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What I know already:

When stating her name, Turanga Leela's surname comes first (her parents' names are Turanga Morris and Turanga Munda).

Some cultures put the surname last, others put it first.

What I want to know is, do we know specifically why the Turanga family puts the surname first? Has it ever been stated in an episode, or through some official channel, what culture they come from that would lead them to do this (Hungary? India?)? or is there some other reason - the mutants do this, for instance?

Valorum
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Octopus
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  • Does anyone know what culture they are from? Perhaps it is normal to put the family name first in that culture? – M. A. Golding Apr 04 '18 at 05:10
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    Where do we see her parents putting their surnames first? – phs Apr 04 '18 at 06:39
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    Because Leela's name is a pun on the Turangalila symphony by Messiaen. Not sure there's any other reason. – Daniel Roseman Apr 04 '18 at 07:23
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    Definitely not a duplicate. I saw and read that question before posting this. It does not answer my question. – Octopus Apr 04 '18 at 17:54
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    Gnovice's answer specifically addresses this "Leela's family appears to follow the same tradition, with "Turanga" being their surname, not "Leela". This suggests they may be of Hungarian or East Asian descent." – Valorum Apr 04 '18 at 18:04
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    Just slapping "was this ever addressed in an episode" onto a dupe doesn't make it not a dupe since if it was addressed in an episode, that would have been mentioned in the answers to the dupe. – Valorum Apr 04 '18 at 18:06
  • @phs, your comment question is answered in the first sentence. – Octopus Apr 04 '18 at 18:12
  • @ M.A.Golding, yes, some cultures do that. So what is it about Leela's culture that explains this? – Octopus Apr 04 '18 at 18:13
  • @Valorum, I am asking for an official canon answer not a "this suggests" hypothesis. If there isn't one then that would be the correct answer to my non-duplicated answer. – Octopus Apr 04 '18 at 18:17
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    I've also opened a question about this in Meta: – RDFozz Apr 04 '18 at 21:17
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    The answer is that there is no answer. The Infosphere page I linked to in my answer to the linked duplicate provides some speculation in the "Trivia" section. But speculation is all there is, so there really isn't anything more that can be added besides what I put in my answer. – gnovice Apr 05 '18 at 16:42
  • Note that, apart from the name order, Turanga Leela does not look or sound Hungarian. (For one thing, Leela would be pronounced something like /leh-eh-lah/ in Hungarian. /Lee-lah/ would be spelled Líla. Which is still not a Hungarian name: lila is the word for purple, and Lilla is a name, but neither of those is pronounced quite like Leelah.) – Martha Apr 08 '18 at 05:38
  • @Martha 'Líla' and 'Lila' sounds similar enough and it won't be the first time a Hungarian name would be associated with a color, there is also the popular girl name 'Piroska' (piros = red) which is the hungarian name of Little Red Riding Hood. There's also 'Ibolya'. All this is pure speculation of course - as was pointed out, there is no canon answer. –  Apr 08 '18 at 11:55
  • @DanielRoseman I think your comment provides the only known answer, even if it's an out-of-universe one. I was going to write it and then noticed your comment. – Ram Apr 08 '18 at 15:04
  • @Lt. Ortega, actually, Piroska comes from a form of Priscilla (or possibly from a rhyming nickname for Irene); it has nothing to do with the color, at least not by origin. (This is according to Ladó János, Magyar Utónévkönyv, i.e. the authority on Hungarian given names.) And Ibolya is after the flower, not after the color-that-is-named-for-the-flower. – Martha Apr 08 '18 at 16:21
  • @Martha sure, what i am saying that those names now associated with colors. (like ibolya(kék) after the color of the flower, and Piros(ka) after the tale. –  Apr 08 '18 at 16:29
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    Reopened based on meta consensus. Although I don't know anything about Futurama, that's a pretty clear show of hands (votes) for reopening. – Rand al'Thor Apr 10 '18 at 20:13
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    Reopened again and locked. Not sure why people are so keen to go against meta consensus on this one. – Rand al'Thor Apr 14 '18 at 06:19

1 Answers1

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In-universe: We don´t know/Out of universe answer: to match the title of a symphonie

We don't know which culture Leela's family belong to or if all mutants use family names first.

However one Easter egg hidden in Futurama is the naming of Turanga Leela after the Turangalîla-Symphonie, a large-scale piece of orchestral music by Olivier Messiaen.

The author derived the title from two Sanskrit words, turanga and lîla, which roughly translate into English as "love song and hymn of joy, time, movement, rhythm, life, and death"and described the joy of Turangalîla as "superhuman, overflowing, dazzling and abandoned". This last description applies to some aspects of Leela's character.

There is a canon reference for this out of universe answer since Leela has a copy of this piece in her appartment. enter image description here

(/speculation begins) The lîla Sanskrit word sounds much more like a given name, it seems the authors went with that and, to leave her name like the title of the symphonie, put her family name first. (/end speculation)

Ram
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  • Which episode is the shot from, do you know? – Octopus Apr 11 '18 at 22:37
  • @Octopus It's "Fry and Leela's Big Fling" – Ram Apr 12 '18 at 01:25
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    This is the correct answer the my question. The other post to which this one was marked as dupe, unmarked and then remarked, never ever provided any such answer and was apparently settled six years ago with perfectly acceptable answers for that particular question. Which is plenty of evidence that this is not a dupe. Thank you for settling my question. – Octopus Apr 12 '18 at 18:12
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    @Octopus there was a somewhat similar speculation, but it was deleted (probably because there was no evidence provided to support it. the answer can be seen by 10K + rep users) "The Turangas are French, their surname being after an opera named Turangalila Simphonie. Leela sounds more like of a given name than Turanga, so they decided to make it so ..." –  Apr 12 '18 at 21:55