Dances with Words

Honorific for someone really good with words. We are still investigating how a post about names ended up with this title.

In our quest to soak up recent popular culture we had missed because we were too busy, we are catching up on Bones, the US crime series that is less "bible belt porn" (CSI AnyWhereUSA) and more "neat stuff with integrated anthropology lessons".

An episode set in the UK triggered a discussion about names when one of our contributors chuckled about the name Portia. The "man, that sounds way too much like a German car" was followed by some bantering, including "this one was a fast woman, indeed" and eventually by some less stupid comments.

One of us pointed out the American "Judge John Minor Wisdom" courthouse, another brought up the name of a man called "Langbehn". That name originated in Northern Germany and means "long legs", and lo and behold the specimen referred to did have exceptionally long legs.

We did not want to rehash the Smiths and the Millers, those widespread profession based names, so we looked for some that said something about character. Please, not Fox again, groaned one.

How about Spitzer, then? asked another. Pencil sharpener in German. But wait, also colloquial German for "horny".
I would not give someone named Wuterich a gun, said the man with the dictionary, adding it means a raging man, someone easily enraged.

You cannot do this! we said. Even if a certain trait was used as the name, too much time has passed, too much genetic mingling has taken place. Some of these names were meant to be demeaning or ostracizing. They represent nothing but bullying still discernible today, several centuries after the fact.
But, yes, you can use them in a sitcom or in a dark, humorless art film.