Cherita
Feminine
Cherita is an American name that is also, by complete coincidence, a Malay word and the name of a poetic form. Cerita means a story in Malay and Indonesian, and a small English-language poetry form invented in the 1990s took the word as its name — six lines, told in one, two and three, and meant to tell a story.
How old is the name Cherita?
Cherita first appears in US birth records in 1948 — 77 years ago. The typical Cherita alive today was born around 1976, making them about 49 years old. About 1,000 people named Cherita are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Cherita most popular?
Cherita peaked in 1975, reaching #1935 nationally. See the whole 1975 chart.
Where it comes from
From a productive American front element and a Latin ending to Cherita
The story of Cherita
The poetic form is a genuinely small piece of literary history. It was devised in the late 1990s by a poet writing in English, on the model of Japanese short forms but with a different shape: six lines in three stanzas of one, two and three lines, each stanza able to stand alone and the whole telling a single story. The name was taken from the Malay word deliberately. It is one of the very few verse forms whose invention can be dated to a particular year and attributed to a particular person, which is more than can be said for the sonnet.
Meaningnot established
Not established
As an American name this is almost certainly built from the front element that produced Cheryl, Cherie and Cherise, with one of the endings that were available to attach to anything in the middle of the last century. The Malay word is unrelated and the resemblance is an accident of two languages using the same alphabet. It is worth mentioning precisely because it is the kind of coincidence that gets written up in name books as an etymology.
How the name formed
- a productive American front element and a Latin ending
- Cherita appears in the record in the 1940s
- peaks in the middle 1970s
- a Malay word for a story names a poetic form
- the two remain entirely unconnected
Related forms: Cherie · Sherita
Pronouncing Cherita
shuh-REE-tuh
Three syllables with the weight in the middle. The ch is a sh sound, following the French front the name is built on, which English readers get right about half the time.
Nicknames for Cherita
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1948
- Most girls named
- 198047 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1935reached in 1975
- Change vs 1994
- −50.0%5 in 1998, from 10
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Cherita in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Cherie in English — related form
- Sherita in English — spelling variant
Cheritas among us
people named Cherita are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Cherita sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- Rita is waiting inside it as a complete and entirely established name.
- The rhythm is the three-beat one English handles most comfortably.
- It is genuinely uncommon while sounding entirely familiar.
- The ch will be read as a hard church sound by readers who have not met it.
- There is no meaning to give her, and the Malay coincidence is not one.
- It is closely dated to the middle decades of the last century.
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Cherita
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Cheritas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,000 people named Cherita are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Cherita in 2025?
- Cherita is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Cherita with classmates?
- Cherita will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More C names
The most-given names starting with C, all years combined.
Carol#2239 · Cynthia#1013 · Catherine#313 · Christine#1272 · Carolyn#1222 · Christina#770 · Charlotte#2 · Cheryl#4352
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Cherita? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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