Over the years, I’ve had many students who have abbreviated their names, taken on a nickname or accepted a twisted version of their given name. Certainly, it is the prerogative of any person to decide what they want to be called. After all, as I regularly remind my students, there are many ways to be a person and everyone gets to decide what kind of person they want to be. That said, a key component to systemic racism (ironically paired with cultural appropriation) is cultural denigration — the idea that the marginalized culture is somehow inferior to the dominant culture. This denigration is manifested in a perpetual cycle of micro-aggressions children of first-generation families experience each day. Maybe it’s their lunch that “smells weird” or why they don’t celebrate Christmas. And maybe it’s their name that’s “just too hard to pronounce.”

I was so grateful to see the animated short, Nivedhan written and directed by Nivedhan Singh and animated by Rahul Manwani. As a white female teacher, I reflect the demographics of the vast majority of teachers in elementary schools, where students learn some of their earliest lessons about who belongs and who doesn’t — about what’s normal and what isn’t. When we look at our class lists in the fall and don’t know how to pronounce someone’s name, the onus is on us — not only as the educator, but as the adult living on this planet — to figure it out. Building community and inclusivity is about the small stuff. And when we honor the humanity of any student, we honor the humanity of every student. Names are sacred, and it’s certainly not the job of the Baratharams, Nguyens and Jiaxings to make themselves more palatable to their classmates and teachers. It’s our job, as teachers and as people, to model what it means to live in a community where everyone is valued and where every part of a person is valuable.