A question regarding names of Russian figure skaters

Rere said:

I know! And that's an amazing thing about different cultures and languages! The names in different countries have always fascinated me, and when I was studying English as a foreign language as a kid, my mind was blown with Peggy as diminutive of Margaret (the dictionary said so, and google seems to agree)!

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This thoroughly confused this native English speaker as well. I remember, as a child, staring at a picture of a wonderful lady in my church during her funeral service, trying to process that sweet Mrs. Peggy's given name was really the glamorous and austere "Margaret." Most English nicknames are much more closely related to the name, though still haven't figured out why we threw "B"s at William and Robert to make Bob and Bill.

Rina RUS said:

It seems I never heard about Russians turning their last name into a name for their kid.

Yet there is a group of "soviet" names. For example, "Marlen" means "Marx and Lenin". "Ninel" = "Lenin" read backwards. "Rem" means "Revolution, Engels, Marx". And many things like "Electrification", "Aviation" were turned into names too... Some names are really weird.

Partly it can be funny, but you know... it is also like a fairy tale. Like an epic tale. There was a country where people believed that electrification and common good were more important than some interests of their family. Where people were ready to be "heroes of labour"... Partly this tale is sad, but it is epic anyway.

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Yes, there was a period after the Revolution when people wanted everything new in their new world, including names. It faded once the idealism did. There are also Vladlen/Vladlena (VLADimir LENin) and Radiy (radium). I have to say permutations of the name Vladimir Lenin make lovely names, maybe why they became popular.

As for borrowing foreign names, there is a fashion for it among Tatars more than ethnic Russians (or Ukrainians or Belorussians), so you get Alina Zagitova, Alina Kabaeva, assorted Dianas, Arturs etc. (Kamila Valieva on the other hand is more likely from the Arabic Kamilah that European Camilla). Tatars presumably would not have an attachment to Christian names in general and Orthodox Christian names in particular that Russians have. If you want to baptise your kid as an Orthodox Christian you need a name that's an actual Orthodox saint's name and it's easier if it's not completely different from their legal name (there is a group of Orthdodox Christian Tatars but I don't know what names they use). Tatars obviously use their own ethnic names and Russian names too, but are more likely to go for something relatively exotic than Russians. Russians currently are more into reviving old Christian names like Taisia and Matvei.

siela said:

I my generation, people with same full names usually also had the same short forms and were addressed as such. But when they were talked about in third person, they more often than not were called differently. e.g. there were two Irinas of approximately the same age (they were two years apart) living in the same building were I lived. Both of them went by Ira. But when talked about they went by 'Ira big' and 'Irochka small'.

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We just used first+last name to avoid confusion if we needed to refer to someone in the third person. I suppose with someone in your building you may not even know their last name though.

Using initials as nicknames sounds weird in spoken Russian. Russian quite likes abbreviations and acronyms but they have a very impersonal feel about them. But initials plus surname is a very common way to refer to someone formally in documents. Virtually all Russians have exactly two initials so it's quite regularised.