DDIG: The Social Context of Naming Conventions and Practices

DDIG：命名约定和实践的社会背景

• 批准号: 0917693
• 负责人: Robert Kemper
• 金额: $ 1.5万
• 依托单位: Southern Methodist University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-09-01 至 2011-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0917693&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: DDIG; Social; Context; Naming; Conventions

Graduate student Jack C. Shoemaker (Southern Methodist University), under the supervision of Dr. Robert V. Kemper, will undertake research on the social contexts of naming practices. In many societies, names constitute a social commentary, and thus convey important information that otherwise would be invisible to social scientific analysis.The research will be carried out as a multi-generational study of the personal names that members of the Ma'di population of northern Uganda give their children. The Ma'di are a good site for the development of onomastic (naming) theory because of their particular naming practices. A high percentage of Ma'di children are named by their mothers, who live as perpetual outsiders in the clans of their husbands. A name often reflects the the mother's circumstances at the time the child was born. Shoemaker will gather and analyze the names of every person from a sample of 30 multi-generational extended families. he will employ systematic qualitative data gathering techniques such as pile sorts. He also will gather data on birth order, important events that occurred around the time they were born, who named the child, what the name meant, and what message the name was intended to communicate. Those who gave names will be asked to explain their choice of name. Since many names refer to death, the researcher will also conduct interviews with each woman to place each of her children in a reproductive history. To ascertain how well names communicate the messages encoded in them, the researcher will ask groups of Ma'di to state what meanings they attribute to a set of names, and will then compare the suggested meanings to any messages the name givers intended to communicate.This research is important because while names and naming practices are known to be significant in human societies and to vary cross-culturally, they have received little systematic attention. This research will help to fill that significant gap. The research also will contribute new information on the ethnography of the Ma'di people by highlighting issues that women consider significant. This will make possible better social policy addressing women's problems. The research also will contribute to the education of a social scientist.

研究生Jack C.Shoemaker(南卫理公会大学)将在Robert V.Kemper博士的指导下，对命名做法的社会背景进行研究。在许多社会，名字构成了一种社会评论，因此传达了社会科学分析看不到的重要信息。这项研究将作为一项跨代研究进行，研究对象是乌干达北部的马迪人给他们的孩子取的个人名字。由于其特殊的命名实践，马地是发展名词性(命名)理论的好地方。很高比例的Ma‘di孩子是由他们的母亲命名的，她们在丈夫的部族中作为永久的外来者生活。名字通常反映孩子出生时母亲的情况。Shoemaker将从30个多代大家庭的样本中收集并分析每个人的名字。他将采用系统的定性数据收集技术，如堆积分类。他还将收集有关出生顺序、出生前后发生的重要事件、谁给孩子取了名字、这个名字的含义以及这个名字旨在传达什么信息的数据。那些给出名字的人将被要求解释他们选择的名字。由于许多名字都与死亡有关，研究人员还将对每一位妇女进行采访，将她的每一个孩子放在生育史上。为了确定名字如何很好地传达编码在其中的信息，研究人员将要求马迪小组陈述他们赋予一组名字的含义，然后将建议的含义与取名者打算传达的任何信息进行比较。这项研究很重要，因为尽管姓名和命名做法在人类社会中具有重要意义，而且在跨文化上存在差异，但它们几乎没有得到系统的关注。这项研究将有助于填补这一重大空白。这项研究还将通过突出妇女认为重要的问题，为马迪人的人种学提供新的信息。这将使更好的解决妇女问题的社会政策成为可能。这项研究还将有助于社会科学家的教育。