Comments on: Ebenezer

By: Matt Munro

Matt Munro — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 11:40:24 +0000

It’s not my real name - its actually the name of a famous crooner from the 1950s/1960s (sang the theme tune to the Italian Job among others) . Perhaps I’m paranoid or perhaps my ego isn’t that large but I never put my real name on the internet (partly because it’s unusual). It also prevents preconceptions creeping into readers perceptions of my postings…….

By: Robert

Robert — Tue, 05 Dec 2006 13:50:31 +0000

I didn’t realise Munro was “foreign”… Obviously it has associations with Scottish mountains, so I just assume it is British in some form.

By: Matt Munro

Matt Munro — Tue, 05 Dec 2006 11:10:57 +0000

Hmmm. Having an unusual name does have an impact but I wouldn’t describe it as positive. I have a “foreign” i.e mediterranean surname, but I look english. I get very tired of the “Could you spell that for me please”, followed by the inevitable “Is that Italian” ? question which follows the majority of name check situations.
One of the positive things I noticed first about the US is that it never happens, they just write it down, they seem to know how to spell it, and they couldn’t care less about its origins. To me that is multiculralism, at a relevant, social level. Accepting a different culture as part of your own means just that, accepting, not drawing attention or making a big deal of it.
If I was overtly sensitive I would find the English approach racist - I mean would you ask someone called Smith if it was an English name ? It goes without saying that asking a black person if their name was African would have the PC police on you like a ton of bricks (yes I know being a visible minority is different, but the principle still holds, where someones name origiates is irrelevent, and drawing attention to it as unusual is an act of marginalisation). Not being especially sensitive I just find it tiresome, and it does have the advantage that my name is rarely forgotten. However, I’m not convinced that seen on a job application form, it isn’t a disadvantage as preconceptions of “foreign” types are still alive and kicking.

By: Clarice

Clarice — Fri, 07 Jul 2006 00:31:26 +0000

Good point. Personally, I can’t decide what to call my child, out of the folllowing options:
Goliath, Judas, Herod, or Icarus. Or possibly Gollum or Darth Vader. Then again, I’ve always liked the name Pol.

By: Robert

Robert — Mon, 26 Jun 2006 18:17:03 +0000

Yeah. I guess it was more “The Boy Named Sue’s” dad in the song that thought that it would be a good name.

I’m not so sure that Ebenezer is such a bad name though. Its Old Testament in origin, so Dicken’s Scrooge isn’t the only reference. And of course, Scrooge’s story is one of redemption and leaf-turning, no?

I think it is perfectly possible to make some form of reclaimation of a name. Witness Homer from the Illiad, and now Simpson’s fame.

Although I noticed it was Ebenezer and not Adolf.

By: Clarice

Clarice — Mon, 26 Jun 2006 18:05:08 +0000

I don’t think Johnny Cash’s Boy Named Sue found much that was positive in being given that name. If he had a son, he said he’d call it any damn thing but Sue. I think cross-gender naming is another matter altogether.

And as for Ebenezer, how cruel to want to name your child after the meanest, most unpopular man in all England. What is *that* about? To have the kind of father who wanted to name you after Scrooge, I imagine would have just as great an effect as being given the name.

I think the wife’s argument on the other hand wasn’t terribly strong. Children don’t get bullied JUST because of their name. They may get teased, but it’s how they handle it, together with everything else about them that determines whether or not they get bullied. And parents can have a big input in that department. It’s not like his father wanted to call him “Emily”.