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As seen in What is Penny's last name in Big Bang Theory?

The main characters of Big Bang Theory (excluding Penny) are:

  • Sheldon Lee Cooper
  • Leonard Leakey Hofstadter
  • Howard Joel Wolowitz
  • Rajesh Ramayan Koothrappali
  • Bernadette Maryanne Rostenkowski-Wolowitz
  • Amy Farrah Fowler

As we don't know if Penny has a middle name or last we can't discount it, but Why do all the main characters have three names?

DForck42
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cde
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    Um, I thought it's a total US thing for about everyone to have a middle name? – Napoleon Wilson Aug 28 '16 at 00:01
  • Most Americans I know dont. Many latinos but not even half. It's just weird that all the characters have them. Maybe regional? – cde Aug 28 '16 at 00:10
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    "Most Americans I know don't" Don't have them or don't use them? There's a difference. I think only Amy uses hers prominently. – Walt Aug 28 '16 at 00:12
  • I regularly see their and many other full names for a variety of reasons in my line of work. But let me put it this way what other show has even a third of the main cast with middle names? Heck i cant even think of one with multiple. Star trek has James T Kirk and NCIS has Gibbs, but no other comes to mind. That all of the main cast have them is interesting. – cde Aug 28 '16 at 00:20
  • Oh, and Sheldon ' s middle name is mentioned often too. And Howard's is mentioned a few times. I didn't even know Leonard, Raj or Bernie had one until that question. – cde Aug 28 '16 at 00:23
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    "main cast with middle names" Er, I dunno, lots of shows? They're just not mentioned that often and are usually fan trivia. People don't usually know the characters' full names, like Walter Hartwell White or Ross Eustace Geller, but that doesn't mean their middle names don't exist. – Walt Aug 28 '16 at 00:34
  • (What I'm basically saying is that if several TBBT characters use their middle names often and prominently, perhaps the question should be why middle names are so prominent on the show instead of asking why they have them - which AFAIK is still an extremely common practice.) – Walt Aug 28 '16 at 08:51
  • I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because obviously people think this is normal enough for multiple down votes. – cde Sep 05 '16 at 17:30
  • Look at your friends' ID cards. I'm sure their middle names are written on them. – Etack Sxchange Sep 14 '23 at 00:33
  • Also, I'm so surprised to see this question is asked by such an established highly reputated user. –  Sep 14 '23 at 00:42

1 Answers1

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Why do you expect them not to? The only people I know who don't have middle names are first or second-generation immigrants. Raj is the only character who isn't a native-born US citizen (as far as I know). Different South Asian cultures have different naming conventions, but middle names seem to be fairly common.

TBBT is based in the US, but this article in Daily Mail states regarding UK names: "Eighty percent of children are now given a middle name, compared with the 37 percent revealed in an audit of the 1911 census." I couldn't quickly find corresponding statistics for the US, but I'd imagine it's pretty similar.

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