Names are pretty important, because without them how would we recognize things? Names help us to figure out important information about a person. A name can tell society the gender, ancestry, and primary language of a person. Sometime it can even reveal the age of someone. This emphasis on the importance of a name has permeated American society. Studies conducted by Steven Levitt, an economics professor at the University of Chicago, have shown that resumes with stereotypical African-American names received less responses than identical resumes with stereotypical Caucasian names. This shows that the bias associated with names can result in discrimination.
My family name is one of the most important things I possess. It is unique, and nobody can take it away from me. I am proud to bear my family name, and while I cannot trace it back very far, I am glad that I have a distinct last name. I've always seen it as my responsibility to carry on, because I'm one of under 10 people in the United States with my family name. A name is something to be proud of, no matter the decisions of your ancestors. I want to make my name known in the world.
The problem of being an individual inside of a larger group is challenging. It applies to everyone, as they cannot help but be part of some larger group. I am an individual, but there are many other groups that I affiliate with. I see myself as belonging to my family, the Millbrook student body, a proud resident of North Carolina, as an American citizen, and as a member of a global community. These can cause conflicts sometimes, as there are many other groups that sometimes conflict. My identity as a Southerner sometimes conflicts with my views as an American citizen. The multiple ethnic identities I belong to often hate each other or are very complicated. My great-great-grandmother was an ethnic German living in Alsace-Lorraine, but was considered French by many people. Even today, people refuse to believe that a person from Alsace-Lorraine could be German. Overall, I belong to many groups, but identify more strongly with some than others.
It would be cool to know the history or lineage(?) of your last name.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with what you discuss in the first paragraph- someone else pointed this out when talking about the meaning of her middle name.
You brought up the importance of a name and how it affects your standing in society, and what kind of assumptions we make based on someone's name. My name, Christian-Dave Villazor, confuses most people. They don't' know what to expect, but a majority of the time they assume I'm Hispanic because of my last name. They then begin to form expectations because of this, and proceed to be surprised when they see I'm Asian. You should try to find the origins of your last name, I'm sure it's interesting.
ReplyDeleteP.S. "Southerner"
You brought up some pretty interesting points. I found it very useful and insightful bringing up the study by Steven Levitt in your post. I never thought about how a simple name could say so many things about who you are as a person. If you really wanted to turn this into a proper TOK essay you could look at the counterclaims of this and look in to how sometimes a name says the wrong thing about you (and measure to what extent ;). I also never would have thought to apply that story to all the groups i belong to (not just my family but friends and others at school and work). This was a really interesting and well written take on everything.
ReplyDeleteP.S. your Great-Great-Grandmother WAS French