Emma and Liam top most popular New Mexico baby names for 2022
Dec. 24—What's in a name?
Ask a baby.
Or better yet, the baby's parents.
Parents in New Mexico reached toward an array of cultural and Biblical sources when choosing names for their newborns in 2022, according to a state Department of Health news release announcing the top baby names of the year Friday.
They also sought strength in the names.
The traditional Irish name Liam, the Gaelic short form of William, was the year's most commonly bestowed name for newborn males in the state. Liam means "protector" or "helmet," according to the website mom.com/baby-names.
Emma was the No. 1 name chosen for girls in the state. The mom baby-name website says it's a variant of the Germanic name Erma and means strength, all-containing, universal or complete.
Following Liam, the most popular baby boy names in New Mexico were, in order, Mateo, Noah, Santiago, Elijah, Ezekiel, Oliver, James, Ezra and Sebastian.
For girls, Emma was followed, in order, by Sophia, Isabella, Mia, Olivia, Camila, Amelia, Luna, Aria and Evelyn.
This is the first year since New Mexico began tracking popular baby names in 2014 that Evelyn made the state list, knocking Charlotte off the charts along the way, the news release said.
Meanwhile, James made his first appearance on the state list, while Ezra, last seen on the list in 2019, returned. They bumped two boy names from last year — Levi and Benjamin — off the list this year.
To at least half a degree, the list follows national trends from 2021, according to annual data Social Security maintains on baby names. The agency had not yet released its list of top baby names for 2022. But nationally, Liam, Noah, Oliver, Elijah and James were among the top boy names in 2021, and Olivia, Emma, Amelia, Sophia, Isabella, Mia and Evelyn were among the top girl names that year.
Many of the baby names in New Mexico are Spanish, as is the case in several other Western states — a reflection of the growing Hispanic population in the United States, which is nearing the 20 percent mark and, in New Mexico's case, also of the Hispano cultural dating back hundreds of years.
In the old days, moms and dads — ideally, together — chose names for their children based on anything from their own names to the rare moniker that belonged to a great-great-uncle nobody could remember. (And maybe who nobody liked.)
These days, the baby-naming business can mean big bucks for those who help parents who need an outside expert to weigh in on the subject. Media reports often report on baby name consultants who charge thousands of dollars to help parents find just the right name for infants.
On the other hand, Bibles are pretty inexpensive, and you can find Noah and Elijah, among other potential baby names, in its pages with a little study. Naming children after saints — James and Santiago come to mind from the list — is a time-honored tradition and doesn't cost a cent to do. (There was a Saint Liam too, but he was a race horse.)
Parents still reeling from the impact of the coronavirus pandemic seem to be reaching out for names signifying strength or peace these days, one national baby naming expert says.
"I believe that COVID really affected baby names and that people are trying to choose names with power and hope associated with them," said Jennifer Moss of babynames.com, in a podcast interview.
Noting such names as Queen, Legend, Royal and Apollo are gaining in popularity, Moss said they "have just popped onto the charts in the last year or so. And I'm like, I wonder if that's just a reaction to kind of feeling powerless in what was going on in the world."
Not surprisingly, some of the names on New Mexico's top ten baby name list invoke such sentiments. Aria derives from noble and Isabella is the Spanish and Italian variation of Elizabeth, which is derived from the Hebrew name Elisheba and translates to, "God is my oath," according to several online baby-naming sites.
Pop culture can play a trend in baby naming too.
"When Kool and the Gang's song 'Joanna' hit the Billboard Hot 100 List in 1984, the name Joanna shot up in popularity. The same thing happened to 'Rosanna' after Toto's song of that name in 1982," journalist Clive Thompson wrote in 2019.
Even babies born underwater can set off temporary trends in baby naming, as was the case after the 1989 Disney cartoon The Little Mermaid was released and Ariel — the title character — became the name of countless girls in 1990.
