Duana Taha - The Name Therapist: How Growing Up with My Odd Name Taught Me Everything You Need to Know about Yours

Advance praise for The Name Therapist

After forty years, The Name Therapist helped me finally figure out why I monogram everything: because growing up I could never find a keychain with my name on it! With her inventively fresh observations, impressive wit, humour, charm, and sometimes harsh real talk, Duana Taha has totally convinced me that we are more than just our names. But that names are, actually, everything. I love this book.

Elaine Lui, author of Listen to the Squawking Chicken

If youve struggled with naming a baby, a character, a cat or a condition, this book is an essential companion and a total delight. Duana Tahas managed to write a smart, personal, trivia-stuffed (and kind of profound) treatise on why we pick the names we do, and how were affected by the ones were given. If theres a name for when a book takes you completely by surprise with its warm, dishy cleverness, so much so, you have to read it in one sitting, thats what happened to me.

Lisa Gabriele, author of The Almost Archer Sisters, and the S.E.C.R.E.T. trilogy under L. Marie Adeline, her nanas name

So would a rose by any other name smell as sweet? Taha answers with a resounding no! The Name Therapist is both erudite and hilarious. It discusses the implications inherent in naming babies and the ways in which we discriminate against certain names. It answers questions you had as a child about all the Jennifers in the schoolyard and then asks, how do we really become who we are? Its a rollicking, fun read.

Heather ONeill, author of The Girl Who Was Saturday Night

I had no idea I needed therapy until I read this book. Wonderfully informative, utterly charming, and laugh out loud funny, I would prescribe The Name Therapist to literally anyone with a name. Which is everyone. Thats how much I enjoyed it.

Dan Levy, co-creator of Schitts Creek

The magic of The Name Therapist lies in Duanas genuine curiosity and love for the psychology of naming. Her unique experience and background elevate the material from baby name encyclopedia to a deeply personal meditation on the phrase whats in a name? Most impressive is her ability to romanticize even the most unlikely of monikers (Archibald, Im looking at you!). Theres no judgment or condescension, just an infectious sense of wonderment!

Lauren (Felice) Collins, actor on Degrassi: The Next Generation, former sufferer of Middle-Name Pain

Ive been fascinated by the fine art of nomenclature since I was a wee girl. I love Duana Tahas unique, compelling take on why we choose certain names. Its so much fun and would be a great gift for anyone, but especially parents-to-be.

Sara Benincasa, comedian and author of DC Trip

Marked at birth with a difficult-to-pronounce, gender-indeterminate, ethnically-confusing name, Ive navigated the world of Jennifers and Michaels looking for someone who gets it. Well, Duana Taha does. She writes with charm, wit, and warmth about something so everyday but also so essentialnamesthose endlessly complex combinations of letters that help us make sense of who we are and where we come from. This book is basically the Magna Carta for people with weird names.

Elan Mastai, screenwriter of The F Word

The Name Therapist makes it clear from the outset that this is a qualitative study, yet the interviews and anecdotes, from Ronit and Shelica to Karen and many Jennifers, left this skeptic reevaluating her entire life as a Jessica, then a Jessie and finally a Jess; monikers all chosen for me by others, which have unconsciously helped shape my identity. Ive seen the light. But the most illuminating story is that of Duanas. Her experiences, struggles and realizations regarding her own name are effortlessly weaved throughout forming a complete narrative thats both entertaining and heady. And they are beautiful, particularly one from Grade 4 where her path as a fine writer may have been determined, thanks to her unusual name.

Jessica Allen, digital correspondent for The Social and Metro columnist

PUBLISHED BY RANDOM HOUSE CANADA

Copyright 2016 Duana Taha

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Published in 2016 by Random House Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited. Distributed in Canada by Penguin Random House Canada Limited, Toronto.

www.penguinrandomhouse.ca

Random House Canada and colophon are registered trademarks.

constitutes a continuation of the copyright page.

Images courtesy of the author.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Taha, Duana, author
The name therapist : how growing up with my odd name taught me everything you need to know about yours / Duana Taha.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-345-81530-9
eBook ISBN 978-0-345-81532-3

1. Names, Personal. 2. Names, PersonalPsychological aspects. 3. Identity (Psychology). I. Title.

CS2367.T35 2016 929.44 C2015-905918-6

Cover design by Terri Nimmo with concept from Valerie Gow
Cover image Peter Dazeley / Getty Images

v3.1

To my parents,
Who gave me this name and this outlook,
which gave me everything else

I love names. In fact, loving them has been one of my defining qualities as long as I can remember. I dont just have a few favourites, I love hundreds of them. How they sound, how they feel in your mouth, the impressions they give. I even love the names I hateor at least, they fascinate me. Scores of names have firm-yet-evolving rankings in my mind, falling under subcategories like fanciful or unambitious or bro you meet in university. So yes, I judge people by their coversor by their handles, I guess.

I know its kind of an odd preoccupation. People who dont love names like I do dont see the point in talking about them. After all, they say to me, we have no control over the names we were given at birth! Yes, this is truebut Ive always believed names are much more predictive than we give them credit forthey can make us who we are. Considering and analyzing this over my entire life has basically made me into a name junkie. I cant not notice them.

Sometimes, when I explain this, people say, Why does it matter? Its just a name! Im not trying to criticize names just for sport, and if I dont love yours, its not like I blame you for having it. But people who think its unkind to judge names prove my point that names do matter. If they didnt, wouldnt we all just be called the same thing? Would people get so exercised about the idea that some names are good and some arent? Our names come from our parents, but theyre weighted and considered before theyre bestowed. So why do we pretend that once theyre given, theyre all equal? Its not true.