I still remember the first time I heard a racist joke and understood that it was a racist joke. I was visiting a cousin who was a teacher. He was talking about some of his students to other family members and laughing about their names. He would list each name using an exaggerated voice sort of like Mushmouth from one of my favorite cartoons, “Fat Albert.” The names were ridiculous and unlikely, and everyone laughed and remarked about how any parent could give their child these names. “Lemonjello and his twin brother Orangejello, pronounced “leh-MON-jell-oh” and “oh-RON-jell-oh”. “Chewbacca.” “La_a” (pronounced LaDASHa). Names with accent marks and strange spellings, which I found more exotic and exciting than funny. I laughed at his theatrics and wondered what life was like at his school. I realized, without him saying who he was talking about, that he was talking about black kids. There were many at his school, but only one at mine. She had a very “white” name, and — all things considered — really wasn’t much different from me. I was confused about these wild characters with crazy speech patterns to match their crazy names.

A bunch of years later, I found myself teaching in a school in a marginalized community. My students were as diverse as a class could be. They had interesting names but nothing as ridiculous as the ones in my relative’s jokes. They were beautiful and hopeful. “Myrikal.” “Destinee.” “Neveah” (that’s “heaven” spelled backwards — she reminded everyone every time someone asked her for her name). And my favorites, “Prince,” “Marley,” and “Hendrix.” I looked forward to getting a new class roster and reading through the list. Each name was like a message to the world about the qualities parents wanted to bestow on their children.

So, imagine my surprise when I logged on to one of my favorite online teaching communities to find a thread where teachers were sharing ridiculous names of students. Wouldn’t you know that in that list were the names from my cousin’s classes? “How strange,” I thought. “Were those names really that popular?” I decided to do an online search to see if I could find these names again. Sure enough, I found plenty of discussions of these two, along with lists of names that teachers claimed to have in their classrooms. I also realized that pretty much every name on the list was a non-white kid. Absent from the list were unusual white kid names — of which I had many. “Talon.” “Ayshlee.” “Ruger.” “Hunter.” “Easter.” “Mykael.” “Brackett.” Really???

Throughout my teaching career, I’ve met so many teachers who have shared the Lemonjello and Orangejello story. When I was a young teacher, not wanting to make waves, I would force a polite giggle and quickly change the subject. Now, I will say, “that joke is older than most of the teachers in this school, and it’s really racist, so please stop telling it.” These jokes are not only offensive but they spread the belief that non-white parents are illiterate, uneducated, or that they don’t care about their children. These jokes dehumanize already-marginalized communities, and further the challenges that children with these names will face in life. Schools like to talk a big game about being “anti bullying,” but how can we when we are actively making fun of student names (and indirectly, their race, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic class, religion, etc…)? Spoiler alert — we can’t, because we are the bullies.

A name is a precious gift parents give to their children. A name is often the first introduction that any person will make with a stranger. It is very important to remember student names and pronounce them correctly, even if you have to study them or create games to help you remember. I admit, I really struggle to remember names and how to pronounce them, but I am upfront with my students and ask them for patience and gentle corrections until I get them down. I practice looking them in the eye and saying their names regularly, and I have a lot of really unfamiliar names from a lot of different native tongues. It usually takes me a few weeks to learn about 200 names. (I admit that, in the past when I sometimes saw nearly 1000 students each week, it took a lot longer, but I’m here to tell you that it can be done). Most of the time, students are pretty understanding and appreciate the attempt to get their name right, even when I fail, as long as I keep trying — as I had to with a student who had a rolled “r” in their name — a sound I really struggle with. I figured it out, and — bonus! — now I can also pronounce a few other Spanish words correctly.

A name is never a joke — no matter how unusual it may sound to you, or how long it takes you to learn. But we can no longer give a polite laugh and change the subject. We have to confront the racism behind these jokes to fight racism. It is no longer enough to be against racism — now we must be actively anti-racist if we are ever to truly have equity in our classrooms. Though this seems like a small issue amid much larger ones in our world right now, to a child, their name — their precious gift from their parents — is everything. To create a world without racism, we must first ensure that our classrooms and schools are anti-racist, starting with the first look at our class rosters.

Resources for reading further about this topic:

Dr. Marijuana Pepsi Won’t Change Her Name To Make Other People Happy. In 2019, a woman named Marijuana Pepsi graduated from Cardinal Strich University with her PhD. Her dissertation focused racism based on student names, and can be found here.

Here is a link to a well-known study about the likelihood of getting a callback on job applications for people with black-sounding names versus people with white-sounding names.

Appreciate the History of Names to Root Out Stigma — this article offers some perspective about why some names trigger racist and classist discrimination, and how these names grew in popularity in the ’60’s and ’70’s.

Mispronouncing your Non-White Students’ Names Is a Racist Act — A Guide for Understanding a Microaggression For White Teachers Working With Students of Color — We’ve all done it. But this article is great for understanding why it’s important to get the names right and pronounce them correctly every time, even if you find it challenging. This article offers some perspective about why it’s an act of racism and offers some ways to talk to other teachers who do it and advocate for these kids. And wait, there’s more! This article goes on to discuss other types of linguistic bias that are also harmful to our students, and provides a bunch of tools for teachers to use to get these names correct — including a technique I use for writing phonetic notes so I can look at my roster and read the names correctly when I am still learning them.

It is important to understand that the microaggression of mispronouncing — or the straight-up aggression of joking about — black names fits within a whole slew of systemically racist practices in our schools. I highly recommend the book, “For White Folks Who Teach In The Hood (and the Rest of Y’all, Too)” by Christopher Emdin. This book looks at the history of racism in our schools and ways we can confront it.