Thursday, September 13, 2012

Melissa: Nickname-Rich Name of the Week (September 13)

Note: Today's post was originally going to be another name and the last one, but since my original plan for this series I've come up with two more names to cover. The other name (a boy's name) that was added will be next week, and the end of the series will be two weeks from today.

She's probably very familiar to today's parents, being very popular during the 1970s and 1980s, and was (and still is) one of my favorites for a girl. The name is Melissa; although now a bit dated it would still fit in with today's other frilly girl's name picks. If the frills are a drawback, some shortened forms are Mel (if you want the tomboy-nickname effect), Mia (a more current nickname if you want to offset the "mom name" feel of Melissa), and Missy (which is even more dated than the parent name). What do you think of Melissa and those and other possible nicknames? Do you find Melissa too dated, or is it still good for a contemporary girl?

2 comments:

  1. I would probably like Melissa if it wasn't popular on my generation. When I as growing up, almost every Melissa I knew was "Missy" at some point. But now, all of the adult Melissa's I know are just Melissa. I think Missy was one of those nicknames people outgrew, which is a good thing in my mind. When I hear Missy, I always think of the generic term for some girl, but it seem slightly derogatory, like yelling "What do you think you're doing, Missy?" I'm not a fan of Missy, but I like Mel.

    Like Melissa, I think Michelle is another 1970s name that would fit a modern baby. I consider Gabrielle, Isabelle and Annabelle as names popular on modern children that were indirectly inspired by Michelle. I even like Mich as a nickname, but I'm not a fan of Shelly.

    You can't imagine how many Melissa / Michelle sister sets I grew up with. It was right up there with Stacy / Tracy. Ugh.

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    1. Melissa and Michelle are also a pair of names I've noticed that frequently get mixed up with each other.

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