What’s in a name?

My daughter recently discovered that people didn’t live at the same time as dinosaurs. She was shocked and didn’t really believe it.

“But if people weren’t alive when dinosaurs were, then how can people know what they were called?” she asked.

It lead to a discussion of why we use names for things – even things that we don’t see in our everyday life. Names save us time, words and energy, as well as individualising us as people.

When writing, the choice of a name can be really important as names also set the scene. Names can give information about the person, such as gender, nationality, personality and age, and about the theme of the writing.

And it’s not just naming characters in fiction stories either. When I am writing something that includes examples, I take care to use names that imply a mix of people – for instance, using male and female names.

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