37. What’s in a name?

Way back in blog entry 6 I talked about a quirky strategy for remembering new words in a foreign language by associating them with assorted images or similar sounding words in your mother tongue or another language you are familiar with. I referred to this technique as “mental connections” and suggested the weirder the connection the easier it would be to remember since the association would stand out more. This is the season when I put the strategy to good use.

The school year has started again in Japan and with it comes the conundrum of what to call my students. My university classes range from 20 to 120 individuals and getting their names down can be daunting. But knowing a student’s name can mean the difference between his or her active participation or indifference in lessons. To complicate matters, there are a number of cultural norms that I must choose to adhere to or ignore when addressing students.

The general rule for Japanese is that you use the family name followed by “san”, the equivalent of “Mr.” or “Ms.” when speaking with those around you. If you are talking with someone from your childhood, however, the first name (or maybe I should say “given name” since, in Japan, the first name is the family name) can be used followed by “kun” for men or “chan” for either sex – kind of like the “e” sound we tack on names in English to indicate familiarity, such as “Jimmy” for “James” or “Suzy” for “Susan”.

In a school setting, another dynamic comes into play, that of teacher and student. If teachers really want to signify who is in charge, they will drop the title altogether and use the family name only. For female students use of the given name is also common.

So what do I do? Being a Westerner who conducts some of his classes in English, I am allowed to play by a different set of rules, which I tend to make up on the spot depending on who is sitting in the classroom. Usually I address my students by their given names, explaining that in Canada this feels more informal and friendly. Just call me Don, eh?

My goal is to break down the walls and get to know everyone better. The reasoning makes sense to the average twenty-year-old and, after some initial awkwardness mostly on the part of the guys, students take this as the norm and soon begin referring to each other using first names often followed by a “chan” or “kun” to make things sound more palatable to their Japanese ears.

Such use of the given name is normally only reserved for friends and family who have known you since childhood but it does have advantages. It helps build a feeling of camaraderie both in and outside of classes. This point was brought home during a recent parent-professor counseling session (yes, we have such things at the university level, too) when one mother expressed her delight that I was using everyone’s first name. She said that it helped break down the usual formality and her son had supposedly made new friends more quickly “just like in elementary school”. I’m not sure that is the ambience I strive for but she certainly approved.

 On the other hand, my demand that students use my first name results in the awkward situation where my colleagues refer to me by my family name with “sensei” (professor) while the students refer to me by “Don”. This has resulted in some professors complaining that my students are being rude. After explaining that the use of my given name makes me feel more approachable and comfortable with the speaker, some brave souls do attempt to “go with the flow” and address me as “Don”, particularly on staff outings. But others visibly cringe when a student or staff member shouts out “Don!” to get my attention in the halls.

When it comes to the foreign students in my classes, there are some interesting variations. My Korean students seem to enjoy using given names for the same reason I do – it breaks down formality and creates a more relaxed, personal atmosphere. As for my Thai students, they seem to have no qualms whatsoever about using given names rather than family names in class. When I commented on their “adaptability”, I was informed that Thais use the given name when addressing someone formally and switch to a “nickname”, which typically has no resemblance to their real name, in the company of friends. So much for creating a more casual ambience in my classes.

As for my students from China, they are harder to read. Some are delighted that I know a little Chinese and call them by their real names in their mother tongue. Others, however, insist that I use the Japanese pronunciation of their Chinese names, which can be disturbingly different. To give an obvious example, “Mao Tse-tung” of revolution fame is pronounced as what sounds like “Mo-Duck-Toe” to English-speaking ears.

I am not really sure why some of my Chinese students are more comfortable being addressed with the Japanese pronunciation of their names. Maybe they are just being kind to the inhabitants of their host country since most Japanese find Chinese names to be real tongue twisters. Or perhaps it makes my students from China feel like they “stick out” a little less. Being in Japan, they want to use a Japanese variation of their name. I can kind of understand this attitude. When I was in university studying Mandarin, I was given a Chinese name, which meant that I was “part of the group”. To this day certain friends in Vancouver still address me as “Meidan”.

On the other hand, if you are trying to remember the names on class lists and have already created an association for a Chinese name, such as “Jing-Jing” (“Hmm. That sounds like change in my pocket...”) only to discover that she wants to be called “Sho-Sho”, it can really mess with one’s mental processes.

Names are important. They reflect the very essence of someone’s persona with usage governed by cultural norms that are hard to overcome no matter how long you have lived abroad. In Japan, when men become well acquainted, they address each other by the surname without a title to show that they are “buddies”. On the other hand, in the Western culture that I hail from, being called by the surname only (“Hey, Smith!”) can come across as rude and offensive.

In my first year working at Mitsui Engineering and Shipbuilding (see blog entry 27), I became close friends with the man in the desk across from mine, Nishimura-san. One day in my second month, he shouted across the large office we worked in to get my attention by using my surname only. I was thrown off balance. How rude! He thought that our friendship had reached the stage where we were on a first-name basis – family name that is. For my unacculturated ears, it sounded loutish.

I have a close friend, Kurt, whose name ends up sounding like “Kato” in Japanese, a typical local surname. Some of his acquaintances are mortified when they discover that for years they have been calling him by his given name, not his family name. On the other hand, his surname contains fourteen letters and is liberally sprinkled with “v”’s, which don’t exist in Japanese. In the end, everyone sticks with the comfortable, if potentially rude, status quo.

 As for the name “Don”, it is not quite as adaptable. It has a range of meanings in Japanese, none of which are very acceptable. “Don” can refer to the noise of a drum being beaten (“don, don, don…”), the head of a yakuza (gangster) clan, stinky, a dimwit... I think you get the picture, which is not an attractive one. Still, my name doesn’t leave people snickering when I introduce myself as it does in Istanbul. In Turkish, my name means “boxer shorts”. What’s in a name, indeed!

(If you are really a fool for language, check out my language learning website at http://en.sulantra.com/ with courses from and to English, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese,Turkish, Bulgarian, Thai, German, Korean, Portuguese and Italian!)