Aisha

Meaning of Aisha

Derived from the Classical Arabic ʿĀʾisha, conventionally glossed as “alive” or “living,” Aisha entered the Anglophone lexicon through the global circulation of Islamic history, where it is indelibly linked to ʿĀʾisha bint Abī Bakr, the intellectual and politically influential wife of the Prophet Muḥammad and an authoritative transmitter of ḥadīth. This venerable association confers on the name an aura of scholarly acuity and resilient vitality, qualities further reinforced by its adoption across the Swahili-speaking regions of East Africa during the spread of Islam along the Indian Ocean trade routes. In the United States the name surfaced in Social Security records in modest numbers during the mid-twentieth century but rose sharply in the 1970s, a trajectory often interpreted by sociolinguists as reflecting wider Afrocentric and interfaith currents in African-American naming practices. Although its national rank has fluctuated—from a high of 171 in 1977 to the mid-300s in recent years—Aisha has maintained a steady annual presence, signaling a durable preference for a cross-cultural appellation that conjoins linguistic elegance with historical gravitas.

Pronunciation

Arabic

• Pronunced as eye-EE-sha (/aɪˈiːʃə/)

Swahili

• Pronunced as eye-SHAH (/aɪˈʃɑː/)

• Ayesha
• Aysha
• Asha
• Aicha
• Aesha
• Aishah
• Aisya