Name Genderizer
Name genderizing is the process of identifying the gender based on a person's name.
| Examples by culture: Examples: |
| Examples by culture: Examples: |
| Examples by culture: Examples: |
Developer: see the technical specification of the REST service.
Process
Understanding the person's name is key to identifying the gender. Then it becomes obvious which name parts to look at. It's not always the first name!
Challenges
There are three reasons why a writing form of a given name can't be clearly assigned to one gender:
1. True unisex names, for example "Casey".
This is also the case for many short forms or pet names, which can derive from given names with different gender:
Alex => Alexandra, Alexander
Charlie => Charlotte, Charles
2. Names that exist in multiple cultures, for example "Andrea".
In this case, identifying the culture is the key:
Andrea Bocelli => Italian => likely male
Andrea Berg => German => likely female
3. Detail is lost through transcription (or asciification), rendering distinctive names the same.
In all these cases statistics help: name statistics (census, birth lists etc) are used to calculate the chance for each gender.
Use Cases
1. Addressing a person
You don't know the person's gender, but you have to address him or her more personally. It just sounds better with a correct salutation than "Hi there!". However, if in doubt, we recommend to use a neutral salutation.
2. Customer segmentation
The gender can be a key criterion in selecting the right target group.
3. Person matching
Two name pairs may look similar. If the gender is contradicting, it's unlikely the same person.