I began noticing at least 30 years ago that lots of performers esp. from the NYC area, in touring shows playing other parts of the country, would list their names in the show's program as obviously made-up things like "Ms. Heaven" or other more normal names but featuring "distinctive" spellings like "Constanz","Bettye", or "Trudee". There were so many of them, and they were so various, I knew it was a trend.
But this was before all the "-eishas" and "-niqua"s". Looking at some of the names cited in this article you just KNOW these are not African names===they have about as much to do with African culture as Kwanzaa does with American Black culture. But look all the apostrophes and
"q"s that appear in the names and they can't help but remind you of the names we've been deluged with for the last 5 years----ARAB names, MUSLIM names. But not quite all the way there, more like halfway there. I'[m not suggesting they are Muslim, or are sympathetic, just that some partly subconscious process may be going on in the selection of these names. There are enough American blacks who have already taken on real Islamic names---blacks have been casting about for a non-American, non-assimilable identity for decades, and the reasons are not hard to see.
But gone are the days , just to complete the circle, of a mother naming a boy Cassius Marcellusv , and NOT having him change it 20 some years later to Muhammad Ali.
"But gone are the days , just to complete the circle, of a mother naming a boy Cassius Marcellusv , and NOT having him change it 20 some years later to Muhammad Ali."
Cassius Clay has to be the greatest name for a boxer, ever.
As my friend once pointed out, all of the great black atheletes who took Muslims names already had great names. I'm not sure what the moral to that story is, but it is still true.