150,000 visits to e-Onomastics

Over the weekend, we passed 150,000 separate visits to this blog. We now average from 200 to 500 readers each day. That e-Onomastics has attracted so many readers in little more than two and half years has been rewarding and inspiring. I want to thank you for taking the time to read this blog and I hope you find the information you sought. If not, let me know and I’ll try to address your question in a future blog article.

This blog is natural outgrowth of the onomastic practice I continue to build. e-Onomastics embodies my commitment to communication and education. I have researched as a linguist in the onomastic field for just over 10 years now (how the years have flown past). in 2012, I sat down to re-examine my onomastic investigations and to decide the best way to move forward. I decided to build a new type of onomastic practice - I mean this blog - one dedicated not only to my personal research, but focused on various name-based research areas. I do not compete with other onomastic centers, linguistic departments and universities, but I would like to spread the name-related news as far as possible.

I don’t want to simply run a business (it's not possible with onomastics, although I appreciate every click on the ads); I want to wow all onomasticians, linguists, language specialists and everybody who is interested in onomastics. I am grateful when you trust me with your news, announcements, reports, etc. and I am proud of publishing them as soon as possible.

I started this blog as part of the commitment to onomastic communication and education. I want to share with readers information about names and onomastic analyses. I want to educate readers about issues that might concern them. And I thought we could share information about our name-oriented research, databases, conferences, publications and articles.

I write in plain English, I repost a lot from other onomastic blogs. I work hard to explain each topic and why it might matter to our today's life. I pick topics that interest me, that I actually research on, but I also pick onomastic topics that I believe will help my readers.

I want to empower students and scholars and the best way to do that is to educate people. Last year, I posted a lot about the applied onomastics – articles that explain how names can contribute to human sciences, digital humanities, genetics and cartography. And I will share much of that information on this blog.

I know that some people use my blog to guide them in the onomastic world. I have heard from other linguists who have adopted my posts for use in their own investigations. That’s great. I want to spread our commitment to communication and education. If this blog delivers new information on names that people expect, that’s great. I do not believe in pure onomastic business as usual; I live and breathe onomastics, I put the science first and that drives every aspect of my research. If this blog helps empower a research or an idea, then I have succeeded.

I also take great satisfaction when a person contacts me looking for help and says he has read my blog and know I can help him. I use this blog to let people know as much as possible about the way the names can be analysed or used. I am proud of what I do and work hard to fulfill my goals and "serve" my readers.

Passing 150,000 visits was an important milestone, one that allowed me to pause and appreciate what I have done so far. It also provides a spur of how much more I can do. I hope you will keep reading. Bookmark this page. Send it to friends. Tap into the RSS feed.

If you have a question or a suggestion, you can post a comment or send an email and I’ll try to answer your question in a future blog article.

Thank you again.

Dr. Evgeny Shokhenmayer