Have you ever thought about your name? The word that gets your attention. The word that makes people think of you. The idea of choosing a name for a child is often a stressful one for parents-to-be, and for good reason. By choosing a name for your child you are inadvertently impacting them and how people may perceive them. For example, if someone walked up to you and said, “Hi, my name is Tom, short for Tomato” you may be weirded out and think of that person as strange though you have no idea about who they are as a person. On the other hand, if someone came up to you and said, “Hi, my name is Joseph” you would not think anything of it. Many people don’t know the actual definition of your name. (find yours here!)
In lecture we learned that Vanayak (Dr. Chaturvedi) got his name from a doctor when he was 6 months old. He later found out that he was given this name because the doctor was a supporter of Vanayak Savarkar and later was a part of the assassination of Gandhi. Also, his name was seen as strange to many people in India, as it was from a different region than his last names and you can often locate where someone is from based on their name in India. He was not named until he was 6 months old because they do not name babies in India until they are sure they are going to survive infancy. This is a strange concept to people in America, many of whom were probably named before they were ever born and officially named on the day of their birth.
A couple years ago I planned a baby shower for my cousin. She was really interested in the meaning of names, she originally wanted to name her baby Lorelei, but found out that it meant temptress. She ended up naming her baby Leanna, meaning light. So, when I was planning the games I had the idea to take the names of everyone attending the shower and make a matching game to the meaning of their names. Everyone in attendance thought it was fun to learn what their name meant, many did not know prior and had to guess.
After learning the meanings something interesting happened, everyone started to see how the meaning of each person’s name could be seen as a part of who the person was. My Aunt Christine, who’s name means Christian is a very religious person and goes to church every Sunday that she is able. My name, Rebecca, means binding. My mom knew the meaning when naming me and thought it was a strong name, keeping people together, connecting to others, creating a lasting bond. I don’t want to say that I do all of those things, because let’s face it, that seems a little arrogant. However, that is something I aspire to do. I want to be a teacher one day and if I could bind my students to one another, or to math, or make any lasting positive impact on them, then I think I would feel more accomplished than if I won the Olympics.
Our names have a big influence on our lives outside of who we are. The Romans would say “nomen est omen” meaning “name is destiny”. This is a really cool concept. Subconsciously we relate certain names to different occupations, backgrounds, ethnicities, and social class. These assumptions are often wrong, however it doesn’t matter when we have already made them. Names are almost a pre-first impression when it comes to jobs, social networks, or basically any format in which you see the persons name prior to meeting them face-to face. And sometimes when you see what someone looks like, you might say to yourself, “they seem like a Rachel” (something I get A LOT). But why do I look like a Rachel? Why does that old lady feeding the birds look like a Mildred? Why does anyone look like they should be named anything? Answer: we stereotype names in our heads based on those that we have seen/met with certain types of names.
Some people even change their names to better suit their personality or have stage names. Lady Gaga’s real name is Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, but that isn’t a very catchy name and wouldn’t be as easy to market as the iconic Lady Gaga. Just think, you can change the way that people view you just by changing your name. I feel like you define who you are throughout your life and either grow into your name as you have defined it to yourself, or you feel as though your name does not accurately describe you.
If you could change your name, what would it be? Or would you keep the name you have?
Empire state of mind 
I have always had a fascination with names and their meanings which is why I naturally gravitated towards your post. I feel like I have honestly looked up the meaning and origin of all the names that belong to the people I know. Personally, I think the story behind Prof. Chatervedi’s name is extremely fascinating and I could only wish my name had a cool story behind it too, but sadly it does not. My name was basically randomly selected from an extensive baby book of names. That’s it. For this reason, I have always felt like I could honestly adopt any name since in reality it could have been anything. Either way, after 18 years of being called “Lizette,” I must say I have grown attached to it and I don’t think I would want to change it to some other name in particular. I also would not know what name I would choose.
I think that it is really cool that many of your family members were able to relate with the meaning of their name. The connection you have with your name, however, particularly stuck out to me. It is amazing that you were able to see the relationship between your future aspiration to be a teacher and your name’s meaning. I can’t help but think that you were destined to become a teacher and for that reason it is reflected in your name. It makes me wonder if everyone’s future could be traced back to their name.
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Rebecca, I think it’s really interesting and cool how you brought up the discussion of what’s in a name into this blog post. The point that you bring up that intrigues me the most is how we tend to stereotype a name based on those we know that carry that name. I remember in 9th grade geometry, we asked our teacher why he named his son “Troy”. His response was quite simple as he said plainly that he and his wife had never met someone named Troy, so it was a blank state. This carries over the concept of how we create our names and their definitions in a sense that not everybody named “Christine” is necessarily bound to be very religious. Possibly it can turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy if they become religious because they know the meaning behind their name and want to live up to it. Just some food for thought in that aspect, but I did enjoy your post very much!
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