| The girl name Whitney [ syll. w-hi-tney, wh-itn-ey ] is pronounced W-IHTN-iy KEY. Whitney's language of origin is Old English and it is used mainly in the English language. Whitney's meaning is 'white island'. Derived from hwit meaning 'white' ; ey meaning 'island'. The first name is from the surname, which is itself from the Middle English phrase 'atten whiten ey' meaning 'by the white island'. The popularity of the name has been boosted by the famous American singer Whitney Houston (1964-); it has been popular among Afro-Americans. Whitney is fairly popular as a baby name for girls. The name's popularity rose from the 1960s up to the 1980s; before that, it was of only infrequent use. At the height of its usage in 1986, 0.517% of baby girls were given the name Whitney. It ranked at #32 then. The baby name has since experienced a marked drop in popularity. In 2007, it ranked at #563 with a usage of 0.025%, but it was nonetheless the most popular within all girl names in its group. Although Whitney is more popular as a girl name today, there was a period from 1909 to 1961 that it was given more often to boys. After 1962, increasingly more girls than boys were named Whitney. In 1988, the name Whitney was given to 70 times as many girls than boys. KEY: approx pronunciation for Whitney: W as in "we (W.IY)" ; IH as in "it (IH.T)" ; T as in "tea (T.IY)" ; N as in "knee (N.IY)" ; IY as in "eat (IY.T)"
A famous person named Whitney is Singer Whitney Houston, born 9 August 1963, Newark, New Jersey. |
