Before Choosing A Baby Name With An Accent Mark, Apostrophe, Or Hyphen, Check These Records

Naming your little bundle of joy is a deeply personal and important decision. Many languages use diacritics to direct pronunciation, and they are as essential to a word or a name as the letters themselves. Even some English words take on completely different meanings with a single accent mark (like exposé and expose). So those tiny markings can be a big deal. If you are considering using diacritical or punctuation marks for your new arrival, it's not as simple as just tilde-ing the ñ or accenting the é. A patchwork of official record requirements makes a name with special characters much more complicated.

The first official document you'll fill out for your child is their birth certificate, which is issued at the state level. This means the rules for names with special characters can differ from state to state. Most states have birth certificate guidelines available on their vital records websites, which the U.S. Centers for Disease Control makes available on its site. 

Many states, including Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New York, do not allow diacritical marks on their birth certificates. This is primarily because the states' vital record systems do not support special characters. Other states allow special characters to varying degrees — North Carolina accepts hyphens, tildes, and accents, while Arizona allows apostrophes, periods, and hyphens. Alaska and Hawaii are among the most flexible, with many symbols carrying significance for their respective Indigenous cultures. Since you usually complete the birth certificate at the hospital after giving birth, it's helpful to research your state's rules before the baby arrives. However, even after sorting out the birth certificate, the document dilemma has only just begun.

Like birth certificates, other official records will vary in the use of special characters because they're found in different database systems. Driver's licenses are state-issued, like birth certificates, but your child's name may not match on both documents. The REAL ID compliance regulation brings in a federal layer of identification to a license that can cause further confusion. And speaking of federal documentation, your baby's Social Security Card is issued by the Social Security Administration, while a passport is issued by the State Department. These two documents may vary with the inclusion of hyphens, apostrophes, and spaces. For example, the U.S. Department of State system does not support accent marks, carets, and other common diacritical marks.

Since tax filings are coordinated through a person's Social Security record, your child's name will need to match the name on their SSN card when filing your own taxes as well as theirs, when the time comes. So a basic, albeit imperfect, rule of thumb is that diacritics and special characters outside of hyphens and apostrophes are not used in U.S. federal documents, but they may be used for state-level records, depending on the state.

Before you lose hope for your preferred baby name spelling, know that special character mismatches are common, and any records office should be well-versed in handling related issues. But it can cause an extra headache. And of course, none of this prevents you from using special characters for your baby's name in your everyday life. Understanding how they translate into official documentation can help ensure you and your child navigate important records throughout their life as smoothly as possible.