What's In A Name?

[willow_fae_20]

I'm looking for stories that feature naming as a prominent theme. Whether it be 'What's Blair's middle name (I see Jacob a lot is that canon? 'Cause I also see some more 'hippie' names like Sunshine, and Rainbow, and the like.)' or Jim and Blair naming a child, or Jim and/or Blair re-naming themselves when they come into their Sentinel/Guide powers

Comments

[janedavitt]

'Jacob' is pure fanon. Blair, in canon, has no middle name. I never give him one in a fic and I don't know why people DO when he hasn't got one. Why bother introducing something that isn't canon when you don't need to? ::baffled::

Jim's is often 'Joseph' and I think there is canon evidence for that? We definitely see the 'J' as a middle initial on a computer screen or something and I think there's a prop that shows 'Joseph'.

[willow_fae_20]

Thanks for the explanation, Jane. I've kind of reached the conclusion that 'Jacob' has become canon, because so many people use it in fic (which like you I don't understand...). I have my own problems with it: Mainly why would Naomi give Blair such a 'common' middle name, (especially one with biblical/religious roots) when (in my opinion) she probably left her family/home to escape overly religious parents, especially when she (basically) went out of her way to give him a unique first name.

I think it's easy to pair Joseph with James because the names 'flow' together. I've seen it in other shows. So that works for me.

[janedavitt]

Heh, it might be used a lot but it'll never be canon even if it's in every fic there is ;-)

I do find it fascinating how powerful fanon can be, though and to someone new to the fandom, it'd be incredibly easy for them to assume it WAS canon after seeing it in a dozen fics and that they'd just missed the episode where we found out about it and so they'd use 'Jacob' in a fic to fit in and perpetuate it.

I assume whoever first used it never dreamed it'd catch on so well :-)

Same with Rafe, who's often called 'Brian'.

[alynt]

We don't know that Naomi left home at all - to escape overly religious parents or any other reason. That's totally fanon too.

[willow_fae_20]

That is a good point. I thought in one episode Blair did specifically say they'd (meaning Naomi and him) been traveling all over the world since he could remember. And while most people's memories start around 4 or 5 years old (we just don't retain much of anything before that point)I simply took that to mean they'd started traveling before Blair was born.

Also (and this may well be a case of fanon turned canon), I think Blair mentions being in communes for a lot of his youth. Which (in my mind) translates into Naomi having left her parents home.

[alynt]

Both of these are fanon. Blair does say Naomi was the original flower child and we know she spends some time at retreats but there's no mention on the show of them traveling all over the world or of them living in communes. I wrote a story once based on all the fanon things we see called Fun with Fanon.

[willow_fae_20]

I wrote a story once based on all the fanon things we see called Fun with Fanon.

I'd like to read this, if you have a link handy.

[alynt]

Sure!

http://brothersinarmsfiction.com/tsstories/fanon.html

Hope you enjoy it.

[willow_fae_20]

*opens new tab* Yay! Thanks. I'm excited to read this.

[janedavitt]

It's canon that Blair doesn't know his father so any relatives would be Naomi's but it does seem that he has some he knows pretty well. In Spare Parts he says

[hanarobi]

A while back, Magician and I tried to figure out where Blair would have lived in order to have seen 3 World Series and 5 NFL playoff games.

To be honest, I wondered about it and Magician did all the think work in trying to figure it out.

[janedavitt]

That's very cool! I love it when we take sparse canon facts and build a bridge with them :-)

[magician113]

Well in some cases, they need to. I can think of Jacob's Ladder where he chooses to take away the spotlight by dropping Blair and going by his middle name. Or BJ Sandburg where the name is purposely obscured by letters when he becomes a woman for a year. I think the original story (I forget the one), the author needed it for some reason.

I kind of like Blair with a middle name and I'm glad that "Jacob" stuck. It pays homage to his Jewish heritage, has a nice flow to the syllables and makes him a bit more real. Most people do have middle names. It's easy to imagine that the Jewish convention for naming people after dead relatives might be why he'd have that name. Free-spirited Naomi might have fancied "Blair" but also wanted to pay tribute in a traditional way.

I think for Jim the "Joseph" appears in the wedding announcement in the scrapbook that his dad has. I'm not sure whether it appeared anywhere else.

[janedavitt]

Yes, but he doesn't HAVE a middle name to go by! My husband and his brother don't either; it's certainly not obligatory (me, I have two, so I make up for it :-)).

I'm sure the original author had a reason but I get bent out of shape a bit with it becoming so prevalant; I like Blair as he is in canon, no middle name, and I think it's a bit like deciding to give him green eyes because the author likes them better. They can if they like, but it doesn't make it true.

If Blair needs an alias, wouldn't he go for something totally unconnected? Using his middle name isn't exactly stealthy :-)

[magician113]

If Blair needs an alias, wouldn't he go for something totally unconnected? Using his middle name isn't exactly stealthy :-)

Oh you want to discuss logic in fanfic? I can't even get logic to work for canon. LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

[janedavitt]

Heheheh! This is very true :-)