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Help[Opinions] Re: Kalyani
in reply to a message by tara
If you spell it Kalyani, I'll assume it's three syllables, not four--kahl-YAH-nee rather than kah-lee-AH-nee, which seems to be what you're going for.
Kalyani does nothing for me, but it is a perfectly nice name, and I balk at this idea that, say, an all-American girl of German and Irish origin couldn't be as much a Kalyani as a woman born in India. There's just such a latent racism in that idea--that Western names are good enough for the entire world (when's the last time you met an Indian woman named Brenda and gone, "Wow, that's a weird juxtaposition"?), but the rest of the world's names aren't good enough, won't "work", on a child from Western culture. It's more complicated than that, I know, but I could probably go on for pages on this--it's one of my biggest naming pet peeves.
Which is not to say that I think you're racist, btw--it's this widespread belief people have that I have a problem with.
And Adelle once summed it up really nicely, far better than I ever could do: http://www.behindthename.com/bb/arcview.php?id=761048&board=baby
So basically, if you like Kalyani, don't let the part where your children are fair keep you away from it.
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Kalyani does nothing for me, but it is a perfectly nice name, and I balk at this idea that, say, an all-American girl of German and Irish origin couldn't be as much a Kalyani as a woman born in India. There's just such a latent racism in that idea--that Western names are good enough for the entire world (when's the last time you met an Indian woman named Brenda and gone, "Wow, that's a weird juxtaposition"?), but the rest of the world's names aren't good enough, won't "work", on a child from Western culture. It's more complicated than that, I know, but I could probably go on for pages on this--it's one of my biggest naming pet peeves.
Which is not to say that I think you're racist, btw--it's this widespread belief people have that I have a problem with.
And Adelle once summed it up really nicely, far better than I ever could do: http://www.behindthename.com/bb/arcview.php?id=761048&board=baby
So basically, if you like Kalyani, don't let the part where your children are fair keep you away from it.
Array
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