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Rant: Being "True" is No Excuse
One interesting phenomenon I've observed is that having written a baby-name book is a great conversation starter. Not because people then ask you interesting questions about naming practices and trends, but because everyone in the world is an expert on naming practices and trends and has only been waiting for the chance to show off this knowledge to someone who will truly and properly appreciate their expertise. (It may be a special-case variant of mansplaining, although of the more gender-neutral variety.)
But just as telling someone you're a linguist gets you inundated with that person's pet grammar peeves -- many of which will be completely wrong-headed -- telling someone you study names will result in you getting inundated with their pet name peeves. And it is unfortunate that some of the most popular and oft-told "terrible baby name" stories in American culture reflect cultural misunderstandings and cultural ignorance that can be extremely difficult to distinguish from racism.
I had one of those conversations recently and wish to offer some advice to the world at large. (I hope I don't need to offer it to my f-list but if a reader finds themself feeling defensive on reading this post ... think about it a bit before responding.) Names in one culture may be coincidentally similar to -- even phonetically identical to -- words in another culture. Sometimes the words they are similar/identical to have socially unfortunate meanings. This is not a reflection of the intelligence, common sense, or taste of the person so named or the person who chose the name.
Just for example (avoiding personal names for the moment), the King Dong Chinese restaurant in Berkeley was not named in reference to royal male organs. Once you get over your little adolescent giggle, try one of the lunch specials. Pretty much everything is delicious.
And, to get to the specific example from that conversation: if you start telling me a story about some African American woman you heard about (or met, or saw on TV) named LaTrina, and it is clear that the point of your story is "look how ignorant and uncultured the parents of this woman must have been to have named her after a toilet", do not get all defensive on me when I point out that your telling of this particular name anecdote creates a strong impression of racism on your part.
Never mind for the moment that about 99% of the time when stories about this name get told it's a Friend-of-a-Friend story with all the usual fictionality of a FoaF. Because being "true" is no excuse. The question is why are you telling this story? About this particular name? While ignoring the larger sociolinguistic context in which this name exists (and in which it is completely unremarkable)? While ignoring the fact that "latrina" itself is not even a word in English? Why? Because, you see, your telling of this story about this name does not exist in a vacuum. There are lots of stories you could tell about names that sound odd to you within your narrow cultural experience. But you told this one. And you are one of a large number of people who tell this same story about this same name. (And remember: I've spent a lot of time listening to people tell me stories about names and naming practices.) And I can follow contextual implication as well as the next person, and it's blazingly clear that the story was not meant to be a neutral commentary on a coincidental similarity of sound.
So when you tell me a "funny" story about a woman named LaTrina, don't get all huffy when I point out to you what the story says about you.
But just as telling someone you're a linguist gets you inundated with that person's pet grammar peeves -- many of which will be completely wrong-headed -- telling someone you study names will result in you getting inundated with their pet name peeves. And it is unfortunate that some of the most popular and oft-told "terrible baby name" stories in American culture reflect cultural misunderstandings and cultural ignorance that can be extremely difficult to distinguish from racism.
I had one of those conversations recently and wish to offer some advice to the world at large. (I hope I don't need to offer it to my f-list but if a reader finds themself feeling defensive on reading this post ... think about it a bit before responding.) Names in one culture may be coincidentally similar to -- even phonetically identical to -- words in another culture. Sometimes the words they are similar/identical to have socially unfortunate meanings. This is not a reflection of the intelligence, common sense, or taste of the person so named or the person who chose the name.
Just for example (avoiding personal names for the moment), the King Dong Chinese restaurant in Berkeley was not named in reference to royal male organs. Once you get over your little adolescent giggle, try one of the lunch specials. Pretty much everything is delicious.
And, to get to the specific example from that conversation: if you start telling me a story about some African American woman you heard about (or met, or saw on TV) named LaTrina, and it is clear that the point of your story is "look how ignorant and uncultured the parents of this woman must have been to have named her after a toilet", do not get all defensive on me when I point out that your telling of this particular name anecdote creates a strong impression of racism on your part.
Never mind for the moment that about 99% of the time when stories about this name get told it's a Friend-of-a-Friend story with all the usual fictionality of a FoaF. Because being "true" is no excuse. The question is why are you telling this story? About this particular name? While ignoring the larger sociolinguistic context in which this name exists (and in which it is completely unremarkable)? While ignoring the fact that "latrina" itself is not even a word in English? Why? Because, you see, your telling of this story about this name does not exist in a vacuum. There are lots of stories you could tell about names that sound odd to you within your narrow cultural experience. But you told this one. And you are one of a large number of people who tell this same story about this same name. (And remember: I've spent a lot of time listening to people tell me stories about names and naming practices.) And I can follow contextual implication as well as the next person, and it's blazingly clear that the story was not meant to be a neutral commentary on a coincidental similarity of sound.
So when you tell me a "funny" story about a woman named LaTrina, don't get all huffy when I point out to you what the story says about you.
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That's an interesting perspective, thanks.
I find I'm often rolling my eyes when people tell me (usually smugly) that "their dog is a racist" without wondering what it might say about themselves.