Something I've noticed and never seen addressed before in any of those "Do's and Don't's of Fanfiction" guides...the majority of OCs in modern-day stories have really boring surnames. We all know we're advised against giving an OC a name that is too cool, flowery, eye-catchingly unusual, or "meaningful," but what about the opposite problem?

What do I mean by boring? Maybe a better description would be too WASP. For some reason, despite the enormous ethnic diversity in the United States, 95% or better of OCs in stories taking place here have bog-standard English surnames like Thompson and Miller. I know such names are very common in the U.S., but not that common. Not 95%. You'd think in a group of five or six young American characters, at least one of them would have Hispanic heritage. Or Polish. Or Indian. Or Chinese. Or Italian. Or...you get the picture.

So what's going on? Are the writers doing this on purpose--giving their characters "normal"* surnames because the injunctions against "unusual" names are so heavily ingrained? Do they just not think of any non-English names? If the latter...goodness, how sheltered are these people? Don't they go to school? Don't any of their classmates have non-English names?


* The fact that English surnames are almost exclusively considered "normal" is a huge problem in itself.