Pseudonym

A pseudonym (Greek: false name) is a fictitious name used by an individual as an alternative to their legal name (whereas an allonym is the name of another actual person assumed by one person in authorship of a work of art; e.g., when ghostwriting a book or play, or in parody, or when using a front such as by screenwriters blacklisted in Hollywood in the '50s, '60s, and '70s).

Other pseudonyms

Others in public life have adopted pseudonyms for many reasons. In the late eighteenth to early nineteenth centuries, it was established practice for political articles to be signed with pseudonyms, the most famous American example being the pen name Publius, used by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, in writing The Federalist Papers. Malcolm X, the civil rights campaigner, (born Malcolm Little), adopted the 'X' to represent his unknown African ancestral name. Many Jewish politicians re-adopted Hebrew family names on return to Israel, dropping westernized versions that may have been in the family for generations; Golda Meir, for example, was born Golda Mabovitz in Russia, and lived in USA before emigrating to Palestine; she adopted her Hebrew name on becoming a government minister in 1956.

Related Topics:
Eighteenth - Nineteenth - Publius - Alexander Hamilton - James Madison - John Jay - The Federalist Papers - Malcolm X - Golda Meir

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Famous pseudonyms of people who were neither authors nor actors include:

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• Le Corbusier, the architect, was Charles Édouard Jeanneret.
• Aphex Twin, prolific techno artist Richard D. James, who uses up to 11 other different names on various releases.
• Alan Smithee is a name commonly used by directors who want to disown their own movie.
• George Spelvin and Georgina Spelvin are names used in American theater when the actor playing the part is unknown at printing time, wishes to remain anonymous, or the part is double cast or played by an actor who plays more than one character in the cast.
• Luther Blissett is a shared pseudonym often used for activist and artistic purposes, especially in the Italian art scene.
• David Agnew is used on BBC programmes where a writer's name cannot be used for contractual reasons.
• Nicolas Bourbaki was a famous pseudonym for a group of mathematicians.
• Student was William Sealey Gosset, discoverer of Student's t-distribution in statistics.
• Hambali is Riduan Isamuddin, the leader of Jemaah Islamiah, a terrorist group; he was born Encep Nurjaman

On the internet, pseudonymous remailers utilising cryptography can be used to achieve persistent pseudonymity, so that two-way communication can be achieved, and reputations can be established without linking a physical identity to a pseudonym.

Related Topics:
Pseudonymous remailer - Cryptography - Pseudonymity - Identity

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Users on Namespaces such as Wikipedia also often use a pseudonym instead of their birth names.

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