Lately I’ve gotten a wee bit obsessed with the notion of names, and how they influence our personalities, identities and relationships.
In The Crucible, Daniel Day-Lewis John Proctor chucks a major fit when asked to sign a false confession of witchcraft. Why? It was all about the name. Check his reasons for nixing the signature:
Because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life! Because I lie and sign myself to lies! Because I am not worth the dust on the feet of them that hang! How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!
Too right: our names define us. They represent us. They embarrass us when people spell them wrong. In fact, according to an essay found on a random purple webpage, “people generally resent the mispronunciation of their name because mispronunciation amounts to a distortion of their identity”.
All this is interesting, yes? (Please say yes.) Well, I reckon it is. So I made a video about names, featuring a special guest: my unusually named sister. Here t’is.
If you’re in a sharing mood, I’d love to know the story of your name: where it came from, whether you like it, and how it has affected your identity.
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
Shortcake death! hilarious!
I think your sister was named ahead of the digital wave – she’s ‘eClair’.
I have the English variations of the two most common names to come out of the Latin based language family for my first and second names. So I guess you could safely say mine has quietly sat in the corner of my psyche in cardigan and slippers doing a crossword wondering what all the dreadful noise and ruckus coming from Mr Id’s flat upstairs is about.
I feel your pain, Shortcake. When I was 8, I won the McDonald’s Star Wars colouring competition. Big news at the time – art historians will recall the Sun Herald announcement. It was hailed a masterpiece that pushed the boundaries of the artform, without once straying outside the lines. My efforts were to be rewarded with a Millenium Falcon 1:72 scale model, featuring cut-away ceiling hatch, light-up exhaust and fully functional hyperdrive. When we fronted up to claim my prize, the head hamburglar informed us that, since my entry form appeared to be attributed to a girl’s name, I’d actually won a single Princess Leia action figure (Bespin gown ensemble, no less). Talk about your gender remuneration inequity.
Such incidents continue to vex my days with wearisome regularity but these days I have more of a sense of humour about it. I sometimes wonder if I’d have turned out any less of a socially inept freak if I’d gone through life with a more conventional moniker. Probably not. Maybe a unique name can actually turn out to be character building. And I think to change mine would feel a bit like getting cosmetic surgery – walking around with a protuberance that I know deep down, isn’t truly my own.
My name is Joel Abram Reed. My first and middle names come from the Bible, but as for its effects on my identity… It was a pain when I was younger as several things rhyme with Joel such as hole, mole, and bowl. So insults were easy for even the simple minded to make up. Later in life it because something cool to me because I wasn’t a Bob or a John, so its more unique I guess. Also its fun to sign things with just my initials… JAR
Your sister DOES have a hybrid accent! It’s awesome.
At school, kids would shout, “Nick! Hide!” at me. It’s as funny now as it was then.
My full name doesn’t fit on licence application forms (and most other government forms). The number of middle names went up in 2002 when the NSW Police Force told me to either change my name or fill in a new application using my then full family name. Counting my current given names and family name I have 5 (the rest of the kids have 5 names, but 3 given names and 2 family names). Another thing my parents decided, all the kids names start with J. Being the eldest, I got the new clothes and the others got hand me downs. Getting mail and phone calls were interesting. When asked which J K they wanted: female narrowed it down to 1, but when wanting male, there were still 3 to choose from. And if they asked for Mr. K there were 4 to choose from (Mrs K only 1, Miss K only 1).
My name “Yann” is a Brythonnic Celtic version the English John, the Danish and German Jan and the French Jean, one of the most spread name in Europe with equivalents in pretty much most Latin and Germanic languages. This version is from the western region of Brittany in France. Now living in Netherlands, where the equivalent Jan is quite common, Dutch keep (usually on purpose
on calling me “Jean”, although i do my utmost best to act as un-French as possible. Though not a French name per se, it seems to only be used there, principally in Brittany.
I love my name. When I was born my parents were under a lot of pressure to name me after various family members. Name him after uncle Jack or Grampa James and so on. In order to not show favouritism to anybody my dad, a history major, researched it and named me after nobody in the family.
