Icelandic Naming Committee

Just listened to an old episode from The Allusionist podcast and found out about rules about Icelandic rules surrounding the naming of a child.

The Naming Committee was established in 1991 to determine whether new given names not previously used in Iceland are suitable for integration into the country's language and culture. The committee comprises three appointees who serve for four years, appointed by the Minister of Justice—one to be nominated by the Icelandic language council within the Icelandic Language Committee, one by the faculty of philosophy of the University of Iceland, and one by the university's faculty of law.

A name not already on the official list of approved names must be submitted to the naming committee for approval. A new name is considered for its compatibility with Icelandic tradition and for the likelihood that it might cause the bearer embarrassment. Under Article 5 of the Personal Names Act, names must be compatible with Icelandic grammar (in which all nouns, including proper names, have grammatical gender and change their forms in an orderly fashion according to the language's case system). Names must also contain only letters occurring in the Icelandic alphabet, and with only occasional exceptions, a name's grammatical gender previously had to match the sex of the person bearing the name.

Foreigners and their children are allowed to keep their own names and loanwords from other languages are permitted. Loanwords must have other name bearers in the country and follow the grammar of the original language or have adjusted grammar for the Icelandic language.

In 2019, the Icelandic parliament passed the Gender Autonomy Act (Icelandic: Lög um kynrænt sjálfræði), guaranteeing transgender and intersex individuals' right to gender self-identification, including the recognition of non-binary gender in law. To this effect, given names were no longer restricted by gender. Moreover, Icelanders who are officially registered as non-binary will be permitted to use the gender-neutral suffix -bur ("child") instead of -son or -dóttir.

As of the end of 2012, the Personal Names Register (Mannanafnaskrá) contained 1,712 male names and 1,853 female names.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icelandic_Naming_Committee

ant-mac ,

This story is what really got my attention.

Jón Gnarr, former mayor of Reykjavík, protested the committee's denial of his request to legally drop "Kristinsson" from his name despite his desire to disassociate himself from his father. Gnarr pointed out that if Robert Mugabe moved to Iceland, as a foreigner he would be allowed to keep that non-conforming name, but that native Icelanders were not allowed to have non-conforming names. He was also unable to legally name his daughter "Camilla" after her grandmother; it was instead spelled "Kamilla" because C is not part of the Icelandic alphabet. Jón was allowed to legally change his name in 2015; however, Gnarr, the surname adopted by him and his children in 2005, was only recognized by the courts in 2018; it was legally considered a middle name before then.