August 15, 2025
One of the first things you notice in Bali is that many so people share the same name. Your driver is named Wayan but so is your waitress and so is the clerk who sells you a sarong in a shop. Or over the course of a couple of days you may meet five Ketuts. Or several Mades (pronounced Ma-day). Four Kadeks.
What the hell is going on?
People in Bali are given names based on their birth order.
The first-born child in a family is named Wayan (for a boy or girl), Putu or Eka for a girl, Gede for a boy, all meaning child #1.
The second child in a family will be called Made, Kadek or Nengah.
When a child is third in the family, they’re named Komang (sometimes shortened to Mang) or Nyoman.
And the name for child number four is Ketut, male or female.
So what if a family has a fifth child?
They go back to the names given for the first child and the fifth child also becomes a Wayan, Putu. Gede or Eke.
Number six will be a Kadek, Made or Nengah again. Back to number two.
That’s why there are so many people in Bali using the same name.
To distinguish one from another, children are often given a nickname that may be rooted in some aspect of their physical appearance or character.
In Bali, there is no such thing as a family name or a last name.
If a child is given one of the unisex names, the Balinese identify that child as male or female (there is no concept of continuum of gender here) with a prefix: I (pronounced “eee”) is used for a boy and Ni for a female.
So, our Balinese leader, Surya’s full name is I Made Suryasa.
There’s another aspect to Balinese naming protocol. Names not only identify birth order; they also identify a person’s caste. Ninety percent of the Balinese belong to the lowest caste—sudra—and the naming conventions already mentioned apply to all of them.
But prefixes such as Gusti, Anak Agung or Ida Bagus reveal a different family legacy. These names let you know that the person you’re dealing with is from the middle, high or Brahman caste.
The second caste, called Wesya, can be recognized by the title Gusti, Kompyang, Dewa or Sang in their names.
The high caste group, the Ksatria, includes nobility and royals. Different ranks in this group have their own titles. Kings and their direct family have the prefix Anak Agung, shortened to AA before their name. Or Tjokorda, shortened to Tjok.
Above all these groups is the highest cast, the Brahman caste. Brahmans are traditionally the high priests, the religious and spiritual leaders, and the advisors of the royal family. They go by the name Ida Bagus for men and Ida Ayu for females.
So, a name in Bali is far more than a name. It identifies your gender, your placement in your family and your social status.
After listening to Judy’s lecture about this, three of us got into a conversation about this on our way to Tirta Ganga yesterday. What would it be like to live in a culture where your place in life and in society is established and broadcast to everyone you meet through your name? In the US, you can freely change your name and identity, “pull yourself up from your bootstraps,” and alter your social and economic status. That’s the theory anyway.
In Bali, the first question someone asks is about your home village and family. In the US, it’s usually, “What do you do?”
For the Balinese, identify is wrapped up in how the individual fits in a larger family puzzle. This can create a sense of security, belonging and being grounded. In Bali, there aren’t homeless people. Someone can always return to their family compound for rice.
In the United States, this isn’t the way things are. There isn’t the same cohesion in families and communities, close-knit families that stay put and often live together. Who we are isn’t evident when we speak our name.
As Joanie said, “I love my outrigger paddling club. We all share a love of the water, but we really don’t know anything about each other.” And later, “I would not want to be defined by my family, that’s for sure.”
There are advantages and disadvantages to being clearly defined and locked into one identity, rather than having the freedom to “reinvent ourselves.”
And what if the Balinese don’t conform to the patriarchal norms of their culture? What if they’re queer or trans or don’t want to marry or fulfill the gender roles expected in traditional Balinese family life? When we asked Judy that question, she said, “They move to the cities.”