You see, Marcus means the son of war, Mars. It is the most common name for a Roman emperor. Now when the Romans got to Scotland, they looked at the MacGregors and said’ “You know, I’ve had enough of conquest. Let’s build a wall and go home” Not a lot of Roman/Scottish overlap.
So I’m the only Marcus MacGregor. When I want a username of marcusmacgregor I get a “sure”, rather than “would you like marcusmacgregor2784?”. It actually weirds me out when I don’t get it. That’s usually when a Mark or a Mcgregor alters their name slightly. Although marcusmacgregor.com is currently held by a name camping company. LOL. I think they can wait until it expires.
When I google myself I get, me, me ,me, oh yeah I remember that, oh man who’s talking about me now. It’s like an instant scrapbook.
If you know another Marcus MacGregor, email me at my hotmail account.
My name is Mark. I was named this because my parents wanted to leave their “mark” on the world. My job is being a camera assistant in film and television. In the course of my job I take a lot of marks, so I think I was aptly named. I thought of the cameras as soon as your sister said her name.
My official Ukrainian name is “Tatiana,” but everyone in my family called me “Tanya.” When we moved to the U.S. just in time for first grade, I decided to start off as exclusively as “Tatiana” (because I thought it sounded more mature), and I tirelessly corrected everyone who called me anything else. Then for some perfectly logical reason I can’t quite recall, I decided by the second grade that hereto-forth I shall only be called “Tanya”. THEN in middle school, I got so sick of teachers calling me “Tatyana,” that I convinced my mother to legally change my name to “Tania” (with – I thought – prettier and less Russian-looking spelling than “Tanya”). And so I remain until something possesses me to try something new. What I’ve learned though is that names are like uniforms, you feel different depending on what you have on, so choose carefully.
P.S. Ella I love, love your blog.
My name means “God’s light” in hindi. It’s pronounced “They-bo-jo-thi”. I used to have a lot of trouble with it when I was a kid, I was pretty adamant not to shorten it or anything, but people in N.A. (bless their souls) can’t make such sounds come from their mouths, so they called me anything under the sun, from deboti, to deBOjoti, debra, and some fun ones like debohottie and debohotstuff. It’s all fun and games but I agree that mispronunciation is a distortion of who I am, and it I think has greatly affected my early years. Not quite fitting in, with the added + of being an immigrant. People have decided to change me because it is easier to do so and remain ignorant. I admit I have grown accustom to it. I’ve embraced the abbreviation “Deebo”. I wonder if I would have grown-up to be different if I had forced people to say my name right…I love my name, it’s a reflection of my culture, of the love my parents had for me and my brother (who also had a similar name, and changed it to Dave) and i think it’s sweet. I think though that since we adapted our names better to our society, we were more easily accepted and things just became a little easier. I sometimes wish I hadn’t made such a sacrifice of my morals to appease a severely ignorant (albeit, against their will perhaps) nation of easy to remember mostly two syllable names…I definitely do appreciate people who put an interest in it and I understand affectionate or friendly nicknames, but i suppose it’s just the society. Even back where my name originates, things are starting to change…I should start an army of interesting name-d people and party about, then maybe we can gain popularity and eventually rule the world…
My name is Dax. It’s of french origin, but it really have it roots on the gauls that inhabited the northern part of France, many many years ago. I like my name, short and easy to remember. I’m not French or live in France; actually I live in Panama (Republic of), my dad is of spanish descendant and my mother is chinese, so go figure. My mom named me after the main character of a novel she was reading when she was pregnant. This is where things get weird…. my second name is Tennessee. Yes…. I’ve said it! I was named not after the state but after Tennessee Williams, an american author. So living in a country where everybody speaks spanish was a little bit tough for me. Nobody could pronounce or spell my name correctly. I still struggle with it.
but I’m happy about my names. They are unique, on a country that everybody is named Juan, Pablo or Carlos.
I’ve finished reading your blog and I wanted to reply to some of the posts, but I am afraid that my commentary might be unsolicited especially if they are too long or not particularly interesting. So that’s why I made a post here if you have some time to waste.
http://kiselazelka.blogspot.com/2010/06/whats-your-name-my-whole-name-is-elitsa.html