Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.” This word sounds imaginative, not real, yet still almost every kid takes pride in being able to pronounce such a difficult word. All throughout elementary school, kids would be running up and down the halls trying to show everyone that they had this amazing ability to pronounce that word. Nonetheless when it came to pronouncing the names of some of our ethnic classmates, somehow both students and staff were stumped. The accents on certain letters or since the name was not spelt with the English alphabet and phonics, they were somehow unhinged as if they forgot other cultures exist. The endless corrections and phonetically spelling our names were still not enough. By the end of the year, I still had people calling me “Lila.” Our names are our identity; it's the first thing people hear or read when you introduce yourself. It’s a shame that to some people our names are nothing more than an unnecessary obstacle they have no intention of ever facing.  

To my parents, my name is a breath of fresh air. It's the opportunities that they never had growing up in a developing country. When they came to the US, they had nothing in their pockets except the pride and passion they felt for their home country. They made sure to carry it with them until they had children and decided it was important to them that their children feel tied to their culture regardless of where in the world they are located. My siblings and I grew up with my parents' culture wrapping its arms around us like a warm hug. 

This is the case for most children of immigrant families who are growing up on the outside of their parents' culture. We take pride in our names and they represent so much more than non-enthic people would ever understand. According to We Have Kids, job applicants with white names needed to send about 10 resumes to get one callback; those with African-American names needed to send around 15 resumes to get one callback.  Our names are deemed as unprofessional and not suitable for a work place just because someone struggled to pronounce it correctly. This society was not built for us to succeed so when we do, it's important that our names are represented in a way that includes the struggles and hoops we had to jump through.

The colonization of ethnic names is something most ethnic people have unfortunately become immune to since it happens so often. In today's society, people choose their children's names off of what sounds unique or unheard of, oftentimes, they are ethnic names. When non-ethnic people possess the name ethnic individuals, it's similar to reaping a reward without having to go through the struggle. Ethinc names limit so many opportunities that most parents create a western name for their children to use when they go to school or work. 

Then comes the issue of so many non ethnic people having an enthic name so now when an ethnic person has the name, it becomes “whitewashed.” If people actually took the time to research the names they wanted to name their children, there would not be so many non ethnic people named all variations of “Layla.” 

As a society, we should spend less time colonizing things that have no sort of relation to us and start focusing on ways to uplift the voices of the people who struggle through discrimination everyday. As ethnic people, we can't settle for wrong pronunciation of our name anymore. Don't compromise. Wear your name with pride and remember, your name to someone else is a breath of fresh air. Don't let people steal that breath.