Ayana (name)

Ayana is a name known in several unrelated languages around the world, such as Japanese, Kikongo, Oromo, and Turkic.

Japanese
Ayana (あやな, アヤナ) is a feminine Japanese given name which can be written using different kanji with different meanings:
 * 彩菜, "colorful, greens"
 * 彩那, "colorful, what"
 * 彩名, "colorful, name"
 * 綾奈, "design, what"
 * 朱菜, "vermilion, greens"

The name can also be written in either hiragana or katakana.

Kikongo
Ayana (Ah-yah-nah or Ay-yah-nah) is a unisex Bakongo name that means "they protected" or "they supported" in the Kongo language. Those who bear the name can be found in northwest Angola, southwest Democratic Republic of Congo, and among the African diaspora in the Americas.

People

 * Ayana (彩菜), Japanese singer-songwriter
 * Ayana Holloway Arce, American physicist
 * Ayana V. Jackson (born 1977), American photographer and filmmaker
 * Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, American marine biologist
 * Ayana Jordan, American addiction psychiatrist
 * Ayana Onozuka (彩那), Japanese freestyle skier
 * Ayana Sakai (彩名), Japanese actress
 * Ayana Shahab (アヤナ), Japanese-Indonesian singer
 * Ayana Siriwardhana (born 1999), Sri Lankan cricketer
 * Ayana Taketatsu (彩奈), Japanese voice actress
 * Ayana Tsubaki (彩菜), Japanese transgender TV personality
 * Ayana Walker (born 1979), American basketball player
 * Ayana Zholdas (born 2001), Kazakhstani freestyle skier
 * Dawud Ibsa Ayana (born 1952), Ethiopian political figure and militant