¡Salud y Saludos!

I recently had a conversation with a colleague of mine who was surprised to hear about the different ‘name’ structures used in the Hispanic culture. Not only do names in most Latin American cultures include both last names--the father and the mother’s, and in that order; or in the case of married women, the husband’s and her father’s last name--but there are also certain twists that we do to the first name.

Now this isn’t entirely unlike the Anglo culture. We here in the States often change names; sometimes in the most mind-boggling ways: Richard becomes Dick, John often becomes Jack, Margaret can become Peggy, James turns into Jim, etc. Well, Spanish also has some of that, as well. Ever heard the popular Spanish “Pepito” jokes? Well, Pepito is a diminutive of Pepe. You see, diminutives are also quite common in the Hispanic culture--something it shares with the Russian culture, among others, which modifies just about every name. With Latinos, Miriam (my mother and sister’s name) becomes Mirita. Jesus becomes Jesusito, and so on. But the core name, itself, may be substantially transformed. Take Jose--one of the most common Hispanic names out there. Well, the nickname for Jose is in fact ‘Pepe.’ I can’t begin to tell you how Jose turned into ‘Pepe.’ Others are a bit easier to understand: Marcela, for example, can turn to Chela. Other name changes often resemble Anglo modifications: Antonio is often Tony; Francisco shortens to Frank; Enrique can be tightened to Ricky. But others are still strange-sounding...even to me: You have the nickname Mena or Kiko, which happens to be a nickname for my father--whose real name is Julio.

The opposite, however, is also true. Often, names are actually longer than Americans may be used to. I’m not just talking about having two last names and possibly one or more middle names. I’m talking about the first name itself. It’s often a combination of two, three, or even more names. We all are probably familiar with Cuban salsa singer Celia Cruz. Well, Celia was actually born Celia de la Caridad Cruz Alfonso. Singer Julio Iglesias, father of Enrique Iglesias, is actually named Julio José Iglesias de la Cueva. So you get the idea. Luckily, most names are shortened a good bit to something a little more easy to remember.

But the fact still stands that there are countless ways of transforming proper names in Spanish that may prove a bit difficult for those not accustomed to such a style of naming.

Things could be much more foreign, however. In Iceland, the name that actually counts is not your last name, but your first. That’s because everyone’s last name is simply their father’s first name with the suffix son or dottir attached to it (Eric the Red’s son is Leif Ericson). This makes for some interesting situations--such as the fact that Icelandic phone books simply list people using their first name. A family of four might have four different last names: the married couple Jón Stefánsson and Bryndís Atladóttir, and their children Fjalar (Jónsson) and Kata (Jónsdóttir). This also means that names do not necessarily reflect the marital status.

While there is often confusion in the use of multiple last names in Hispanic families, it is a good rule of thumb to assume the first last name is generally equivalent to the primary last name in the U.S.

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Last Modified: October 31, 2005