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Of course, there's always an etymology even if it is onomatopoeic :-) Also, nickname is an incorrect translation see the end of this message.

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Since most Bengali parents (see later) spend more time choosing the "name" rather than the nickname, the nicknames are often less analyzable and more generic. Common themes in Bengali (which is the culture I was talking about) include variations on father [from baba, e.g., bAbAi, bAbu and bAbul for males and bAbi, bAbli for females; but all these might have alternative connections to bAbu (a word suffixed in the same way as 'mister' is prefixed in English) or bAbla (onomatopoeic related to talkative, idiot)], mother (from mA with onomatopoeia, e.g., mAmmA and mom for females), old (buro for male, buri for female---the r is actually retroflex, or at least harder, in these words; though varying dialectically), small (from chhoto, male chhotkA, female chhutki; female tukun) or names of animals/birds/flowers/plants (e.g., billi, a word for cat, for females and similar sounding billu, biddu for males, or patterned after these, such as guddu for males; female TunTun/TunTuni, a kind of bird, but may be from the sound; female totA, parrot; female bulu/bulbul, a kind of bird; male nimAi from neem, a kind of tree), or sounds onomatopoeically suggesting music/dance (jhilli [sound of loud music/crickets], jhinti [sound of musical instrument], Tupur [sound of raindrop] etc. for females) or softness (tultul, tultuli, TulTul [T representing retroflex, t alveolar/dental] for females) etc. Some are shortened/altered versions of proper names (male debu from deb, Sanskrit deva, God; make shubho, from Sanskrit shubha, auspicious; female kAntA, from Sanskrit meaning desirable/wife; female Jolly from the English word; male RTTu from names derived from Sankrit R, to be proper/upright/rise), and almost every proper name has been used as a nickname somewhere. I do not know of a proper study of Bengali nicknames, so just recalling names from my own family.

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