That's Not My Name
What’s in a name? To Jimmy Kimmel, it’s the butt of a tasteless joke at the Oscars not once, not twice, but thrice. To employers, it’s one more reason to deny you a job.
As many Asian Americans can tell you, names have powerful connotations. They’re tied to race, ethnicity, and identity. They influence how people see themselves — and how others see them. Specifically, it leads to job application discrimination, according to an article by NPR Codeswitch. “Asian Last Names Lead to Fewer Job Interviews, Still” describes a Canadian study done by Ryerson University and the University of Toronto:
“The study found that job applicants in Canada with Asian names — names of Indian, Pakistani or Chinese origin — were 28 percent less likely to get called for an interview compared to applicants with Anglo names, even when all the qualifications were the same. Researchers used data from a previous study conducted in 2011 where they sent out 12,910 fictitious resumes in response to 3,225 job postings. The previous study, also in Canada, similarly found that applicants with Anglo first names and Asian last names didn’t fare much better than applicants with Asian first and last names.”
A study in the U.S. reflects a similar finding: changing an Asian name to an Anglo one leads to a higher chance of an interview. It’s a conclusion that isn’t likely to surprise many Asian Americans (or other minorities). To Americans, a foreign-sounding name suggests a degree of difficulty with the English language, an inferior intellect, or worse.
I’ve been in the position to assist with the hiring process during my years of internships and jobs. In one occasion, a woman involved in the hiring process saw the resume of a girl with an Arab name, and remarked to her coworker that she’d driven by the girl’s home address before — and that the house had looked kind of suspicious to her. “Maybe we should drive by and check it out,” she added, half-jokingly.
The girl didn’t get an interview.
“For many Asian-Americans, this kind of discrimination means that the pressure to change their names and shed the perpetual foreigner stereotype is strong,” Jenny Chen wrote in the NPR Codeswitch article. She’s right. My legal name, Alexandra, is Anglo — because my parents didn’t want me to experience discrimination from a Vietnamese one. My cousin’s last name is her mother’s (Chinese, not Vietnamese) because my uncle wanted her to avoid the anti-Vietnamese sentiment that was prolific in the U.S. at the time*.
"To Americans, a foreign-sounding name suggests a degree of difficulty with the English language, an inferior intellect, or worse."
I grew up with my Vietnamese name, Thuy, up until second grade when my family moved towns and I switched schools. Suddenly I was immersed in a different environment, one in which my teachers and classmates called me by my legal name. Disliking the nine-character length, I chose the nickname Ali from a list my teacher provided for me, and I’ve gone by that nickname ever since. But my family and friends who knew me before the move have continued to call me Thuy.
Recently, I’ve realized that it’s the only name with which I’ve truly associated myself. As Quartz writer Zheping Huang wrote, “This is the only name that I feel I belong to.” I’ll respond to Ali — years of habit has ingrained that in me. But whenever my family calls me Alexandra or Ali in front of others, it feels like they’re referring to a stranger. Those names do not evoke the thought of “That’s me”, only a distant acknowledgement. At my core, I am Thuy.
Left to right: My sister, aunt, and me when I was known as Thuy
Reinvent yourself, my friends suggest whenever I bring this up. Start introducing yourself with your Vietnamese name. Yet for the reasons brought up by NPR’s Codeswitch, I won’t. Aside from the potential discrimination that starts with a glance at a resume header, Americans can’t easily pronounce my Vietnamese name. It’s clearly foreign and takes extra work to learn and remember. As some Asians can attest to, sometimes Americans refuse to learn or say their Asian names altogether.
The result is a strange duality of identities that have sprung from my two names: the façade of a woman careful not to be “too Asian”, who works to be accepted by the white-dominated American culture and ignores racial microaggressions so she can succeed; and the Vietnamese American woman who’s comfortable with and talks openly about her Asian-ness, enjoys her culture without worry of discrimination — and isn’t afraid to call out racism when she sees it. Alexandra tries to blend in with her white American peers and hopes they won’t see her race first and her accomplishments second; Thuy corrects her coworkers for the upteenth time when they confuse her with the one other Asian woman in the office.
What’s in a name? Nothing short of identity.
*He had good reason to worry. The Vietnam War caused raging hostility against the Vietnamese, which culminated in outright threats and attacks against anyone who was perceived to be Vietnamese. In 1988, the actor Mark Wahlberg beat two Vietnamese American men, smashing one in the head with a stick, and punching and blinding the other one later. When he was arrested, he released a barrage of racist anti-Asian slurs, including “slant-eyed gooks”. The attacks have been swept under the rug and largely forgotten by most Americans.
