PROPER NAME
1. Conventionalism and Realism
The proper name is given by convention; it contains no information about its bearer. That is, all the animals called cow belong to the category of cows and share common properties; proper names don’t correspond to categories, and don’t share common properties.
Proper names are conventionally ascribed, in the sense that they do not correspond to a description of the person they designate.
It follows that we cannot make any inferences about proper names in the way that we can about names of natural categories.
For example, a cow is called « cow » and we recognize it as a cow when we meet it. This is because of its main distinguishing features combined with a family resemblance. When I meet a stranger I have no way of deducing his proper name from considerations about his person; if I know that he is called Smith, I know nothing about him (but see infra).
2. Proper Names as Indices
Since a proper name is a conventional social designation, it cannot be exploited by arguments from definition, but it can be used as an argument based on indexical evidence.
Indication of origin – The proper name can be associated with particular groups of people who generally bear that kind of name, by an argumentat that uses the proper name as an index. If I am to meet Mr. Martin-Dupont, I can only think that he is most likely of French origin, — unless . . . see lay out of argument.
Lineage Indicator – In general, the identity of the proper name may be a sign of family relationship, which may or may not be flattering. Having the name of the wrong person or the guilty party is extremely burdensome. If John Doe is unanimously condemned and stigmatized as an incestuous anti-Semitic pedophile, then at the height of the media storm, the Doe family can be interviewed in order to take a position on the John Doe case. Clarifications appear: “Alan Doe is not related to John Doe”.
3. Onomastic contamination
Onomastic contamination can occur between the name of a person at the center of the news and the name of another person
Pablo1 Iglesias1 […] is old-fashioned, obsolete, passé. His last name, for starters. And the best proof of this is that there was once a Pablo2 Iglesias2, a left-wing politician, in the 1920s. A century ago! What’s more, the Spanish call his1 political doctrine as “Pablisma”. But there was once a Pablismb, named after a Trotskyist dinosaur (= Pablo3 Iglesias3)!
Marc Crapez Divisions of the Spanish Left: How Íñigo Errejón made Pablo Iglesias uncool, 2019 [2] (my notes)
I can’t find a more charitable reading of these two converging arguments than the following.
– The first line of argument attaches the “nerdy” character to the name « Pablo Iglesias » and to all those who have the misfortune to be called Pablo Iglesias, especially Pablo2019 Iglesias2019. A certain Pablo1 Iglesias1 lived “a century ago!”; the link between the two Iglesias is their name, Iglesias. The argument is “PI2019 is obsolete, since PIXXth century is obsolete. »
– In the second convergent argument, the argument is based on the name of the doctrine. The political doctrine of Pablo2019 Iglesias2019 (= « hisPI2019 political doctrine ») is Pablism, derived from his2019 first name Pablo2019, that is, « Pablism2019« , This doctrine is apparently homonymous with another political doctrine, Pablismancient, which the author does not like. The argument is “Pablism2019 is outdated, because Pablismancient is outdated ». Here, the inferring license is the derivation: « Pablismancient is a political dinosaur, so Pablism2019 is also a political dinosaur ».
The argument is topped by a clear appearance of the argument of the novelty argument (a contrario)
A vague suspicion that they might belong to the Landru family hangs over all people named Landru (a famous serial killer of women). When a person’s name is the same as that of a famous person who is elevated to the status of a paragon, the character of the paragon is attributed to them by antonomasia.
4. Naturalization of proper names
Some conceptions of proper names reactivate the realist conception of proper names, according to which the name and the person actually share properties in common; the proper name John, refers to a category grouping all persons named John and that these John’s do share some interesting properties.
The following argument attributes to a person with a particular name the characteristics of other people with the same name. The popular science of proper names attributes to them a “character” that is not unlike the common name of a natural category:
Characteristics of the first name Fleury
Fleury tends to have an amiable character. … he is also positive. He is a person close to his family. But sometimes he can be too charming… [1]
We are on the way to making the first name a natural species name: The toadstools are poisonous, and the Fleury’s live like a big family. The name announces the character, and we can apply the argument by definition; if his name is Fleury, he is nice, it is normal, natural.
