Kirsten

More modern American parents may be familiar with the name Kirsten from the American Doll Collection – she is a mid-19th century pioneer-era doll. Strange that the makers of American Dolls would pick the name Kirsten because this girl’s name didn’t even appear on the American female naming charts until 100 years later in 1957. Although Kirsten the doll originally hailed from Sweden and Scandinavians have a much longer history of having bestowed the name Kirsten. Here in the states, the Kirsten, Kiersten and Kristen versions of the Christine name haven’t been around nearly as long so they feel much more modern and less traditional to Americans. Additionally they have different pronunciations so it all comes down to a matter of preference (note: because there are so many pronunciations, this also adds to some confusion which some people find annoying). There’s Kris-TEEN, KUR-stin, KYEER-stin and KRIS-ten, for instance (and that’s just a partial list). The height of Kirsten’s popularity, specifically, was during the 1990s when she almost (but not quite) reached a position on the Top 150 most commonly used girl names. This was also right around the time that Kirsten Dunst became a widely recognized young actress for her role in “Interview with the Vampire” (1994). Not surprisingly, Dunst is part Swedish.