The American Language: A Preliminary Inquiry into the Development of English in the United StatesMencken, H. L. (Henry Louis)
General
The American Language: A Preliminary Inquiry into the Development of English in the United States
Mencken, H. L. (Henry Louis)
Americanisms; English language; Names -- United States; Names, Personal -- United States
Among the immigrants of other stocks some extraordinarily radical
changes in name are to be observed. Greek names of five, and even
eight syllables shrink to /Smith/; Hungarian names that seem to be all
consonants are reborn in such euphonious forms as /Martin/ and /Lacy/.
I have encountered a /Gregory/ who was born /Grgurevich/ in Serbia; a
/Uhler/ who was born /Uhlyarik/; a /Graves/ who descends from the fine
old Dutch family of /'sGravenhage/. I once knew a man named /Lawton/
whose grandfather had been a /Lautenberger/. First he shed the
/berger/ and then he changed the spelling of /Lauten/ to make it fit
the inevitable American mispronunciation. There is, again, a family of
/Dicks/ in the South whose ancestor was a /Schwettendieck/--apparently
a Dutch or Low German name. There is, yet again, a celebrated American
artist, of the Bohemian patronymic of /Hrubka/, who has abandoned it
for a surname which is common to all the Teutonic languages, and is
hence easy for Americans. The Italians, probably because of the
relations established by the Catholic church, often take Irish names,
as they marry Irish girls; it is common to hear of an Italian pugilist
or politician named /Kelly/ or /O'Brien/. The process of change is
often informal, but even legally it is quite facile. The
Naturalization Act of June 29, 1906, authorizes the court, as a part
of the naturalization of any alien, to make an order changing his
name. This is frequently done when he receives his last papers;
sometimes, if the newspapers are to be believed, without his
solicitation, and even against his protest. If the matter is
overlooked at the time, he may change his name later on, like any
other citizen, by simple application to a court of record.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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