My Name, Part 1

Today we are going to write about our names. The prompts we offer are both “literal” and “imaginative.”

Take a minute to look up “literal” and “imaginative” to better understand their dictionary meanings.

Part 1: Literal Prompt

By literal, we mean writing about the name or names you are called by others. We invite you to write a story about your name or names, using some or all of the following questions. (If you don’t know the answer to these questions, you can ask someone before you begin.):

• How did you get your name? (Were you named after a relative? Your mom’s favorite singer? The month you were born in?)

• Who named you?

• Were there other names you might have been called?

• Are there other names you are called, nicknames such as Tiger or Ladybug?

• Who calls you those names and why?

• How do you feel about them?

• What nickname would you like to give yourself and why?

Think about the answers to these questions, jotting down notes as you do. If you can’t find out all the answers, don’t worry; you’ll still have plenty to write about. You may want to read these two stories to help inspire you.

Here is another example of a literal story about a person’s name. In this case, though more imaginative elements are woven into the story. Did you look up the word, imaginative? How are metaphors and other figurative language features used in this story?

In English my name means hope. In Spanish it means too many letters. It means sadness, it means waiting. It is like the number nine. A muddy color. It is the Mexican records my father plays on Sunday mornings when he is shaving, songs like sobbing. It was my great-grandmother’s name and now it is mine. She was a horse woman too, born like me in the Chinese year of the horse—which is supposed to be bad luck if you’re born female—but I think this is a Chinese lie because the Chinese, like the Mexicans, don’t like their women strong. My great- grandmother. I would’ve liked to have known her, a wild horse of a woman, so wild she wouldn’t marry. Until my great-grandfather threw a sack over her head and carried her off. Just like that, as if she were a fancy chandelier. That’s the way he did it. And the story goes she never forgave him. She looked out the window her whole life, the way so many women sit their sadness on an elbow. I wonder if she made the best with what she got or was she sorry because she couldn’t be all the things she wanted to be. Esperanza. I have inherited her name, but I don’t want to inherit her place by the window. At school they say my name funny as if the syllables were made out of tin and hurt the roof of your mouth. But in Spanish my name is made out of a softer something, like silver, not quite as thick as sister’s name—Magdalena— which is uglier than mine. Magdalena who at least can come home and become Nenny. But I am always Esperanza. I would like to baptize myself under a new name, a name more like the real me, the one nobody sees. Esperanza as Lisandra or Maritza or Zeze the X. Yes. Something like Zeze the X will do. (By Sandra Cisneros from her book, The House on Mango Street ).