“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet.”

William Shakespeare created that line, which came to my mind this past weekend as we were watching a football game, and someone joked that a player’s name sounded like a new pharmaceutical drug. The bard was telling us that what you call something doesn’t change the thing itself.

And while that’s true, it leaves out the simple fact that what we call something — what we name it — gives the thing a life of its own.

Even simple nominative applications of a name say a lot about a person, place or thing. One of the cutest little boys we know of is named Titus.  I don’t know if his parents intended to pay homage to the New Testament, in which the apostle Paul was accompanied by Titus on some of his travels. Or maybe they just liked the sound of it. Either way, the baby could be named anything, and he’d be just as cute.

Names follow fashion. They come and go.

When I was a kid, all the girls seemed to be named Debbie. Lisa, Linda, Kimberly and Karen were also popular. Today, Debbie usually has “Little” in front of it and refers to a snack cake.

Karen, however, has not fared so well. A “Karen” is now a middle-class white woman who demands to have her way. The term is probably as misogynistic as it is class-based. (Middle-class white men who want their own way are usually called “leaders” or “uncompromising.”)

By the time I was grown, children’s names sounded like a roll call out of the Old Testament. Who would have thought that little kids would be running around the playground shouting for Joshua, Jacob, Jeremiah, Noah, Elijah, Benjamin and Levi? Not to mention Sarah, Rachael and Rebekah.

Other kinds of names fall in and out of fashion, too. A generation ago, when commercial fishing was big business on the central Gulf Coast, boat names were usually feminine and referred to a family member.

On the East Coast, the style was different. Schooners carried the full name of a person, or the first names of two people. The “T.A. James” or the “Mary and James” would have been typical. On our coast, the style was to use a name and initial: The “Helen E.,” “Rose J.” and “Bonny S.” were a few familiar names.

There also were the “Hustler,” the “Four Brothers” and — because shrimpers are often country music fans — the Crystal Gayle. The best-ever shrimp boat name was “Pandalus,” after the variety of the tiny crustacean that started it all.

Slang and ship names are well understood. The Royal Navy repeatedly rejected the idea of naming a ship after the famous prime minister, William Pitt, because of the rhymes that sailors would inevitably create.

To contradict Shakespeare, names themselves can have real meaning. Would you go to sea on a ship named “Titanic”? For the more poetic, how about a voyage on the “Hesperus”? When you pass by the Bates Motel, would the murder scene where Janet Leigh’s character is knifed to death keep you from checking in?

There are professional name generators out there, by the way. The drug companies hire them to come up with names like Ozempic, Tremfya and Otezla. Why stick with sildenafil citrate when you can call your drug by a snappier name, Viagra?

Meanwhile, words like liberal, patriot, conservative and compromise all have their own special meanings these days that have nothing to do with the thoughts the words once conveyed.

Names matter. How would you like to live in Toad Suck, Ark., or Monkey’s Eyebrow, Ky.?

Names are words that define us, too, not just communities and drugs. I am not just Frances Ann; I am also a writer.

When you name something, you define it for others. That rose may smell just as sweet, but the name of it is what will encourage you to take a sniff.

A rose variety called “Stinker” or, heaven forbid, a variety named after William Pitt would have a hard time getting much traction — much like a cruise on the Titanic or a stay at Bates Motel.

Frances Coleman is a former editorial page editor of the Mobile Press-Register. Email her at [email protected] and “like” her on Facebook at www.facebook.com/prfrances.