The American Language
under everyday observation. /Pfund/ becomes /Pound/; /Becker/,
/Baker/; /Schumacher/, /Shoemaker/; /König/, /King/; /Weisberg/,
/Whitehill/; /Koch/, /Cook/;[19] /Neuman/, /Newman/; /Schaefer/,
/Shepherd/ or /Sheppard/; /Gutmann/, /Goodman/; /Goldschmidt/,
/Goldsmith/; /Edelstein/, /Noblestone/; /Steiner/, /Stoner/;
/Meister/, /Master(s)/; /Schwartz/, /Black/; /Weiss/, /White/;
/Weber/, /Weaver/; /Bucher/, /Booker/; /Vogelgesang/, /Birdsong/;
/Sontag/, /Sunday/, and so on. Partial translations are also
encountered, /e. g./, /Studebaker/ from /Studebecker/, and
/Reindollar/ from /Rheinthaler/. By the same process, among the newer
immigrants, the Polish /Wilkiewicz/ becomes /Wilson/, the Bohemian
/Bohumil/ becomes /Godfrey/, and the Bohemian /Kovár/ and the Russian
/Kuznetzov/ become /Smith/. Some curious examples are occasionally
encountered. Thus Henry /Woodhouse/, a gentleman prominent in
aeronautical affairs, came to the United States from Italy as Mario
Terenzio Enrico /Casalegno/; his new surname is simply a translation
of his old one. And the /Belmonts/, the bankers, unable to find a
euphonious English equivalent for their German-Jewish patronymic of
/Schönberg/, chose a French one that Americans could pronounce.
In part, as I say, these changes in surname are enforced by the sheer
inability of Americans to pronounce certain Continental consonants,
and their disinclination to remember the Continental vowel sounds.
Many an immigrant, finding his name constantly mispronounced, changes
its vowels or drops some of its consonants; many another shortens it,
or translates it, or changes it entirely for the same reason. Just as
a well-known Graeco-French poet changed his Greek name of
/Papadiamantopoulos/ to /Moréas/ because /Papadiamantopoulos/ was too
much for Frenchmen, and as an eminent Polish-English novelist [Pg278]
changed his Polish name of /Korzeniowski/ to /Conrad/ because few
Englishmen could pronounce /owski/ correctly, so the Italian or Greek
or Slav immigrant, coming up for naturalization, very often sheds his
family name with his old allegiance, and emerges as /Taylor/,
/Jackson/ or /Wilson/. I once encountered a firm of Polish Jews,
showing the name of /Robinson & Jones/ on its sign-board, whose
partners were born /Rubinowitz/ and /Jonas/. I lately heard of a
German named /Knoche/--a name doubly difficult to Americans, what with
the /kn/ and the /ch/--who changed it boldly to /Knox/ to avoid being
called /Nokky/. A Greek named /Zoyiopoulous/, /Kolokotronis/,
/Mavrokerdatos/ or /Constantinopolous/ would find it practically
impossible to carry on amicable business with Americans; his name
would arouse their mirth, if not their downright ire. And the same
burden would lie upon a Hungarian named /Beniczkyné/ or /Gyalui/, or
/Szilagyi/, or /Vezercsillagok/. Or a Finn named /Kyyhkysen/, or
/Jääskelainen/, or /Tuulensuu/, or /Uotinen/,--all honorable Finnish
patronymics. Or a Swede named /Sjogren/, or /Schjtt/, or
/Leijonhufvud/. Or a Bohemian named /Srb/, or /Hrubka/. Or, for that
matter, a German named /Kannengiesser/, or /Schnapaupf/, or
/Pfannenbecker/.
But more important than this purely linguistic hostility, there is a
deeper social enmity, and it urges the immigrant to change his name
with even greater force. For a hundred years past all the heaviest and
most degrading labor of the United States has been done by successive
armies of foreigners, and so a concept of inferiority has come to be
attached to mere foreignness. In addition, these newcomers, pressing
upward steadily in the manner already described, have offered the
native a formidable, and considering their lower standards of living,
what has appeared to him to be an unfair competition on his own plane,
and as a result a hatred born of disastrous rivalry has been added to
his disdain. Our unmatchable vocabulary of derisive names for
foreigners reveals the national attitude. The French /boche/, the
German /hunyadi/ (for Hungarian),[20] and the old English /froggy/
(for Frenchman) seem lone and feeble beside our great repertoire:
[Pg279] /dago/, /wop/, /guinea/, /kike/, /goose/, /mick/, /harp/,[21]
/bohick/, /bohunk/, /square-head/, /greaser/, /canuck/,
/spiggoty/,[22] /chink/, /polack/, /dutchie/, /scowegian/, /hunkie/
and /yellow-belly/. This disdain tends to pursue an immigrant with
extraordinary rancor when he bears a name that is unmistakably foreign
and hence difficult to the native, and open to his crude burlesque.
