Names are frequently classified into certain categories, however, without a gratifying pledge of justice or justification. Here, we are not just dealing with original names in general, but also with the more twisted specimens of a similar league—the nicknames. Now, these nicknames are the products of the fertile imaginations of the creative name givers who may or may not have the most benign of intentions at heart. Granted, nicknames do evoke a feeling of affability and intimacy under certain circumstances. But it also cannot be completely denied that they can become a source of mortification and pain especially if they happen to be aimed at one’s physique, color, creed, gender, age, race, nationality, occupation and likewise.
Keeping nicknames safely aside, there are other pressing troubles that surround the original names too. Some names are too ‘traditional’, seemingly straight out of an earlier era, while others are too ‘international’, apparently making the owner appear like a foreigner in his/her own country. After finally getting through the task of finding a compromise between the two contrasting territories, another nagging problem waltzes into the scenario—there are just too many people around who answer to the same name!
So, to name or not to name, that is the question. Regardless, the answer is very simple. Naming is not a choice but a compulsion and acquiring a suitable name becomes more of a necessity in the long run. As a matter of fact, the meanings of the names are supposed to stretch ahead of a couple of innocent letters clustered together. And this characterization does not qualify only for those names that adorn the identities of the mortals but also for the names of those stuffs that are not made up of flesh and blood.
Naming is not a choice but a compulsion and acquiring a suitable name becomes more of a necessity in the long run.
At all times, big names have attracted big attention. Everywhere, there seem to be these ‘biggies’ that regularly manage to remain in the public eye, on the basis of some conventional criteria like money, power and prestige within their specific spheres and beyond. Association with big names, no matter how fragile or fleeting, is almost always a matter of pride and pleasure to a larger portion of the populace.
I once ran into someone who was sketching with the help of charcoal and the expression on the face was of the same dedication and focus that I had earlier encountered on that of somebody else who was solving a complicated problem on calculus. At that juncture, a thought crossed my mind. In our society, why is it that out of the two, the former profession is comparatively less sought after than the latter, in other than a few exceptional cases? The answer to this question, for that matter, lies conveniently in the name game and the rules by which it is usually played.
Actually, this is a small portion of a much broader picture. For example, some social strata are prioritized over the others, some brands are believed to be superior to the others, some languages are preferred over the others, some institutions are held far above the others, some codes of conduct are allegedly better than the others, some lifestyles are supposed to be higher than the others, some hobbies are taken to be cooler than the others and the list simply goes on. All this is quite understandable if the big names are capable of maintaining their expected standards and goodwill with the ever changing times and truly doing something productive in their concerned sectors. But at the same time, it is also equally true that the same concept of placing some names at a pedestal might someday backfire if they end up being all words and no worth.
To cut a long story short, the name game has always been and still remains a popular sport, in a manner of speaking. The main reason why it has never lost its touch so far might be that nobody can ever imagine a society without an order or a hierarchy. Everything would be in chaos and confusion if a concrete system were absent, no matter what less or more drawbacks came with it as a part of the package. Nevertheless, following a person, a trend or a belief with a blindfold of preconceived notions securely wrapped around our minds just because they have ‘big’ names, may not always be the wisest thing to do since this kind of attitude amputates our knowledge and makes us retrogressive. On the contrary, finding ‘bigness’ within ‘smallness’ and vice versa is what we ought to strive towards so that names are fathomed correctly and perceived in accordance with their genuine qualities.
Anyway, when all is said and done, the magnitude of name appears to be self-evident since one of the greatest bards of all times who famously dared to ask the crucial question ‘What is there in a name?’ probably did not think twice before signing his own name right below it.
younitya@gmail.com
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