whats with Bengali people having different last names within the same family??

Do they have the same first name? Maybe their first name is their "last name."

 

My "Bengali" friend said that the politically correct term is "Bangladeshi" but she could be wrong.

 

"Bangladeshi" pertains to people from the country of Bangladesh. "Bengali" is the nationality pertaining to people from either West Bengal of India or Bangladesh. "Bangladeshi" is a subset of "bengali."

 

So do all Bengali people speak Bengali regardless of if they're from from Bangladesh or India?

 

For the most part, yes. However there are many different dialects of the language. As a result, it can be quite hard for people who are from different regions to understand each other. For example someone who speaks bengali and is from kolkota may have a hard time understanding bengali spoken by someone from sylhet.

As for the original poster's question, I wouldn't know. I have a bengali background and I haven't heard of this particular last name weirdness before :/ .

 

This is exactly right. My dad and all his 5 brothers have the same first name, but their last names all differ. So they'll be addressed by their last names, like Hafiz, Mamun, etc. The first name is more of a formality and isn't used on a day to day basis.

 

Perhaps it is a bengali/bangali thing? i.e west bengali/bangladeshi thing? Or maybe I am just a really horrible coconut .

 

That is certainly a possibility. I have a few Bengali (Indian) friends and it's much less common with them than it is with Bangladeshis.

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i think it has something to do with terrorism, i'm not sure though.

 

Lol this isn't a bengali thing. This is a illegal credit card scam thing.

 

Okay guys. Luckily one of my best friends from my trip to India last year is Bengali, so I messaged her this morning and got the scoop on how something like this could happen.

She said basically the origin of the surname (sometimes/usually/maybe) comes from the family guru, but most are very old and people don't really know the family guru anymore.

But it's also common for women to have different surnames than the men, but they sort of share the same root. For example, a girl might have the surname "Ganguly", while her father/brother would have the surname "Gangopadhyay". Also a girl with the surname "Banerjee" would have a father with the surname "Bandopadhyay". Those were just examples she gave.

Also, she said among a certain caste of Bengalis, the "Brahmins", the men have the option to inherit a different surname than their father. (although the women don't have the choice) So it's entirely possible that a guy could have different last names with every other male in his family, and still have a different last name than his sister.

Anyway, hopefully this was enlightening and didn't offend any of my ClutchFan brethren, but I definitely learned something.

Also, take it with somewhat of a grain of salt, because it was all based on my interpretation of the comments of a 20 something girl I know in India, but she's definitely not an American, and she IS Bengali, so I trust her knowledge on the subject.

 

Racist thread?

 

terrible. rofl.