Dakota

Dakota is wide country in three syllables. The name of the Siouan people and their language — the Dakota themselves translated the word as "allies" or "friends" — was borrowed by two American states, then by a generation of parents looking west in the 1990s. Dakota Fanning and Dakota Johnson sealed it as a serious feminine option; it has remained fully unisex throughout, currently sitting at 272. Three open syllables, the warm central O, the soft final A. Plains horizon on the tongue, neither cowboy nor hippie but something distinctly American. A nature-tied name that carries acknowledgment of an older history than its ranking suggests.