If You Want to Be My Ally Learn to Say My Name

It used to be thought in ancient cultures that if you held someone’s true name, you held power over them. In modern times we lead with our names, they travel out before us, introducing us to the world and holding images in the receiver’s mind.

They hold no power over us, at least not as once believed, or do they?

Does the willful lack of effort to speak a person’s true name, to pronounce it correctly, to not shorten it or create a simplified nickname that is easier for you to say or fit better with the words you are more commonly used to, is that not having power over someone? But in this case, having the power to minimise them and all they are?

When we pick our children’s names, we feel into what resonates with them, with the family they are growing into, with the person they are about to be.

As a writer when I pick names for fictional characters it’s not an easy task. The storylines and narratives may be conjured out of the ether or evolve organically, but picking a name is something else. In picking a name, we create an instant image of a person. Who they are, what they might be about, and where they come from. A name brings with it many assumptions and stereotypes. But in a time when most of us (I like to think) are trying our hardest to understand the micro-aggressions that people of colour experience daily, understanding our responses to people’s names would be a good starting point.

I’m Nigerian Irish and I have four names. Two first and two last. Two from my mother and two from my father. I always jokingly said that they couldn’t decide, and both refused to concede the argument, so they slotted them together, a perfect reflection of the combination of the two of them.

I later found that having a ‘white’ name and your given name is actually a very common practice. All to enable us to walk and work in a world, not always ready to welcome the foreigner. A name that could offer you entrance to doors that might otherwise remain closed, and sadly that is exactly what I have found to be true.

My name is Adeola, my friends know me as Adeola, I’ve always been Adeola. It’s who I am, and it’s at the core of my identity but yet whenever I am when I have to deal with anything official my name reverts to Maria because I know that this unconfrontational, neutral, and ambiguous name will always be more easily welcomed.

If I’m on the phone dealing with utility companies or government departments my name is Maria.

If I am trying to rent a property, when I call to register my interest, Adeola has nothing to do with it and Maria is sent out to work.

I know full well that there will always be a different response depending on which name I give, and I cannot rely on the person seeing my face and meeting me to overcome the prejudices that live within their minds, unconsciously or not.

So, I use the safe route. I choose Maria.

But then there are all the times I introduce myself as Adeola and the person frowns or asks me to repeat my name over and over as if they just can’t compute what I am saying, and then repeatedly gets it wrong even though my name is pronounced exactly as it is written.

It might seem like a small thing. It is definitely one of the things I most commonly brush under the carpet, laugh off, make a joke at my own expense and reassure the other person about.

‘No, don’t worry, Maria is fine.’

But it isn’t fine. My parents gave me a name. A name with meaning and power. A name connected to my ancestry, and importantly a name that I love, and want to be known by.

I would wager that every person of colour feels the same way, and further, every person of non-white western origin has a similar experience and also feels the same way.

Pronunciation matters. It shows that you have respect for the person and a desire to welcome all of them, not just the parts that are most comfortable and fit in with your world.

What’s in a name? Everything.