"Mohammed" one of the most popular names in Germany

A few days ago the Association for the German Language (GfdS), a politically independent organization dedicated to the cultivation and study of the German language, published its annual report of the most popular names for newborns.

From data used by 700 civil status registries across Germany, the GfdS report pointed out that the most popular names in Germany in 2018 were "Marie/Mari" for girls and "Paul" for boys.

The ranking takes into account all the names given to newborns in 2018.

The report, which usually receives no attention, quickly turned into fodder for a media political battle and disinformation, all because 280 of the 22.000 newborn boys in Berlin were given one of at least 25 variants of the first name "Mohamed". ". (The name Mohamed appears with different variants of writing. ed.)

Media coverage

The German newspaper "Tagesspiegel" summarized the report on the names under the headline "Mohamed more popular than Karl-Heinz". And the British newspaper The Daily Mail emphasized that "Mohammed was one of the 10 most popular names for boys in 6 out of 16 German states", without putting the results of the name report in the right context.

Alice Weidel, one of the leaders of the parliamentary group of the right-wing AfD party, an anti-immigrant party but ranked third in the Bundestag, quickly retweeted the Bild newspaper article about the GfdS report. "So, last year in Berlin the most frequent first name for newborn boys was Mohamed...the trend is growing".

The AfD's Berlin branch was less secretive, and posted a picture on Twitter, centering on a teacher in a headscarf in front of a classroom full of students. Title - Mohamed the most favorite name - Stop Islamization, only with AfD!

Sawsan Chebli, a German social democratic politician in Berlin, of Palestinian origin tweeted a counter message to the AfD. "My father's name is Mohammed. My name is Sawsan Mohammed Chebli. My eldest grandson is named Mohammed".

Missing context

The GfdS report lacks the proper context to explain its results, Gabriele Rodriguez, a specialist in naming terminology at the University of Leipzig, told DW. This lack of explanatory context combined with a society sensitive to demographic change and embroiled in a political debate over migration and refugees led to such a stream of misinformation.

It is partially true that the name "Mohammed" has increased in the names of newborns, thanks to the growth of the migrant community in Germany. But this is also because it is a tradition that families from the Arab world give at least one of their children the name Mohammed. "There is not a wide pool of names to choose from, as in the case of German families," says Rodriguez, adding that more than half of the names of newborns registered annually in Germany are the same, and that the most popular names make up at most 2 or 3% of all newborns.

And if most newborn names have only a few writing variants, for the name "Mohammed" there are at least 25 writing variants. Being given more as a first name, it is more likely to appear more often than other names in this category. The most popular name for boys in Berlin – when all given names are considered – is Alexander. The study of the language organization GfdS ranks Mohamed in the 24th place of the most popular names in Germany, taking into account second and third names. /dw/