Moreover, the general feeling penetrates the man himself, particularly
if he be ignorant, and he comes to believe that his name is not only a
handicap, but also intrinsically discreditable--that it wars subtly
upon his worth and integrity.[23] This feeling, perhaps, accounted for
a good many changes of surnames among Germans upon the entrance of the
United States into the war. But in the majority of cases, of course,
the changes so copiously reported--/e. g./, from /Bielefelder/ to
/Benson/, and from /Pulvermacher/ to /Pullman/--were merely efforts at
protective coloration. The immigrant, in a time of extraordinary
suspicion and difficulty, tried to get rid of at least one
handicap.[24] [Pg280]
This motive constantly appears among the Jews, who face an
anti-Semitism that is imperfectly concealed and may be expected to
grow stronger hereafter. Once they have lost the faith of their
fathers, a phenomenon almost inevitable in the first native-born
generation, they shrink from all the disadvantages that go with
Jewishness, and seek to conceal their origin, or, at all events, to
avoid making it unnecessarily noticeable.[25] To this end they modify
the spelling of the more familiar Jewish surnames, turning /Levy/ into
/Lewy/, /Lewyt/, /Levitt/, /Levin/, /Levine/, /Levey/, /Levie/[26] and
even /Lever/, /Cohen/ into /Cohn/, /Cahn/, /Kahn/, /Kann/, /Coyne/ and
/Conn/, /Aarons/ into /Arens/ and /Ahrens/ and /Solomon/ into
/Salmon/, /Salomon/ and /Solmson/. In the same way they shorten their
long names, changing /Wolfsheimer/ to /Wolf/, /Goldschmidt/ to /Gold/,
and /Rosenblatt/, /Rosenthal/, /Rosenbaum/, /Rosenau/, /Rosenberg/,
/Rosenbusch/, /Rosenblum/, /Rosenstein/, /Rosenheim/ and /Rosenfeldt/
to /Rose/. Like the Germans, they also seek refuge in translations
more or less literal. Thus, on the East Side of New York, /Blumenthal/
is often changed to /Bloomingdale/, /Schneider/ to /Taylor/,
/Reichman/ to /Richman/, and /Schlachtfeld/ to /Warfield/. /Fiddler/,
a common Jewish name, becomes /Harper/; so does /Pikler/, which is
Yiddish for /drummer/. /Stolar/, which is a Yiddish word borrowed from
the Russian, signifying /carpenter/, is often changed to /Carpenter/.
/Lichtman/ and /Lichtenstein/ become /Chandler/. /Meilach/, which is
Hebrew for /king/, becomes /King/, and so does /Meilachson/. The
strong tendency to seek English-sounding equivalents for names of
noticeably foreign origin changes /Sher/ into /Sherman/, /Michel/ into
/Mitchell/, /Rogowsky/ into /Rogers/, /Kolinsky/ into /Collins/,
/Rabinovitch/ into /Robbins/, /Davidovitch/ into /Davis/, /Moiseyev/
into /Macy/ or /Mason/, and /Jacobson/, /Jacobovitch/ and /Jacobovsky/
into /Jackson/. This last [Pg281] change proceeds by way of a
transient change to /Jake/ or /Jack/ as a nickname. /Jacob/ is always
abbreviated to one or the other on the East Side. /Yankelevitch/ also
becomes /Jackson/, for /Yankel/ is Yiddish for /Jacob/.[27]
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.
Among names of Anglo-Saxon origin and names naturalized long before
the earliest colonization, one notes certain American peculiarities,
setting off the nomenclature of the United States [Pg282] from that
of the mother country. The relative infrequency of hyphenated names in
America is familiar; when they appear at all it is almost always in
response to direct English influences.[28] Again, a number of English
family names have undergone modification in the New World. /Venable/
may serve as a specimen. The form in England is almost invariably
/Venables/, but in America the final /s/ has been lost, and every
example of the name that I have been able to find in the leading
American reference-books is without it. And where spellings have
remained unchanged, pronunciations have been frequently modified. This
is particularly noticeable in the South. /Callowhill/, down there, is
commonly pronounced /Carrol/; /Crenshawe/ is /Granger/; /Hawthorne/,
/Horton/; /Heyward/, /Howard/; /Norsworthy/, /Nazary/; /Ironmonger/,
/Munger/; /Farinholt/, /Fernall/; /Camp/, /Kemp/; /Buchanan/,
/Bohannan/; /Drewry/, /Droit/; /Enroughty/, /Darby/; and /Taliaferro/,
/Tolliver/.[29] The English /Crowninshields/ pronounce every syllable
of their name; the American /Crowninshields/ commonly make it
/Crunshel/. /Van Schaick/, an old New York name, is pronounced /Von
Scoik/. A good many American Jews, aiming at a somewhat laborious
refinement, change the pronunciation of the terminal /stein/ in their
names so that it rhymes, not with /line/, but with /bean/. Thus, in
fashionable Jewish circles, there are no longer any /Epsteins/,
/Goldsteins/ and /Hammersteins/ but only /Epsteens/, /Goldsteens/ and
/Hammersteens/. The American Jews differ further from the English in
pronouncing /Levy/ to make the first syllable rhyme with /tea/; the
English Jews always make the name /Lev-vy/. To match such [Pg283]
American prodigies as /Darby/ for /Enroughty/, the English themselves
have /Hools/ for /Howells/, /Sillinger/ for /St. Leger/, /Sinjin/ for
/St. John/, /Pool/ for /Powell/, /Weems/ for /Wemyss/, /Kerduggen/ for
/Cadogen/, /Mobrer/ for /Marlborough/, /Key/ for /Cains/, /Marchbanks/
for /Marjoribanks/, /Beecham/ for /Beauchamp/, /Chumley/ for
/Cholmondeley/, /Trosley/ for /Trotterscliffe/, and /Darby/ for
/Derby/, not to mention /Maudlin/ for /Magdalen/.
§ 2
/Given Names/--The non-Anglo Saxon American's willingness to anglicize
his patronymic is far exceeded by his eagerness to give "American"
baptismal names to his children. The favorite given names of the old
country almost disappear in the first native-born generation. The