Name variants

A name variant is an alternative of a name that is considered to be equivalent to that name, but which differs from the name in its particular external form. In other words, the two names are considered somehow equivalent and can be substituted for the other in some context.

Name variants occur for many reasons, including:

• Spelling variations (Geoff and Jeff)
• Nicknames (Bill for William
• Abbreviations (GPE for Guadalupe)
• Cognates, or translations (Peter for Pierre)
• Cultural differences (John vs Jon vs Jean)
• Variations in the order of components (For example, adapting a name to another culture, L.N.S. Gandikota adapted from Gandikota Lakshmi Narayana Sastry)
• Transliterations from one writing system to another (For example, from Logographic Chinese characters to Roman characters)

Global Name Management components produce name variants that are caused by spelling variations, nicknames, cultural differences, and abbreviations.

Knowing the possible name variants helps you expand your name queries to include the variant forms, and include those name variants in searches to generate lists of candidate matches. Name variants can also be helpful when analyzing names, because analysts can see the lists of variant forms of a name that are likely to occur.

In Global Name Management components the process of generating a list of name variants involves breaking the name fields (given name and surname) into name phrases, and then generating a list of variants for each of the name phrases. Knowing which name is the given name and which name is the surname is important, because there are different variants for a phrase, depending on which field it occurs in.

Knowing the culture behind each name field is also important, because the name variants differ widely between cultures. Just because a particular name may be found in many cultures and spelled the same way, does not mean that the names are the same. In actuality, the names are different names, and produce different variant forms depending on which culture is associated with the name.

For example, if we compare the name variants for the Hispanic name Juan and the Chinese name Juan, we can see a vast difference in the variant name forms, because the name is not the same name in each culture.

The Hispanic name variants of Juan include:

• Juam
• Juanch
• Juancho
• Xuan

The Chinese name variants of Juan include:

• Chuan
• Chwan
• Jwan
• Zhuan

While both cultures share some of the same variants, the two names are very different. This difference is supported by the difference in the order of the name variants, which reflect the differences in the frequency of spelling from one culture to another.