Top 60 Black Ghetto Names….Really?

Ok, allow me to say this. Those names in the video were clearly exaggerated to the fullest extent, but at the same time, some black parents do love naming their children the most ridiculous names!! “Quanesha?! Seriously?!! You just prevented your child from getting a good job and you don’t even care. The names are GHETTO, triflin, disgusting, DISGRACEFUL, and that putting it lightly. I love my name because it has meaning AND when a white employer looks at my résumé, they won’t think I’m some ghetto trash that crawled out of the cracks if some random back alley. It is what it is. Unfortunately, this is our society. At the same time, if I see someone with some ghetto trash name on a resume for a professional position, if they don’t have high credentials, that resume is going straight in the TRASH!!

I can't understand why blacks do this to their kids. It's almost as if they are setting up their kids for failure. Thousands of studies have already been conducted and they all prove one thing: the name on a resume significantly influences the number of calls they get for interviews. So knowing that, why would they continue to do that? I don't want to sound racist by saying this, but then what they end up saying is, "it's the white man keeping us down" when in reality is them keeping their own people down by continuing to do these type of things.

IM MORE MAD AT THESE SELF HATING SO WHITE (BLACK VERSION OF SNOW WHITE) ASS IMILATED SELL OUTS than I am the video. These dudes are young and dumb. People commenting sound so ignorant talking about employees (now sitting in a big ass office instead of overseeing the fields) hiring them and jobs! Talk about HAVING A CORPORATION YOURSELF SO people don't have to worry about getting names to blend in and TRICK the employeer to believing they WHITE with their WHITE ass names. Learn about Melanin your BLACKNESS CARBON that the SUN will only be your only hope to SURVIVE not the slave masters of MONEY you wish to get RICH! GET WEALTH! UNCHAIN YOUR BRAINS SELL OUTS! LOVE TO SHANI AND THE REST OF YA INDIVIDUAL BLACK MELANINATED NAMES! BROWN PRIDE BLACK POWER
http://freedompeoplemagazine.com http://uncolonize.com http://mexica-movement.org

I knew an African American boy named "Chameleon!" (Bolingbrook, IL Chicago suburb) How GHETTO is that!

I don't think this video and our culture should even be in the same conversation. This was a video of two very immature individuals with a lot of time on their hands who had their own motive for doing this (who knows what it was). The issue you are addressing is one that I think most of us agree on as a culture. While all of us may not change our names or even have names that express our uniqueness, I think we all have a measure of respect for names that embody strength. I am not offended by this video. Rather I pity the creators because it shows that many hard lessons are inevitable in their lives. Seriously, my black is beautiful! To discuss this video in relation to undermining that gives it too much power.

My name is Shaneka and unlike the other Shanika- I'm very proud of it. It is not a ghetto name. It's 3 syllables and it is rather unique and it has several meanings. I usually don't tell people I come into contact with what my actual first name is because they often mispronounce or mispell it. Therefore, for most people- I am known as Shan or Neka, which lets me know I actually deal with them. I'm glad to have an ethnic name, however- it's far from ghetto. Ghetto is more like something that is totally made up. If there's a "Topeka, KS" in the USA then Shaneka is more than acceptable as a sound that is familiar.

I am a Caucasian woman

I thought it was very funny and was not offended at all . Some, in our community, are not as thoughtful as you are when considering how they will bless their babies with unique names. For those of us who have some intellect behind how we name our children, the video does not apply. For those of us who are trying to beat the next mama with something that no one will be able to recognize in print or pronounce, this video will be inspiration.

Yes, the video is stupid but it brings up a good point. While it is great to pass on your heritage to your offspring, you and that child have to live in America. There is a fine line between cultural and creative. Your child will have the name you give them for at least 18 years, most likely for their entire life. A name you made up and thought was cute when you got pregnant at 16, might not be as cute when that child is 22 trying to get into law school. Yes, in a perfect world people should be able to make up whatever name they like, but we don’t live in a perfect world. As I said before, we live in America. Why would a parent intentionally put up more hurdles for their own child to overcome?

I think the only ghetto name is keisha. That is a very well known name and I know sum keisha and they are triflin. I would nvr name my daughter that. But no I think most names are not ghetto. I think people get creative thats all.

