The Traditions Behind BGirl & BBoy Names

Creating perfect BBoy names or BGirl names for you and your crew when you’ve decided to take the breaking thing seriously? There are a bunch of cool ways and traditions that could be used to make the process of choosing the name more meaningful and easy.

The name a breaker chooses to go by can have a big impact on his career. It’s responsible for the first impression you give to people and you build your reputation on top of it. There’s only one chance to create that first impression. That’s why the name is a precious thing for a b-boy/b-girl, it’s your alias as a hip-hop artist and your alter ego.

If you enter a competition that’s the first thing that people hear when you’re announced on the stage. If the word about your skills starts spreading your name is what people use and if they have never seen you before that is what gives the first impression. And you can’t expect people to take you seriously if your name is B-boy Chicken! That’s why the name should be chosen carefully, so you can keep the same name for a longer time.

If your mission is to make a name on the international scene it’s a good idea to pick a BBoy name or Bgirl name that is readable and understandable also outside of your country. In a competition, it’s hard to be remembered by the judges if there is 100 names on the list that look and sound like “Zskrkvski”.

What’s a good way to pick a name then?

The greatest BBoy names are made of something meaningful for the individual. On the other hand, it can also describe you or your style. For example, Focus is called Focus because his way to practice has always been very focused. Focus was also into photography and in photography there’s a term called focus point. If the camera’s lens is in focus all the rays of light come together in the focus point and the picture is sharp. Focus wanted to become the focus point of b-boy skills with all the aspects and elements of the dance summarized in one.

A common way is also to add an adjective to a name or its initial that describes your style.

For example Ken Swift, Kool Herc or E-Swift. That makes the name more complete. Small wordplay is a good way to add more flavor to your real name. Take Hatsolo for example. His last name is Hattunen which means small hat in Finnish. As a kid, he used to watch Star Wars and became a fan of Hansolo. When he trained his hat would fall off so he would continue the solo doing tricks with the hat. Combining all this made perfect sense and the name Hatsolo was born. Later he got an extension, the White Gorilla, which describes his style of dancing even more.

The traditional way is to be named by someone else.

AT for example was named by her teacher Taya after her initials. In the mid-2000s many Finnish b-boys got renamed when they traveled to New York to learn from the pioneers of this dance. Receiving a name from your master is a big honor and you represent it with a different kind of pride. Passing a name to the next generation is another traditional way. For example, b-boy Kid Glyde of the Dynamic Rockers carries on the legacy of his father, b-boy Glyde as well as DJ Lean Rock aka Lil Lean, the son of Lean-Ski of the Floor Lords.

Common ways to spice up your name is to add -one, -rock, or -ski at the end.

-One simply means you’re the baddest b-boy, the number one, and the king of the hill. The tradition of adding numbers after names run deep with the likes of Taki 183, the first graffiti writer to gain fame with his tag in NYC. He added his street number at the end of his tag. In hip hop to rock means you’re doing something exceptionally well. You rock the floor, you rock the mic or you rock the wall. Added to the end of your name it represents the fact that you rock. For the -ski we’ve heard different meanings. One story was that in the 1970’s there were a lot of Polish people in the neighborhoods and the end of their names sounded cool as ice. The street kids wanted their names to sound as cool so they adapted the end of “Polanski’s” to the names. Another story says that once drugs started flooding the streets of New York, the dealers were the cool guys because of their wealth so the people from the streets looked up to them. The ski extension was added to names to make them sound cooler because like Jay-Z raps there was “so much coke that you can run a slalom”.

Anagrams have been very popular, especially in the 90’s.

Anagram means that every letter has a separate meaning. For example KRS-ONE:

Knowledge

Reign

Supreme

Over

Nearly

Everybody

Or POE-ONE:

Peace

On

Earth

Originality

Never

Ends

Overall the most important thing is that your name has a meaning to you. That way you’re proud to carry it and build your reputation on top of it. Sometimes even the silly names start to make sense after you hear the stories behind them. What’s the story behind your name? Comment below, we would love to hear your story.

-Focus / Bboydojo.com

Frequently asked questions (FAQ):

How do you come up with a Bboy name?

The traditional way is to be named by your teacher. You can also come up with a name by yourself, by finding something that describes your style or using your nickname. You can also add something to the beginning or end to make it cooler.

What do you call a breakdancer?

The correct term to use referencing a breakdancer is a b-boy, b-girl or a breaker. Breakers themselves don’t like to use the term breakdance or breakdancer, because of the misuse and the exposure of the term in the media back in the 1980’s.

What does the slang “B-boy” mean?

B-Boy is simply the short version of a breakboy, a male dance within the style of breaking also known as breakdance to the wider public. A female dancer in breaking is referred to as a b-girl.

How do you spell B-boy?

The Merriam-Webster dictionary has added the term b-boy in it, how cool is that? Their spelling is done with the line “B-Boy”. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/B-boy