Thursday, March 15, 2007
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And You Think it's Tough to Get People to Say "Johanna" Right
Let me preface this post by saying that I am a veritable fount of liberal, first world guilt. I'm always acutely aware of the fact that being a South East Asian female, I could easily be stuck in a brothel, a sweatshop, caring for my 19 other siblings and/or supporting said siblings through prostitution or work in a sweatshop. I could be denied education on the basis of the fact that I don't have a penis, married off to someone with a penis who thinks that the penis makes him the unquestionable boss of me, or I could've just bypassed the whole penis/no penis thing by being killed off as an infant for having a vagina. I could be living without access to clean drinking water, or to basic medicines and vaccines. The reason all this is relevant is because I was signed up by a door-to-door today to give monthly contributions to some kind of save the world fund. I think it's actually called "
Save the Children", but it's really just using the "children" angle as a selling point because the work it does helps communities, not just the kids.
It isn't the monthly donation directly debited from my savings account that's the point of this post though (I mean, other existing, ongoing deductions from my bank account include a
sponsored Indonesian girl and
Greenpeace - I told you I was a fount of liberal, first-world guilt. I'm even going to sign up as a volunteer for my local whole foods, ethical consumer market.), it's the conversation I had with the girl who came by to talk to me about Save the Children.
When it came to writing my name down on the sign-up form, she asked what title I commonly used. I always use Ms. because I think there's something fundamentally wrong about the fact that it's common practice to indicate your marital status, as though it's an integral part of your public identity, where someone who has a penis doesn't need to do the same (the implication being that unless you already have a penis, you need to let the world know about how you're doing on your quest to acquire one - seriously, what is it with the emphasis on penises?!). She misheard me and wrote "Miss" instead, and I insisted that I be put down as Ms. This then initiated a conversation about whether I would take Jim's name (she also asked what the difference was between Ms. and Miss having previously thought that both prefixes were interchangable).
It wasn't a completely out of the blue, privacy invasion question. Up to this point we were sharing details of our respective lives (she's currently seeing an ex-Canadian pro hockey player
*hawt!* who's living in Sydney) and so the question was reasonable. I just wanted to put that out there because she really was a very nice person and I don't want people to get the impression that she was anything other than friendly and completely within the bounds of polite company.
This just returns me to the "Johanna Hobbs" problem: chiefly, that it makes me sound like a 17th century British peasant. Don't get me wrong, I would love to take his name to acknowledge the fact that Jimmymabo is the one person who has made me comfortable with who I am and inspires me daily to pursue life for my own happiness and well-being. In other words, taking his name would recognize the significant contribution he has made to my identity and self. I should note at this point that I have never before been even remotely happy with the person that I am. On the other hand, taking his name would be buying into the patriarchal idea that as a woman, I am tied to the man who is responsible for me at the time (first my father, then my husband - see also the tradition of a father giving his daughter away during the wedding ceremony).
Simple solution? Hyphenate! It's not like it's a big deal, I already have one hyphen in my name (Si-en), another one's not going to make a huge difference. Uh. Dudes. Have you considered Tan-Hobbs?! For one thing, it reads like some Brit who has spent too much time out in the sun. Most people outside of Singapore already don't say "Tan" right. In fact, Jonathan (my brother) doesn't even say "Tan" right -
and he is one (I encourage everyone of you out there to call his cell phone and leave a message on his voicemail urging him to pronounce his own damn name correctly. You can hear him say "Jonathan Tan" on the recorded greeting).
Johanna Tan-Hobbs. What a train wreck. Maybe I should just do without a last name altogether. I mean Cher's doing just fine isn't she?
Labels: Name
posted by Joie! at
5:20 a.m.
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Monday, March 05, 2007
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NAAM-uh-SAA-kay
If I had a dollar for everytime I had to explain how to pronounce my name, I could finance my education. Possible PhD included. And to this day, I'm not sure if I actually like my name*, or its less troublesome variants like Jo or Hanna (Jo sounds like a guy's name, Hanna is the plain, uninteresting pilgrim). I love Joie and I love it when the people I love use it, but I downright hate people who I've just met calling me Joie. It's a privilege, please stand in line while I process your application to use it. Thank you. Besides, only people who know me know that Joie is pronounced joe-EE, despite the fact that it is orthographically similar to the French word for "joy". In case anyone was wondering,
Tammy was the one who came up with that spelling. Before that, I never spelt it out.
I could write a very long post about how name is tied to identity and how in my struggles to get my name said right (GODDAMIT THERE'S A FUCKING H IN IT. HOW DO YOU NOT SEE THAT THERE'S AN H?! AND IF YOU DO SEE IT, OH YOU LITERATE YOU, WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU ASSUME THAT IT'S SILENT?! HAVE YOU EVER ENCOUNTERED A SILENT CONSONANT IN THE MIDDLE OF SOMEONE ELSE'S NAME?! HAVE YOU?! WHY WOULD YOU THINK IT'S SILENT IN MINE?! IT'S JUST LAZINESS. EFFING-EH LAZINESS. OH WAIT, you didn't call me Joanna, you're one of those people who have to demonstrate your AMAZING world knowledge. yo-CHCHCHCHA-na! *Did I say that right? oh look at me! I can produce a
uvular fricative! I'm soooo smart. Gimme a cookie and tell me that you're flattered that I'm the first person ever to get your name right.* Look goddamit. I don't give a flying fuck that you can spot the German variant of "Joanna". And for future reference, no, you are not the first person to ID it correctly, neither are you producing a convincing uvular fricative. Next time you meet someone, it might be a good idea to
ask them how their name is pronounced novel idea, I know.) I've developed a certain assertiveness that can cast me in certain light when meeting new people and how that in turn shapes my social interactions blah blah blah. Simply put, my name and its attendant baggage is a pain in the ass.
Jhumpa Lahiri (Winner of the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for her collection of short stories
Interpreter of Maladies) has written a beautiful book on the quest for identity while growing up with an awkward name**, titled
The Namesake. It's one of my favourite novels (I've read it five times, and I sorely regret not being able to find it before I had to leave for Melbourne. I might have to buy another copy) and I highly recommend it. Imagine my delight when I discovered that not only has it been turned into
a movie, the main character, Gogol Ganguli (yes, he was named after
Nikolai Gogol), is played by
Kal Penn of
Harold and Kumar go to White Castle fame!
Lucky for us, Kal Penn is keeping
a blog about his experiences while working on and promoting the film. Being the comedian that he is, he has also posted a couple of videos on the blog that relate to the movie.
This one is my favourite and it illustrates what I've been trying to say about my name all my life.
*In a recent conversation with a friend, it came up that if I decide eventually to take Jim's name, my name would be Johanna Hobbs. My Irish friend couldn't stop laughing because, according to her, that sounds like the name of an English peasant. Unfortunately, I agree. More specifically, I think it sounds like the name of ye olde washerwoman. "Got yer clean linens guv'nor!"
**Of course that's not the ONLY thing the book is about, but it is the main theme.
Labels: Books, Movies, Name
posted by Joie! at
11:43 p.m.
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