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As an African, I would like to comment and give a different perspective on this name matter and on what constitutes as ghetto.

As you can read, my name is not European. My parents did not give me what has been dubbed a Christian name, unlike some of my friends. I’ve had my name remixed for the pleasure of mouths who could not fathom how to pronounce it, when it only just 3 syllables.

I watched the video and I found it funny. I found it funny because it reminded me of 2 things:
1. the scene from ‘How To Be A Menace While Drinking Your Juice In The Hood’ where one Dashiki tells the boys that her name “means doggystyle in Swahili” (which it does not)
2. coming to the realisation as an adult that these names (like the above) are strange ie how do African Americans name their children.

Where I am from (South Africa), naming your children is serious business. Names must mean something and all names mean something, whether it is in the literal sense or traditional spiritual sense. However, post-democracy, one has seen interesting names pop up such as Cellphone, Computer, Matric and the like. These names are definitely unusual anywhere but I guess we can’t blame parents for naming their children because of wishes and desires they have for their offspring. T he problem comes when Cellphone leaves the safe cocoon of his/her home town and goes to the city or towns for employment. Once again, people have a good laugh at the expense of your name. No one is interested in hearing that you were named because of your parents’ desire for you to be the first Matriculant or high school graduand. They just laugh and say “this name is backward”.

And that must be what they mean when they talk about names being ghetto. No lies, music videos, films etc have sold the notion of what is ghetto to us all over the world. And part and parcel of that is the names. They are particular to what is deemed to be ghetto, including the breaking of the neck and sucking of teeth.

I think that another issue here is about stereotypes. There has been a lot of press about how African-American women are being portrayed by the media and how they themselves are acting out for the viewing pleasure of everyone around the world. And I think it’s sad. This tells me that emancipation is a long way away then. People think that someone called Anna would not snap her fingers at a perceived rival – but a Kisha would though this may not be the case.

It was explained to me that the reason for the so-called ghetto names is that people genuinely wanted to give their children a link to their African ancestry. This warmed my heart. But there needs to be pride and dignity and respect embedded in the choosing of the name so that the child can act as such. And it must make sense too because how do you act if you don’t know the meaning of your name?

I have not yet watched the video, but to answer the question: I think a name is Ghetto if it has no meaning. A name is a label that should reflect a persons character or some trait that you would like your child to have. It is not just African American names that can be ghetto, but it seems that quite often, we give names to our children only because we like the sound of the words.

If you don't mind sharing? What was yoru birth name? Personally, my name was on the video and I don't see it as GHETTO…although there are names that I think when heard are automatically associated with the African American community.

Molefi Asante refers to names given in an attempt to *sound* like African names 'African-American' names. The names that they mentioned that include parts of female genitalia were hopefully mentioned tongue-in- cheek. "African-American" names show some attempt to *Sankofa* by our people. You can still get a job, but as is the case with wearing natural hair, discrimination based upon foreign sounding names is real. In some ways it's worse, because the resume can get trashed before you can get in the door for an interview with a name as common place as 'Leroy Brown'. (This was documented in a media expose, when I was pregnant with my son in 1998 – an influenced my naming of him – see below) Names such as 'Lexus', 'Infinity', and 'KashMonet' (yes we've met a 'cash money') often reflect a pathological materialism in which ones self worth and identity comes from things – not unusual among our people who may have little sense of historical and geographic history. We have also metever, met children with names such as "Melena", which is a clinical term describing the black, tarry bowel movement typical of a person who has a bleeding ulcer. I pays to google or buy a baby name book – just to be sure your not naming your child s***. But it is culturally correct for African children to have African names. As the saying goes, 'only dogs and slaves' don't name themselves. Perhaps I wimped out by giving my son an African middle name which we use, but an anglo-ish first name so when it's expedient for him to put it on a resume he can do so. I encourage more courageous and revolutionary brothers and sisters than me, to continue to give their children truly meaningful African names in boldness. As with wearing natural hair, if we ALL named our children out of our genocultural background en masse, the world would get used to it and it would soon become a non-issue and the quite normative – as it should be.