Like most things in the world, this threatens to open up a can of worms. Let's say I'm trying to describe a student with a name like Dejanay. What do I call her instead? Something like "Yolanda"? That seems a little racist. "Yolanda" is a perfectly reasonable sounding name if it is connected to a girl who is actually named Yolanda who is sitting in front of you, having a conversation; "Yolanda" is an uncomfortable stereotype if it is simply the black sounding name that I give to Dejanay because she needs another black sounding name to replace her own black sounding name. For that matter, what if I am describing one of Dejanay's classmates, a [black] girl named something like Brenna? Do I give Brenna a name that is as non-black-sounding as "Brenna"? Do I call her "Casey" or some similar bullshit just because her name is Brenna? It sure as hell seems like I shouldn't call Brenna "Yolanda"; oh my god. Maybe it's safer to give both Dejanay and Brenna nice racially-neutral names like "Michelle". That's a fine name for people of all colors (Obama, Pfieffer, Kwan, etc). But this sounds like a dishonest and futile attempt to render these characters cultural/racial eunuchs. They're black children from one of the blackest cities in the country. Am I pretending black names don't exist?"Get over it!" you might say, disgusted. "This is stupid and embarrassing." Unfortunately, this is the thing about race. Oh, you can want to get over it. You can know that it's stupid and embarrassing. But, it won't go the fuck away. As far as I can see it, there is only one solution to this problem: in my writing, I will give all of the children the very whitest names possible. Fortunately, the smug assholes that wrote that sort of interesting book Freakonomics have done a regression or something to ferret out the whitest names in the contemporary American book. Thanks, dudes.
Coming up next: fun with Jake, Molly, Connor, and Claire.
They forgot Peyton, Hayden, and Junior. I mean, cmon.
ReplyDeletenow i can't write that post where i advertise new super mario brothers wii because it'll look like i'm copying you. i thought that you wanted me to blog more, not less?
ReplyDeletei like the freakonomics podcast, but they always start every show with the same prerecorded intro banter where they do a bit. It gets so old. Also once they did an episode where they explored the idea that maybe being obese was not a health problem and the only expert they had to back up that possibility was some dipshit academic from the social sciences. I hope that the economist wasn't involved with making that particular episode (he doesn't seem to be involved with much to do with the podcast). Anyway, it's unusual that they bring pseudoscience into their podcasts, but they did it!
Jacob is a very white/Jewish name, plenty of people tell me that which I find mildly insulting.
ReplyDeleteJust use Marqueeta or D'Angelo (but flippantly, because you're NOT LIKE THAT).
ReplyDeleteWhy can't you just call them "Dirty Shirt" or "Stinky Feet" or "No Front Teeth"?
ReplyDeleteOr what have you?
Why do you think I named my daughter Claire? So people would know she is white!
ReplyDeleteJust kidding. It was so that she might be as classy as Claire Huxtable.
You can always use biblical names, btw. 'Cause them kids you worked with was Southern and we Southerners loves us some bible names irregardless of race.
I'm all for nicknames. It seems like you, specifically, would sleep better at night if you didn't have to enter this long, semantic night of the soul.
ReplyDeleteBiblical names is a great idea, actually. The density of lady names in the Old Testament is pretty small, but fortunately it's a pretty big book -- I think I can find enough to draw from. If, that is, I get around to writing anything else about it.
ReplyDeleteYes: "biblical names is".
ReplyDelete