Why black parents give their kids African names

Jet, June 21, 1993

Names like Aminah, Rashida, Jelani and Kwame are popping up in hospital nurseries, playgrounds and classes across the nation. While they used to sound odd and out of place, these lyrical names with their roots in Africa have gained widespread acceptance with Blacks in the U.S.

But, why are Black parents in America giving their children African names? To understand that you have to look back to the late 1950s and early '60s. Many believe the trend began in 1957 as the international spotlight focused on Ghana when it was liberated from Great Britain. Kwame Nkrumah led the independent West African nation from 1960 to 1966 and many Blacks in the U.S. named their sons after the African head of state.

About 40 to 50 other African nations gained independence afterwards, including Kenya, whose first president was Jomo Kenyatta. He served from the time the East African nation became a republic in 1964 until his death in 1978. During that time, Kenya became a fashionable name for American-born Black girls, and Kenyatta was popular among Black boys.

The broadcast of the television mini-series "Roots," which broke all audience-viewing records in 1977 when it was aired, was also responsible for the explosion of African names in the U.S., experts agree. Thanks to the late Alex Haley, who traced his ancestral tree to come up with the Pulitzer Prize-winning book of the same name, many youngsters from that era were named Kinte, the surname of the hero in the book.

Many Black Americans who looked to the motherland for meaningful monikers for their offspring found an index of names for males and females in Names From Africa, a Johnson Publishing Company book written by Ogonna Chuks-orji and edited by Keith E. Baird. The book, published 21 years ago, continues to be one of the company's best selling issues year after year.

A native of Nigeria, Chuks-orji said, "The giving of names is of great importance in Africa. People are named after events, happenings, great things, the days of the week or the order in which they were born." Chuks-orji said he wrote the book "as a result of numerous inquiries for African names from many people in all walks of life who were interested in using them for themselves, their children and their friends."

He pointed out, "The book has been written for people of all ages. Parents will use the book to find names for their children but any individual of any age can take an African name to substitute for or add to his given name."

The beauty of African names is that they say so much about the individual and his or her connection to the community, Baird said. Since the birth of a child is a joyous occasion, "the child is very often given a name which precisely refers to the family's happiness in welcoming the newcomer," Baird explained.

"Thus the Nyakyusa people of Tanzania might name a baby girl Sekelaga ("Rejoice") or Tusajigwe ("We are blessed"). The Swahili-speaking people of the same country might make a similar if somewhat less expansive communication by naming a new baby boy Sudi ("Luck"), he added. "In the same way, the Akan people of Ghana will name the new arrival, if it is male, Nyamekye ("Gift of God"...)," he noted.

Other African names which may vary in spelling but have become commonplace in Black neighborhoods across the country include Aina (ah-ee-NAH), Jamilah (jah-MEE-lah), Khadija (kah-DEE-jah) and Shani (SHA-NEE) for females and Hasani (HAH-sah-nee), Jabari (jah-BAH-ree), Kofi (kof-FEE), Quaashie (kwah-SHEE) and Sulaiman (soo-lah-ee-MAHN) for males.

The trend of choosing African names is also far-reaching in Black celebrity circles. Superstar Stevie Wonder immortalized daughter, Aisha, in his hit tune Isn't She Lovely ("Life is Aisha, the meaning of her name.") Also in the music industry, the popular Motown group, The Boyz, are brothers Hakeem, Bilal, Tajh and Khiry. Songbird Gladys Knight has a daughter named Kenya and a son, Shanga. Lateefah, which means "gentle" or "pleasant" was a name adopted by rap star Queen Latifah.

Actor Danny Glover of Lethal Weapon movie fame and his wife Asake Bomani named their daughter Mandisa while actor and former star of the Broadway play Dreamgirls Obba Babatunde's name comes from Nigeria where "oba" means king and "babatunde" means father returns. Writer-activist LeRoi Jones changed his name to Amiri Baraka to reflect his African heritage and former SNCC leader Stokely Carmichael changed his name to Kwame Toure in honor of the African leaders Kwame Nkrumah and Sekou Toure.

Educator, Nemi Johnson, African/African American coordinator for the Mayo Elementary School on Chicago's Southside, said during her 20 years at the school she has seen more and more African-inspired names cropping up there. "We have a young lady named Tanzania, two girls named Kenya, one boy named Kenyatta and a couple of Kwames. We have two brothers, one named Jelani, who said his name means 'mighty.' The other is Shomari, which he said means 'fast,'" she said.