quasinames

Quasinames are name-like items that function as proper names in discourse but do not point to a specific real-world entity. The term is used in onomastics, linguistics, and data privacy to describe placeholders that resemble names without fixed referents, allowing researchers and writers to discuss naming behavior without implying actual identities.

Etymology and usage: The term combines quasi- with names, signaling their partial resemblance to real names. It appears in scholarly discussions as a label for name-like tokens that are not anchored to identifiable individuals, places, or organizations in the world.

Characteristics: Quasinames are typically capitalized or styled like proper nouns and may participate in normal syntactic processes as if they were genuine names. However, their referents are ambiguous or intentionally omitted. They can be language- or domain-specific and may be regenerated or generalized across texts, serving as stable placeholders for analysis or storytelling.

Applications: In natural language processing, quasinames help test coreference resolution, named-entity recognition, and anonymization methods by providing name-like input without revealing real identities. In fiction and world-building, authors may use quasinames as provisional labels for characters or places during draft stages. In data privacy, quasinames function as anonymized identifiers that preserve structural properties of names while preventing identification.

Examples: In a dataset, tokens such as "CharacterA," "Place01," or "Name_X" can operate as quasinames, offering a controlled stand-in for real entities. In a story, a city referred to initially as "Quentis" before an official naming develops can illustrate a quasiname’s role in narrative framing.

See also: placeholders, pseudonyms, anonymized identifiers, named-entity recognition, coreference resolution.