The situation is different with nicknames. His friends call him « the bull » because of his particular way of doing things. The argument of the proper name gives the proper name the meaning of the corresponding common name; the proper name signifies its bearer.
Mr. Bull can be the most sensitive person imaginable, his friends think he has something of a bull about him.
4. Aptonyms: Topos of the name
4.1 Aptonym
A proper name is an aptonym 1) if it is homonymous with a common name, and 2) if something in his life can be closely associated with the bearer of the proper name, especially his profession.
Because someone is called Mr. / Ms. Children, we infer that he has some essential relationship with children, and therefore it is normal for him to become a pediatrician, a teacher, etc., or that he has a childlike character: the name is an aptonym, that reinforces the person’s suitability for his job, confirming the attribution of a character trait.
Phrases like “It’s not for nothing that he’s called …”, “With a name like that!”, “He lives up to his name” turn the first name into an aptonym. Because the opponent is called Black, we infer that he has a black soul, and we suspect him of black designs; if he is involved in a suspicious business, we assume that his name predestined him for it; as if the person were trying to reach his signifier through his actions. The first name functions as an appropriate nickname,
4.2 Topos of the Name
The topos of the proper name is based on aptonymy:
Another [place] is derived from the name; for example, as Sophocles does, Having the hardness of iron, you bear your name well (Aristotle, Rhet., II, 23, 1400b18; Dufour, p. 126).
The note specifies that it is a play on the Greek proper name Sidero and the Greek noun meaning “iron, iron instrument”: « He is inflexible, his name is iron ».
In June of 2017, a general election was held in the United Kingdom, called by the Conservative Prime Minister Theresa May. According to a slogan of the Labor Party, the defeat of the Prime Minister was written in her name:
June will be the end of May.
In the Latin Gospel, Christ chose Peter to be the first head of the Church in this way:
You are Peter (Latin Petrus), and upon this rock (Latin petram) I will build my church.
This construction is a special case of naming, the repetition of the same word in a statement with two different meanings. In the general case, the property of the thing is directly predicated on the proper name.
Stigmatization by Proper Names
To infuriate and humiliate the other person by distorting his name is a playground practice. But no one, not even the greatest minds, can resist turning his opponent’s proper name against him. In the course of a controversy, the philosopher Jacques Derrida renamed his colleague J. Ronald Searle “Sarl”, that is, the acronym SARL with the corresponding insinuation that it was an aptonym. [3]
In response to Michelle Loi‘s vision of Maoist China, Simon Leys, published a pamphlet titled L’oie et sa farce (The Goose and its Farce) (Wikipedia, Simon Leys) In French, Loi and l’oie are perfect homophones.
The process of stigmatization by distortion of the proper name can serve anti-Semitic and political hatred:
[In this press sympathetic to the extreme right] we find proper names manhandled, proper names reworked: André Glucksmann becomes “André Glücksmann”, Simone Veil becomes “Shimone Veil”, Robert Hue becomes “Hue-coco” (*)
(*) Former First Secretary of the French Communist Party active against anti-Semitism; « coco » for « communist ».
Krieg 1999, p. 12 [4]
Stigmatization by proper name is one of the most intolerable instruments of personal attacks, harassment and racism.
[1] https://www.parents.fr/prenoms/fleury-40932#Caract%C3%A8re-du-pr%C3%A9nom-Fleury
[2] Le Figaro, www.lefigaro.fr/vox/societe/divisions-de-la-gauche-espagnole-comment-inigo-errejon-a-ringardise-pablo-iglesias-20191011 (13-01-2020)
[3] Jacques Derrida, Limited Inc. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1988. Limited Inc. means « SARL, Société à responsabilité limitée” in French.
[5] Krieg, Alice, 1999. Vacance argumentative : l’usage de (sic) dans la presse d’extrême droite contemporaine. Mots 58, pp. 11-34. https://www.persee.fr/doc/mots_0243-6450_1999_num_58_1_2523