What's In A Name?

[e_juliana]

(Yeah, this is navel-gazing. I'm amazingly competent at cat-vacuuming when I have bigger issues to contend with. Lemme work through this so I can go slounge.)

Contemplating my insistence on my moniker, I found myself wondering why I am so vehement about the matter. What is the difference if someone calls me juli or jules or julie?

It comes down to identity, I think. People build their sense of identity on various things. One person may have as his bedrock the fact that he is a male. Another might build her world around the fact that she has a large family. Self-identity comes from a lot of different sources, but I think that everyone has a few core things that provide the structure for everything else, and that those core things vary (as so many things do) from person to person.

So, why is my name a core component for me? Specifically, why my first name? I have no attachment to my last name beyond the fact that it's been mine for nigh on 30 years. So, why my first name? What's in a name? It is neither hand nor foot.... Right.

Let's see... I was Julie until I turned 10 or so, I think. Even then, I hated silly nicknames like 'Julie Boolie' and 'Jules'. 'Round about 6th grade, I dropped the 'e' out of the name, and became 'Juli'. (Some people still haven't picked up on the original shift.) When I was 17, I shifted over to 'Juliana', because I did finally feel as if my name suited me. I liked the length and the slight edge of formality. The shift didn't really catch on until I went to college a year later, but it was still there.


In my personal history, juliana is someone who has managed to fuck up royally and still come out of it alive. She's grown a tremendous amount, and has become comfortable in her own skin.

'Juli' or 'Julie' , especially in mouths of acquaintances and strangers, is like wearing an old and impossibly dated outfit. It doesn't fit right, it doesn't flatter, and it feels like a sore thumb. The Juli that I was was a very lonely, very insecure child. Julie was even worse. ('Juli' in the mouth of my family feels like wearing my at-home sweats - comfortable and familiar.)


I have a tendency to abandon past history. Sometimes it takes me longer (Alaska and my father, for instance), but I always end up burying it and moving on and not wanting much more to do with it. It's harder when it's your name, I guess.


Oh, and speaking of past history? Old boyfriends keep popping up. They need to disappear, damnitall.

(Also, if anyone reading is panicking about calling me 'Juli', please don't. My last two posts to the contrary, it's really not that big of a deal. Unless you've just met me in any form and call me Julie. Then we need to talk.)

Comments

[mskat.livejournal.com]

I think that names are not only identity, but also situational. Or at least the name defines the friendship.

Growing up I was always Kathryn. Always. My father demanded it with "If I wanted to name you Kathy I would have put that on your birth certificate.

In gymnastics I was Kay or Kat for brevity's sake. But that was to teammates and not to the coaching staff or any adults.

In college I was Kat because there were a ton of Catherines we knew and it was easier. My BATT though insisted on calling me Kathryn.

When I moved to LA I was Kat because that is what Lori calls me. So when I started grad school, I was also Kat.

But when my mom called me Kat one day, I almost fell over. That's now how our relationship works. I should be Kathryn to her.

So now, professionally, all of my work folks and my writing project folks call me Kathryn, because I miss that name and because I want to reclaim it. All of my personal folks still call me Kat.

[e-juliana.livejournal.com]

I love the name Kathryn. If I ever meet you in preson, can I call you that?

[mskat.livejournal.com]

Of course! I answer to both!

[stephl.livejournal.com]

For me, I twitch when people call me Stephanie, because it just sounds so freaking formal when it's spoken, addressed to me. (On paper, it looks lovely, but it doesn't match up with ME when it's spoken.) Some family members (aunts, mostly) still call me Steffie, and I can't dislodge it. Most people who are regular cast members of my life call me Steph, at my request.

Though -- and this is weird -- my mom spells it Stef, and I can actually *hear* the difference in the -ph ending and the -f ending when she says my name.

I just don't *feel* like a Stephanie. I'm not tall enough, for one thing.

[stephl.livejournal.com]

And, of course, I love "Teppy," and all variations and bastardizations thereof (Tep, Tepalicious, Teppycat, etc.)

[e-juliana.livejournal.com]

I can actually *hear* the difference in the -ph ending and the -f ending when she says my name.


Yup. I can hear the 'e' when people mispronounce my name, La Tep of Tepponia.

[sowilo.livejournal.com]

This makes me laugh. I don't mind Stephanie or Steph, but I CANNOT STAND STEPHIE. My parents get away with it, and one friend, who it is a joke with (she's Kimmie, and I'm Stephie, but only with each other) and one friend who I cannot break of it, but I love him too much to really care.

and you're totally tall enough to be Stephanie. but only if you feel like it. Own it, girl!

[dxmachina.livejournal.com]

I hate Eddie, although it doesn't bother me much when family uses it. I just shrug.

The other place it doesn't bother me is when teammates use it in sports. It's part of the camaraderie.

[e-juliana.livejournal.com]

Now I want to cal you Ed, Ed, and Eddie. :)

[maidengurl.livejournal.com]

I have gone by Suzi the majority of my life because people never pronouce Susan the way it should be. I am half Iranian, and in Farsi Susan (pronounced Suss-san) means Lily of the Valley. But if it is pronouced with more of a z sound (Su-zun), as most Americans do, then it means needle. While I'm not fluent in Farsi, it still rubs wrong.

My major frustration is when people spell it wrong. I can't tell you how many e-mails I get addressed to Susie, or Suzy. Hello, you are responding to something I sent, check the header for how to spell my ()#))!@# name.

[susanw.livejournal.com]

I never had a nickname as a child, and I've always hated the two usual Susan nicknames. Sue is the chain-smoking woman 30 years my senior that I knew from choir growing up, and Suzy is a little kid in a ruffly dress and shiny patent-leather shoes. Throughout life there have been a few people who could get by with nicknaming me--e.g. a college friend's family called me Sue, but since they called the mother Lin for Linda and the daughter Lor for Lori, I figured it was a hopeless case, and done in affection besides. But when coworkers and so on automatically default to Sue, I correct them. And one of my earliest memories, from when I was about 3, is correcting a doctor who called me Suzy.

[stephl.livejournal.com]

I'm just loving the juxtaposition of the 2 Susans' posts....

[bigpenguin.livejournal.com]

See, now my given name is Zachary, but I have alwas been Zach, even to my parents. To me Zachary always sounds like a small child. The only two people I know who can call me Zachary and get away with it (outside my immediate family, who don't anyway) are two older black women I know at the restaurant I work at, and for whatever reason, it doesn't bother me. But they are it. Most everyone just calls me Zach, although the other most often is simply Curtis (which often ends up getting me called Curt by people who don't listen to my name being said).

Another oddity? If someone goes to say my name, and they get it wrong, 90% of the time (honestly, even more than that), it's Josh. Why? What is that? It's always been that. So weird.

[charlotte-buff.livejournal.com]

The moment I first saw your pic online, it never occured to me to call you anything other than Juliana. The name fits you so well, looks and personality-wise.

Old boyfriends keep popping up. They need to disappear, damnitall.

AMEN, Sistah!