other trend appears to be simply misspelling names completely). I have seen LaDonna, LaMichael, DeShawn. . . there are hosts of other examples.

While I have no objection to naming your children whatever you want (they can always change their names when they get old enough, if they want) I am wondering WHY this has become a popular method of "blackening" a name. The closest I can come up with is a desire to evoke a connection Louisana's rich black culture by making names sound French (le-, la-, de-, des-). I am unable to find any real grounds for this belief, so I am hoping someone who might have some understanding of this phenomena can explain it and show a clear connection.

Answer 1

Why the trends for ANY names for ANY people? It's just that: a trend. There is rarely any real reason for it. Someone somewhere thought it sounded nice, and it caught on. I don't think it is much deeper than that, personally. Then, after the fact, people try applying meaning to it for justification.

Answer 2

~The "le-la-de-des" trend isn't just among blacks. I worked in a pediatric office and you wouldn't believe some of the names (and spellings) that some parents would stick on their kids. When I would ask them how they decided on the name, 9 times out of 10, they would respond that they "wanted something different".

Here are a couple of first names that I ran into that made me just shake my head in amazement:

LaBaron
Fonzarelli
Des Sirree
Zion (supposedly named after a "mountain god")
DeBra (fortunately, the parents called her "Debbie")
LaBelle
DeShawna
Des Mann

and my all time favorite:

Dil Lynn (the mother wanted to name him "Dillon" but said she didn't know how to spell it)

And these poor kids have to live with these names!

Answer 3

well forget that, what I want to know is why to mmany african americans have English last name and not african last names?? I did look up my last name, in one source it's not traced back to europe, but in another source it said that i was, but my last name is also comon in the caribbean and even in africa too. but it sounds very english ??
and to asnwer your uestion i've never seen it that way.. as a way to blacken names but it seems to give it more flava but i hae no idea why. i know people that are white but with balck names too like leneesa (sp), latasha, and some others i cant think of right now.

Answer 4

This is not a NEW "trend". I do not know what to say about you just now noticing names like that.

I doubt it was any of these parents intent to "blacken" a name. I bet they liked the sound of it.

Answer 5

Thier called American names.I hope you arent suggesting they take African names (which are really arab names)...African Americans are 20% anglo-saxton anyway which is why they have the English names in the first place..

Answer 6

I have 3or 4 white friends named Ladonna, LaJauna. shaynayna, shaniece... dont know what to say , All these people is basically 30 yrs old or older

Answer 7

i don't have a issue with the two. Calling me an African-American is positive with me through fact i'm of African descent (no remember how a techniques decrease back my final ancestor from Africa became, i'm nonetheless an African). certainly, a white guy or woman can call himself Irish-American or English-American if he needs, no remember if he's been to that usa or his ancestors settled in u.s. centuries in the past or not (He does not say he's British-American through fact Britain is eire, England, Wales and Scotland as an entire or you may call it the united kingdom). yet I see not something incorrect with asserting you're African-American and there is not something puzzling approximately it. It does not sound like "you're an American yet not vulnerable to me" through fact the term became coined with the help of black guy or woman to grant different black human beings a feeling of delight in Africa and those comparable human beings fought for racially equality for black human beings and different races as nicely. i don't evaluate it incorrect through fact a guy or woman could be talked approximately as Asian-American or interior sight-American (And all of us be responsive to the interior sight-individuals are American they have been right here longer than all persons. that is their usa). i don't see something incorrect with representing your historical past and neither do those communities. They by no skill say they are yellow or purple while telling human beings their race:that is basically strange. Why do black human beings war with plenty? i does not prefer to be basically be responsive to as black through fact technically my pores and skin is brown. (that is strange how I wrote this and moved slightly faraway from the term black). i've got continuously like the term African American through fact it made me sense like each and every person else, while i became a new child, like I had a historical past and it wasn't basically defined with the help of pores and skin. I felt like the Asian little ones and the Russian little ones (I went to a school that celebrated many distinctive cultures), being African-American made me pleased with Africa and that i wanted to check greater approximately it. i does not prefer to be be responsive to as basically white the two because you need to be pleased with your historical past too and in case you be responsive to it, i might quite say "i'm Irish-American or Portuguese-American" as a exchange of "i'm White". that is glaring that they are white and that i don't discover basically white or basically black thrilling in any respect.

Answer 8

Baby you know that La is French. lol