What's in a name...

When I moved to the US for undergrad, my name was often mispronounced. I was usually called Suraaabhi instead of Sur-abhi. I tried correcting people a few times and then realized, it was a lost cause because one day they'd call me Surabhi but the next day it was back to Suraaaabhi. I jokingly started telling people that I respond to whatever name they wanted to call me because I was embarrassed (and tired) of having to correct everyone. So, sometimes I was called Suraaabhi, sometimes Subaru, and other times Jane (because my last name is Jain). I genuinely didn't care. 

Because I didn't care, I got complacent. I would use my last name Jain often at restaurants, to make reservations, to pick up food, to the drycleaners, etc. And when I got tired of Jain, I started making up names. Every week, I would adopt a new name. Some weeks I was Rose, and other weeks I was June or Reeta or the numerous other names I came up with that were easy to pronounce. 

However, when I moved to Canada, I decided I wanted to be called Surabhi and nothing else. It seemed like an important piece of my identity that I had lost! I wanted to reclaim my name and not be ashamed or embarrassed by it. Gone were the days of letting people get by, by calling me Suraaaabhi or Subaru or Jane. I made sure to keep correcting people till they got my name right. I also made sure that when I called restaurants to make reservations or order meals for pick up that I would give my name as Surabhi and not Jain or the name I came up for that week. Thankfully, in Toronto, I have usually not had to say my name more than once or twice before people can and do make efforts to correctly pronounce it. 

Where I still feel it's a problem, is in meetings where you have to popcorn over to the next person. I have realized this popcorn or pass it to the next person phenomenon doesn't work very well for people with not-so-easy-to-pronounce names. The last two years with virtual meetings have been quite painful for me when it came to popcorn-style introductions. I am usually either the last person to introduce myself because no one wants to pass it on to someone whose name they can't pronounce; or, the first person to go because I don't want someone else to be embarrassed by not being able to pronounce my name. 

I didn't usually think much of this issue till this week when in a few meetings I had to introduce myself and dealt with the first/last phenomenon. I realized how anxious I was to quickly be done with the introductions part because I didn't want to be embarrassed or embarrass someone. So, I began thinking about what I could do to avoid this embarrassment for myself and others. I started putting the pronunciation of my name next to my name in virtual meetings. I started correcting people when they mispronounced my name. I put in the chat boxes how to pronounce my name correctly. After all, I wanted my name to be pronounced correctly so I had to teach people. 

But I also wondered, wouldn't it be just lovely for people to interact with folks whose names they can't pronounce and start learning to pay more attention to names? Our names all have stories, yours and mine. Let's try to learn more of those stories and how to pronounce those names...