Is it still possible?
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
Sure. A guy named Mohammad would be Muslim. Yet to see a Jewish Mohammad.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
Pretty much. People with arab name are likely to be either arab or muslim.
Also, O’neal, O’keefe would be irish i guess.
Ramalingam would be hindu indian.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
I’ve come across non-Muslim Ayeshas and Aliyahs..
Have across white girls with ‘foreign’ names as well..
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
Must be africans. They have this new trend of using arab names. Jamals,and khadijah and ayesha among african americans.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
yes. most of the time you can tell the religion and/or ethnicity just by his/her name. Jewish people have their last names different than a Christian. South Indians have different names than North Indians. in some cases Pakistani Muslim names are different than Indian Muslim names.
this is why it’s important to name your child according to your ethnicity/religion for your identity sake or else you will be mistaken for someone else.
i met this guy on the plane and we talked about local politics. he was an Arab and his name was Nasrallah. i later realized that most Arab Christians have their last name as Nasrallah.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
You can do the guess work but depends upon the person you are guessing about, it may be wrong. As its mentioned, many african descents have names like jamal, Shaqeel etc but they are not muslims, may be their ancestors were. Similarly i’ve even met few with last name Muhammad but they are not muslims themselves.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
Happens to me every time…People who see my last name think that I might be muslim but then they think it may be mis spelled from Kahn. Almost all people who I tell my name to spell my Khan into Kahn since my first name Joel throws them off.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
That reminds me of one of my colleagues whom I knew as Afghani descent but his name was David. So I thought he might be a christian or jew. Later somebody told me that his actual name is Abdul hameed but he has changed is name to David 
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
I have come across many Patels who were Muslim when I thought they were Hindu.
Yes its still possible to guess.
Guessing right or wrong is a different matter.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
I’ve never been able to tell if Patels and Chaudharys are Muslims or Hindus..
Then there are people with non-Muslim first names and Muslim surnames or vice versa, esp in cities like London where it’s not uncommon for people intermarry, or their parents have just decided to be ‘creative’ with their names..
Half my family in Bangladesh have Hindu names as well as Muslim ones.. If I didn’t personally know them I’d never work it out 
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
^ there are some common surnames among Muslims and Hindus but their first name is never the same. a Muslim Patel would always have a Muslim first name and Hindu Patels will have a Hindu first name.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
not necessarily…Sameer Patel…Neha Patel…Beena Patel…all are crossover Hindu/Muslim names…would be hard to tell
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
Meena, Beena, Tina likes are very universal names anyways.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
I know a guy named Kitab Paul Shah.
White as bread.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
these are of non-Muslims acquired by Muslims. this is what happens when parents go for unusual/rare/exotic names. they lose their identity.
that’s why it’s important to name the child which maintains his/her identity.
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
Interesting someone mentioned Patel. Only recently I knew that the fiery Indian speedster Munaf Patel is a Muslim.
Similarly I have come across Muslim names with Rajput as last name I think.
Sameer, Sikander, Malik confuse the heck out of me.
And of course, who would have thunk it that Ethan Hunt is a Muslim name.
Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
Kabir. Another name both Muslims and Non Muslims keep!
Re: Guessing someone’s religion or ethnicity by their name..
most of the times you can tell.
but most of the Christians living in Pakistan have Muslim names like my aunt once had a maid whose name was samina and her fathers name was siddique. and i had one classmate whose name was Ajmal and second name was adnan.