These Genderless Baby Names Will Be the Next Big Thing
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Been thinking of giving your newest family member a gender-neutral name to set him or her apart? Don't want to him or her to be one of many Hayden's or Charlie's in the class? Well, not only has Nameberry released a list of this year's hottest unisex baby names, but it also says that the unisex trend is slowing down.
Of names that will work for both girls and boys, Quincy has experienced the biggest surge in interest, followed by Remi, Winter, Ellis, and Remy. The names are featured as part of the site's hottest baby names of 2017, and are based on the pages that experienced the biggest percent change in page views on the site in January.
The site noted in a blog post that while these unisex names are gaining in popularity, there has been an overall decline in interest in genderless names. It seems that two years after BabyCenter, another baby name-centric site, announced "the year of the gender-neutral baby," traditionally gender-specific names are trending again.
Though this decline in genderless naming might surprise some people, Laura Wattenberg, name expert and author of The Baby Name Wizard, isn't one of them. She's held that the "unisex" trend of years past hasn't been motivated by a move against sexism. Rather, it's a signal of parents channeling more creativity and flexibility in naming. She says this tends to translate into girls being given traditionally male names (like Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds' daughter James, for example) rather than parents adopting girls names for boys.
"The gender lines are still strong." Wattenberg told RealSimple.com. "I'll believe in [a unisex trend] when a traditional female name has turned male."
