What's My Name?

 In American Studies last week we discussed how a single word could impact the meaning of a sentence. For instance, if you changed “the man died” to “the man was murdered” you have completely transformed the sentence. This got me thinking about how a single word can be so important. What first came to my mind was my name. A name is a word that you hear countless times a day, a word that identifies you. Can this word impact our lives as much as the word “murdered” impacted that sentence?

I came across an article in The Week arguing that it can. The article said that your name could make you feel inferior and like you need to live up to it. It also declared that your name could cause you to act out in school and even cause people to decide whether they want to trust you or run from you.

Personally, I find this to be a bit of a stretch. I could understand the feeling of wanting to live up to a name because you are named after a grandparent or someone you value. However, I highly doubt that most people want to do great things because of their name itself. Also, I don’t think a child can blame acting out in school on their name. If a child was called into the principal’s office for acting out and they said, “Sorry, my name made me do it!” they most definitely would not be let off the hook. Finally, if I introduced myself and someone ran away screaming my first thought wouldn’t be, “That makes sense, I do have a scary name.” So after much thought, I don’t believe that a name can change your life as much as a word can change a sentence. After all, does every Jack you’ve ever met act the same?