What's In A Name?

What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.
-William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet

Greetings and welcome to the Un-Zone, the website where I put the "Un" back in "unusual," "unbelievable," and especially "unstable." Unlike some people, I don't mind the negative and/or creepy connotations that the words carry. If you've read some of my posts or if you know me in real life, then you probably know what I'm talking about. If not, then you should read my posts. Hey, what can I say?

There's at least one good thing about law school. I have a block of time where I can post stuff to this blog. And it's not during class! I can make an attempt to pay attention during class. Not that it was a problem or anything. Today's post is about names and nicknames, well, my name and the nicknames based upon my last name. I'll take several detours and sidetrips along the way. Maybe "several" isn't the correct word. And by sidetrips, I mean mental mind-screws. It should be an interesting trip, none the less.

Names are important as they possess literal meaning and emotional impact. As an example, look at the quote I have at the top of my post. One must realize that a thing can be refeered by words that have a very different emotional impact. It is true that the fragrance of roses would remain the same, no matter what name a person might assign them. If one, however, were to refer to roses as "sewer-weeds" or "red stink-flowers," the attitude towards roses would change. Anyways...

For some reason, people mess up my last name, which consists of two letters. That's not a weird typo. My last name? Un. Just like the prefix and the abbreviation for the United Nations. The number one question people ask me? "You sure that's your last name?" Yes, that is my last name. I'm sure that I know my own last name and how to spell it. If I didn't know how to spell my last name, that will be a very sad day in my life. The number two question? "Is that an abbreviation?" No, it isn't an abbreviation.
A little explanation. Excuse me while I go on a brief trip into the realm of linguistics. Koreans don't have long last names or first names or middle names for that matter. Most, if not all Korean names consist of three syllables total. One for the first name, one for the last name, and one for the middle name. Each syllable will come in four forms: vowel, vowel-consonant, consonant-vowel, or, not too surprisingly, consonant-vowel-consonant. It's unlikely that a Korean last name will have more than five letters when transliterated into an English equivalent.
A note on pronunciation. I tell people to pronounce my last name like the prefix. If I were being strict on the actual pronunciation of my last name, it would be pronounced with a schwa sound as the "o" in "lemon." But, due to the caught/cot merger predominant in most areas west of the Appalachians, it's much easier to have people to pronounce it like the prefix. It's one of the more fascinating topics in linguistics and the study of what exactly is American English. Well...I've gotten this out of my system.

To show how often people mess up my name, I'll give several examples.
I used to go to and used to win prizes at math contests. Invariably, someone would misspell my last name, despite writing my name on the registration form, sign-up sheep, my nametag, on multiple answer sheets, a scantron, and God knows what else. One would think that with all this redundacy, they would get my last name spelled right. But no, they got my name spelled wrong. So I told them they got my last name spelled wrong. I even wrote out my name on a piece of paper. Did they get it right? Guess. No, they got it wrong! So they just gave me a new backing for the ribbon and I wrote out my name. Their response? "Oh, so THAT'S how you spell your name! It was that simple!" Yes, it was that simple. So simple that after I spelled out my name multiple times, you still couldn't get it right the first time!
I don't like getting any sort of ID card, especially one that has my name on it. During middle school and high school, I got an ID card. In order to pick it up, one had to tell them your grade and name. I would tell the person that my name was James Un and I was in grade X. Did they get my name right and give me the right ID card? No. For some weird reason, they would say that my ID card wasn't there. Oddly enough, they were looking in the wrong grade. After I told them this, they would apologize and look in the right grade. After searching, they would say I didn't exist there. At this point, I would get annoyed, as I knew I existed. So, they would ask me to spell my name. I would spell it very carefully. They still would get it wrong. I would be confused with a person like "Jeff Young," who would be an Asian guy, but who would look nothing like me. I then would write my last name out. They still would get it wrong! I would search through the cards myself and guess what? I found my card! In the "U" section, just where it should have been and where it was all this time. Their excuse? "I didn't think that was your last name." WHAT THE...? You didn't THINK that was MY LAST NAME? Well, that IS my last name! You didn't THINK I would know MY OWN NAME and you would ASSIGN me one that YOU THOUGHT fit me better and I WOULDN'T NOTICE? Arrgh!

OK. Let's move onto a different subject. The Manhattan Dynamic Duo--Megan and Bridget--and their female friends, would play what I call "The Un Name Game." They would hyphenate their last name to my last name and see what came up. It was Bridget, or it was Megan, or maybe they came up with it at the same time, who noticed that when Bridget hyphenated her last name to mine, it was Un-Fair. They got a really big kick out of this. Megan was quite disappointed that, sadly, there would never be any Un-Fairs any time soon. I don't know. Maybe it is a good thing that there are no Un-Fairs. Could you imagine all the problems and confusion that would arise from that last name? Then again, I kinda like it. I do have a strange sense of humor and it does have a nice ring to it. If there are any females with the last name of Fair out there...
Because of my last name, people would ask me if I liked 7-Up. Remember the old 7-Up ads that used to run on television? The one before "Make 7-Up yours." I would respond that I prefered Pepsi, and they would say, "Why not? 7-Up is the Un-Cola." Then they would laugh at this oh-so-witty joke. So many freaking people would go through this song and dance. Yeah. It kind of makes me long for the old days when people called me "Human Encyclopedia." Then again, some people do call me that. Or "crazy" or "weird." Anyways...

Ah...I think I've typed enough for now. Well, at least enough stuff about my name. A little trip to "Expensive and Possibly Useless Information Town" and a detour to "Why do people think I don't know my name?" City. Next stop...who knows.

That's all for now.