By Name and Story

My friends are not calling me by my name. They don’t know it, and I don’t want to let them know. 

Coming from another part of the world, the first month of college is a crucial part of the adjusting process. Despite  the warmth I received from Wash U faculty, classmates, floor mates, and people in the clubs I participate in, I still could not get over the fact that all the new and fantastic people I  was meeting here do not know me by my name.

I wrote “Elia” in the “preferred name” box on class registration and activities RSVP, and allowed my professors, WUSAs, and others to refer to me this way. “This is a beautiful name.” A girl  I met one day at a Classics Club activity told me . I felt flattered and happy, but also deeply embarrassed: I was not telling her my real name.

 The most apparent reason for international students to choose a different name is simply the difficulty of letting native English speakers pronounce our real name. For example, after repeatedly hearing mispronunciation of her name, Hyunseo Roh began  letting her friends calling her “Jennifer.”

One day we will realize that the so-called “identity” is a social concept but not a personal one, because each individual should stand for the self.

“Well the biggest reason is that” said Roh, “they can’t call my name correct. I’m tired of teaching my name’s pronunciation.”

But the role of a name goes far beyond saying it. A name is deeply attached to one’s family and culture. A name with cultural meaning in a mother language cannot be replaced by a symbol of  English letters.“The kind of language context cannot be translated into Romanized letters in another culture,” Shuyu Lin said. Having a name given by her parents in another culture, she felt the translation to be unnecessary because the meaning is lost. This is why, instead of having a name represented in Romanized letters, she gave herself another name under another “cultural context.”

Even for those who are using the English letter representation of their names, there is still this sense of alienation, for this representation often appears to be weird and out of place. To avoid feeling “alienated,” international students would rather pick some Western name to be their preferred name.

Before using her preferred name, Lin used the Pinyin name (English letter representation of Chinese name) when she first started going to a predominantly white high school in the US. But she could sense the alienation when seeing her name being juxtaposed between “tons of Sarahs, and Amelias, and Amys.”

“Everyone was not uncomfortable with it, but everyone just felt it was really strange and alienated,” she said.

Lin also pointed out the subtle difference between Chinese American students and students who are both nationally and ethnically Chinese. According to her, most of the Chinese American students are second or third-generation Chinese who do not speak Mandarin nor have a Chinese name. She felt herself to be different from them, but she managed to reduce this difference by having a name similar to theirs.

“[I]f I’m speaking like them, I’m still not part of them.” Lin said. “It’s really hard to explain what kind of feelings I had at that point, but I felt like ok if I had a preferred name this could be better.”

But how could a person who grew up in a completely distinct environment be the same as other people, simply because they look similar?

“You want to be you, but you have to a slightly different version of you at times.”

“I understand that eventually, whatever name I have, the fact that I’m a foreigner…is gonna stick with me. I’m trying to ameliorate this situation by putting myself into a preferred name. But I still understand that that kind of divergence is still there.”

So, what does personal identity finally mean? If we define it in terms of ethnicity, international students cannot be put into a fixed category: they spend their childhood in another distinct culture and become fully mature in America.

“I’m different from the majority of Indians in some ways, but I’m different from the majority of Americans in some ways.” Adi Dugar said. Going to school in the US means adjusting and becoming flexible. “You want to be you, but you have to be a slightly different version of you at times.”

The culture of US high institutions is dominated by the culture of English native speakers. To fit in to another culture means to give up a part of the culture of where you come from. This seems sad at first glance. However, if we pause and consider: which part of you is genuinely you? If a name is shaped by, like the Lin said, “cultural context,” including how difficult it is to pronounce it, can you as a person be shaped by the culture that you are placed in, which is not something you can choose yourself? Can you as a person have an identity that stands on its own without being subject to your circumstances?

Dugar mentions how the in-between feeling of identity, although it cannot be eliminated, can become something that he feels “used to.” “For better or worse, you get used to it.” He said. “My first semester was one experience because I was just getting used to how things were in America…And then second semester I kind of had a little bit of an idea and …finally… enjoy America. And now my fourth semester, things a lot more natural to me. I completely feel that I fit in, and I don’t need to struggle.”

 Can you have an identity that stands on its own without being subject to your circumstances?

Surprisingly this resonates with me. After the first two months of life in America, all of my friends and professors have known me by this “English” name. I do not know if I would want to let them call me another way, even if they try hard to pronounce it: this whitish name is already known to them and it is attached to a lively person, a person that is a part of me and is the American me. I wonder if this me named “Elia” will finally someday become me, that my identity, just like how my name needs to adjust to another cultural context, me as person also adjusts to America, and who I am is then shaped by where I am placed into.

I guess every one has to try hard to reconcile with several internal identities that sometimes conflict with each other. And maybe one day we will realize that the so-called “identity” is a social term but not a personal term, because every person should stand for the self. As showcased by the change in names of international students in the cross-cultural transmission, our identities are subjects of our circumstances: “Elia” is me in an American context, while “Longyu” is me in a Chinese context. But none of them really represents me: both are shaped by the cultural and social constructs. Our real identity lies in our story: our experiences that can only be owned by our true selves. As Wash U claims to seek to “know each student by name and story,” I hope our names will no longer be our tags that mystifies who we are; I hope all of us can know each other beyond our superficial names and delve into our stories.