WHAT IS IN A NAME?

Pre Discussion
1. What is your complete name and do you know the meaning of it?
2. Do you have a nick name? Who call you with those nick names? Are you happy being called
with your real name or nick name? Why/why not?
3. Suppose you can change your name, what is your best choice of name? Why do you choose that
name?

READING
People are familiar with the proverb “what is in a name” when there is certain incident
related to someone’s name. However, some people even feel ashamed to mention their real name in
the public when their names are considered old fashioned or unpopular in public. A name is as a
simple thing entitled to us as our brands which absolutely can not be translated literally, and it always
brings a big moment to our personal life. Several cases below are the example of people’s worrisome
toward their personal identity which we call it as A NAME.

One day, I started teaching my tourism class who are consisting all members of 5 stars hotel
employees in town. As usual, I would like to ask individual to introduce themselves with their short
personal background. One after one student had done introduction wonderfully, and the last student
said that his name is JET, and it provokes my curiousity to know further his real name. He was
shocked when I kept asking him to repeat mentioning his real name, even finally he answered that his
real name is ZAEDI.

Several years ago, my American friend started his career as an English lecturer at one private
University in Salatiga. Before preparing the new semester, he printed all his classes’ attendance list to
know how many students had signed for his classes, as the moment he brought the entire list home, he
was surprised to notice that most of Indonesian students are having awkward name in English
interpretation. He was asking me the reason why would parents want to give their children name
RISKY? if the baby born with so many problematic why should the parent keep having the baby name
after it?! Don’t you think that the baby will grow abnormally with the bad label on him?

He even laughed when he finally found some students’ name show the weather forecasts, such
as: Reny (Rainy), Sany (Sunny), Windy or Claudy (in proper English pronunciation).

From those experiences above, we can see how complicated is actually giving someone name in
this modern era, many people are not able to pronounce your name clearly since it is not that popular
for the daily use or your popular name has given public wrong interpretation of the real you? Some
other facts show us clearly that the original ethnic group will have different way on giving their
generation name, the point is we will never feel sad, disappoint or even angry if we are able to pick our
own name start when we born.

Here are the lists of people’s name in our society, let’s guess each name’s meaning by looking inside
the message their parent want to share to others;
 Bonus Prasetyo  Betty Milandria
 Senki Darmawan  Sapatinov Prakoso
 Agung Barkat Mujadi  Cukup Bahagia Sawiji
 Domingus Alponso  Rita Jihantiha
Post-Discussion
1. Do you know someone with deep meaning name? Tell us the story about them!
2. Share your knowledge on local wisdom influence on giving name, i.e in West Java & Nias
3. Some people say that each name brings each character? Do you agree/disagree with this
statement?

A PET BY SOME OTHER NAME

Named your dog Steve, Jack or Bobby?
Well, if you live in Brazil not only is that tacky but also illegal! A law makes it illegal to give their pets
a human name was recently proposed in Brazil after psychologist suggested some children felt
depressed because they shared their first name with someone’s pet. If the law is ratified, pet owners
who break the law may find themselves in the dog house forced to pay fines or do community services.
YETI English Course