The day I was born my parents bestowed upon me a gift- or so
they thought. They wanted to give me a name that exemplified my identity. To
accomplish this, they created a brutal Frankenstein of cultures for a name-
Mairead Dambruch.
Even
though “Dambruch” is extremely German, the closest my family is to being German
is close to none- one of my past ancestors might have eaten a schnitzel at one
point or another. To compensate for this German monstrosity of a last name,
they felt it was necessary to unleash the kraken of Ireland in my first name-
to balance it out. The unlikely pairing of Mairead Dambruch has no doubt had an
effect on my life, the bad outweighing the good. It’s not that I don’t like my
name, but over the years I have noticed a few common plights among those who
live with the strain of a unique name.
First
impressions are important. With my name, first impressions have always been a
cumbersome affair. Whatever I do, I end up repeating my name about 3-4 times,
my voice slowly crescendoing in till I find myself screaming at a person I've
just met. If they still can’t understand me, whomever I am being introduced to
has probably given up completely and will proceed to avoid saying my name or
ever encountering me ever again.
The
other half of the population will stubbornly decide to call me by whatever they
want. Some of the more popular variations of my name have been “May-reed” or
“Ma-red”. On good days the lunch lady calls me “Madrid”.
At
fast food restaurants I have the added stress of coming up with an entirely new
name unless I want to discuss the origins of my family with the cashier for a
minute.
Even
Microsoft Word ridicules me- identifying my name as an error. It scribbles red
everywhere in till I surrender, changing it to “Misread”.
Having
a rare name also causes everyone I meet to compare me to the other Mairead they
know. At school this has become increasingly irritating since every Mairead who
has gone through this school system has left high expectations, and I am looked
at in comparison. One of them is a French ambassador in the House of
Representatives in Washington D.C. and the other was an elite track star whose
times I will never remotely come close to running.
In a study by Dr. Eryn Newman, he
explored if our evaluations of people’s credibility was swayed by how easily we
can pronounce their names. He gave his subjects statements that were attached
to a hard to pronounce name and an easy to pronounce name, such as “Giraffes
are the only mammals that cannot jump” said Yevgeni Dherzinsky. In the
experiment the subjects were found to evaluate the accuracy of a person’s
knowledge solely on the features of the name, choosing the unique names to be
the distrusted names.
Even
though I don’t mind being addressed as Spain’s Capital, there is no doubt some
inconveniences. You carry a name with you forever, so I argue you should make
the burden light. I advise to you, for the sake of your future children, to
think long and hard before you name your daughter Bookcase or your son Yevgeni.
Works Cited:
Hey Hey Mairead,
ReplyDeleteI thoroughly enjoyed your post, and although I can't relate much, you were able to give me a sense of what it must be like to have such a peculiar name. I'm not going to lie, your argument, while completely comprehensive and pretty well written, was not very convincing. The ideas that you used to back up your argument simply were not solid enough to give your argument the substance that it needed. It's my opinion that the first subject you address, the mixing of cultures in your name, was a very good concept that, if you had grown on it more, would've supported your argument much more. Also, the first impressions idea was most definitely the strongest point you made. The next few were much more forced and were basically just hard to take seriously. Also, in the paragraph about being compared to all the other Maireads in the world, you seemed to leave out the fact that there aren't many, and that makes you unique. That part came across as very negative, when it could also be seen in a much more positive light. Lastly, you should've explained Dr. Newman's study a bit more. I don't quite understand how he studied the affect of a name, but certainly seems like it would've been incredibly useful to your argument.
You write very well, and I only have a couple substantial notes. First of all, you use hyphens several times in a way you aren't technically supposed to. You use them in place of a comma or a semicolon. Also, you make a few verb tense mistakes, such as "there is... some inconveniences." It might have benefitted you to have proofread it one time, very thoroughly, to avoid making silly mistakes such as this.
Thank you again for gracing me with your wonderful blog post, and I look forward to reading more of yours in the future.
Happy Holidays. Liam
Mairead, this post is interesting. I have never had a student write about his/her name, which makes this unique and fun to read. You also include some details from your personal experience that were clever and gave me a chuckle. I love the "misread" quip. I agree with Liam, though, these personal anecdotes were the strongest part of your argument. Ultimately the argument is a little confused and vague for the same reasons Liam mentions. Overall, I thought his feedback was precise with one exception. There are other writing issues that I struggle to get past. What do you mean by "in till"? Also, you should have written "WHOEVER I am being introduced to has probably given up completely..." I admit that this is a very tough grammar rule, but the pronoun needs to be a nominative case because it is the subject of "has probably given up completely..." The "I am being introduced to" is just an adjective clause describing "WHOEVER." This one is tough.
ReplyDeleteAlso, have you done research about Dambruch? If what you write is true about the lack of German heritage in your family, then perhaps Dambruch is a variant of a Gaelic name. When I hear Dambruch, I hear Gaelic, not German - but perhaps that's because I am conflating it with your first name.
I've never actually researched Dambruch but when my older sister was in Germany, she got into a conversation with a man who told her Dambruch meant "the breaking of a dam" and how it correlated to childbirth. We have never questioned this disturbing etymology, and have come to accept it as fact. I now realize this might not be legitimate since this conversation probably happened at a festival associated with a certain alcoholic beverage. I guess I will have to do my own research.
ReplyDelete