Ingermanländares namnskick under 1900-talet : Kontinuitet och förändring

Sammanfattning: An increasing number of personal names of non-Swedish origin exist in Sweden. This study deals with the names among Finnish speaking lutheran and orthodox Ingrian refugees from the former Soviet Union. The investigation is based upon written questionnaires, archives and interviews with persons born 1920-52. To the quantitative investigation a qualitative study has been added focusing names in relation to personal identity. Particular emphasis has been placed upon charting the Ingrians’ and Ingrian Finns’ surnames at the time of arriving in Sweden. An attempt is also made to explain different types of difficulties that Swedish-speaking people meet in connection with the immigrants’ foreign names. The question of preserving the original surnames versus changing into new Swedish names is investigated. The purpose of this investigation also has been to make a longitudinal study of what influence the majority languages and politics in three countries – Russia, Finland and Sweden – may have had upon the naming of Ingrian children born. The present study indicates that the traditional naming of children underwent changes during the late 1930s into more new Finnish names and also names from the Russian tradition. In the middle of 1940s the spelling of a number of forenames were changed by the Finnish authorities into a Finnish normalized mode. The orthodox Ingrians’ Russian family names were in many cases exchanged into Finnish ones. When registered in Sweden the forenames sometimes got a mixture of Finnish as well as Swedish orthography by the Swedish registrators. No surnames were changed until several years of stay in the immigrants’ new country, mostly in the 1960s. Changing names was voluntarily done which was caused by a number of different reasons. The surnames are investigated and cathegorized according to a trial of perception among Swedes made by the author. The results are applied upon the names of the investigation and one becomes aware of some of the reasons for preservation or change of surnames. According to the interviews it seems that there is no direct link between choice of name, name-giving and changes of name, on the one hand, and self-identification, on the other. When naming children born in Sweden, parents appear to have been guided by a desire to choose an integrated name, rather than to preserve the distinctive character of traditional names. The study shows how people’s naming customs and their changes have mirrored the geopolitical history of this ethnic group.