Esmi…
Uncategorized September 1st, 2007
My first memory of name consciousness dates from kindergarten. “Anna Banana,” said John McCoy. He laughed. It was alphabet time, but I could not concentrate. “Anna Banana,” he repeated. I felt the blood rush into my cheeks, up to my ears. Bright red again. Kayla looked up. “You’re blushing.” Shannon leaned in, and Louis too. “Anna Banana,” someone sang. Then I was crying in Mrs. Horn’s lap, pleading to go home. That day, for the first time, I wished that my name were more complex. Its symmetry annoyed me. I had only two letters of my own.
When I asked my mother for the story of my name, she explained it the same way every time. “Anna means grace,” she said. “You remember the story of Anna and Simeon in the Bible, right?” I did indeed; Anna, a prophetess, recognized Jesus when she was 84, and he was only eight days old. My mother paused, and I thought of my namesake. I could see nothing in common between myself and the widow. Our disparity unnerved me. I dismissed biblical Anna from my mind, turning my attention to the mystery of grace. No one I knew could explain grace precisely. Examples of it seemed to focus on proper use of the feet, for stomping was not graceful, but ballerinas were.
“We were going to name you ‘Hannah’, but we thought it would be too hard to spell,” my mother continued. I felt envy then, daydreaming about life with a longer name. Imagine having three different letters in your name, and six letters all in all. I coveted such decoration. My mother had different ideas. Born a “Stephanie” much too soon, she opposed lexical frivolity. “It was terrible when I was a girl,” she told me. “They called me Steph-Fanny.” Her expression was such that I knew not to push my luck. My mother viewed my name as gift to me. “Anna”, she felt, was indefectible.
If I gave up on pestering her about my name, still I did not surrender my distaste for its plainness. For years and years I played with it: I added and subtracted letters, I altered its vowel sounds. I appended my middle name, and then took it away again. The process of embracing “Anna” took time, but at last the name came to be mine. I sign it happily, I respond to it. When I hear “an” followed by “na”, I now look up and smile.
Or at least, I did until last week.
I have found new occasion to contemplate my first name. You see, with the start of my employment at the IANE, a new layer of confusion is mine. To wit:
In Arabic, “Ana” is the first person pronoun. When I introduce myself in Arabic, I say “Esmi Anna.” Regrettably, this apparently sounds very much like “Esmi Ana” — “My name (is) I.” Oops. Me talk Arabic like cavewoman.
Alas, the porridge thickens. My school has a sister school which houses the community’s middle and high school classes. Its name? Al Noor Academy. Its acronym? ANA. My coworkers pronounce this “Anna”. Just like the pronoun. Just like my name.
This has led me to wonder. Some non-Arab Muslim people adopt Arabic names when they join the Ummah. Shall I? I could be Anan. Hana’. Anwar. Hanan. But… none of these names means “grace.” None of these names mean me.
September 4th, 2007 at 10:36 am
I used Google translate; grace in Arabic is سماح
I don’t read or speak Arabic… so you’ll have to give us the phonetic spelling of it in English.
September 8th, 2007 at 3:41 am
[…] Anna from annalog ponders coming to grips with her name. […]
September 10th, 2007 at 8:44 pm
whats the arabic for grace …. if its “Samaah” then it definitely sounds like a beautiful name. If you include gracefulness as a part of your personality, then …. whatever name you call a rose with… its still a rose, you know.
The best suggestion would be … try to find out what the Prophet Muhammad (saws) adviced to people when they converted to islam, did he have them change their name ? I think he did, you have a muslim identity now, might as well have a muslim name. Changing a name is easier than other changes accompanied with accepting islam as a lifestyle.
September 11th, 2007 at 10:11 am
as-salam alaykum, “me”
i am sure that anna has come to her own conclusions about this issue, but it appears from the available evidence and the advice of contemporary scholars that there is really no need to change one’s name after becoming muslim. the prophet, on him be peace, did change the names of people on occasion–but that was when the original meaning was un-Islamic or undesirable.
this is not to say, of course, that a new muslim *shouldn’t* change her name. but i look forward to the day when anna sounds like a muslim name just like amal, maryam or ghazal does today.
September 11th, 2007 at 2:16 pm
agreed ! maybe to disagree !!! ? I don`t know.
I hope I did not sound like pushing my opinion on anyone here, just a pointer to follow the example of the Prophet (saws), and a sisterly suggestion to another sister, knowing whatever conclusion she arrives at we are with her in that.
Anna is wonderful, just like her name, thus …. call a rose by whatever name you may, it still remains a rose.
September 12th, 2007 at 8:13 am
(smiling) and maybe i shouldn’t be pushing my opinion on another sister either. i hope it didn’t come across that way.
January 2nd, 2008 at 11:18 am
when you write, it is almost fiction.
February 17th, 2010 at 8:28 pm
You write some very good blogs. I always check back here often to see if you have updated.
March 7th, 2010 at 11:58 pm
very good, thank youu