Names are primarily used to identify people. But as we all know, there is more to them than being just a means of identification. Names reflect our ethnicity, race, gender, occupation and sometimes, social status. There are complexities attached to their usage by other people. Status, age, relationship, etc. determine how other people use our names. In other words, it determines how they address us.
Ultimately, culture determines how names are used. And, culture differs in various parts of the world. In some cultures, it is inappropriate to address a person by his or her first name. However, the use of first names is becoming more acceptable to a lot of people around the globe, irrespective of the laid down culture in their milieu.
My focus in this piece is Africa—Nigeria to be precise. Need I also mention that I am sticking to Anthroponym.
More often than not, names are the first things we learn about other people before we get to know them, albeit how we use their names or refer to them can be a contentious issue. You cannot just call people by their first or last names. Culture demands that you should be conscious of their age, status and the level of relationship you have with them. This consciousness determines whether you add a title to their names or not. In some cases, you are not even allowed to call some people by any of their names. You only address them by suitable titles.
In Japanese culture, people usually call a person by his or her title. An example is sensei which translates to master. It is also common to address a person by his or her last name followed by an honorific suffix such as san and sama. If you are more familiar with the person, you are allowed to use the suffix: chan, san or kun, after their first name. If you find yourself in France, the same scenario is likely to play out with the use of titles such as monsieur and madame/mademoiselle.
On the other hand, in the USA—in the last century, the use of names has been limited to first name basis, except in rare cases, such as a high professional and political context. In the world’s most powerful country, demanding a title now seems an excommunicated custom and may give someone out as proud or full of himself/herself.
The question then is: should people be so bothered about the titles that accompany their names? Should they demand to be referred to by a title? Isn’t their name sufficient enough to be called by? Is a name not given just to identify us?
These are questions that only culture or, to be more specific, custom can answer. And what is culture? Culture is defined as the ideas, art, beliefs, customs and social behaviour of a particular people or society. Culture doesn’t just spring up. It is developed by people and circumstances. People simply follow those before them, irrespective of the inadequacies and limitations of those people. And then, culture becomes a tradition. It becomes a way of life—adopted and sustained by society. However, questions should be asked about it. Mary Slessor asked questions in Cross River and the rest is history. An extreme allusion— I thought so too.
In Nigeria, it is common to address people with different titles. These titles come in the form of ‘ma,’ ‘sir,’ ‘Mr,’ ‘Mrs,’ ‘madam,’ ‘aunty,’ ‘uncle,’ ‘brother,’ ‘sister,’ ‘sis,’ ‘bros,’ etc. for normal familial or day to day interaction with people. Academic, religious and political titles also suffice: ‘Professor,’ ‘Doctor,’ ‘Engineer,’ ‘Senator,’ ‘Honourable,’ ‘Chairman,’ ‘Comrade,’ ‘Barrister,’ ‘Pastor,’ ‘Imam,’ ‘Reverend,’ ‘Sheikh,’ etc. Then, there are chieftaincy titles such as otunba, odogwu, yari, waziri, jagaban, ikemba, galadima, etc.
The first set of titles are often used to depict the age difference between people. It is expected that you should insert these titles—either ‘bro,’ ‘bros,’ ‘brother,’ ‘sis,’ ‘sister,’ ‘aunty,’ ‘uncle,’ ‘Mr,’ or ‘Mrs,’ etc.—depending on the age of the person you are addressing.
However, it is pertinent to point out that there is no rule to the specific age-difference that determines if one should be addressed by a title. Adults that are not so familiar with each other may use titles to refer to each other, as a form of mutual respect. This might be a bit of a strain, when you know you are dealing with someone you perceive as an age-mate or even younger than you are.
Women demand titles more because they bear children and are expected to be called by their first child’s name. So, you are likely to hear ‘mama so, so and so’ (name of the child). One wonders if it is logical for a woman to lose her name because of her child. What about those that wouldn’t give birth to a child? It looks like society has a way of detaching them.
I also want to point out that the first set of titles I listed above are no longer used, within the Nigerian context, to only denote the relationship we have with our family members. With the use of these titles for other people other than our family members, every one becomes our father, mother, uncle, aunty, brother, sister. (Even if they are or turn out to be monsters and paedophiles: another topic for another day).
It is pertinent to point out here that the titling custom is more profoundly practised in some parts of the country. The Yorubas of Southwestern Nigeria are the champions in this practice. Their formality and regard for respect is well known in every part of the country.
This brings me to the concept of ‘Respect’— a common term that is attached to the usage of a name. The way we use a name or don’t use a name determines whether we have respect or not. A perceived lack of respect makes other people draw conclusions as to the sort of upbringing one got from his or her family. Society tends to blacklist such people for friendship and affinity.
As superficial as the use of a title is, it is what people use to determine our inner virtues. In other words, it is what they use to judge a person’s character. It simply means I can overplay the whole respect game and find my way into people’s heart (even if I have evil intentions). People usually give in emotionally to people that are seen to be respectful because of the perceived prestige they feel from their display of respect codes.
In a society where a dwindling economy has reduced people’s self-worth and has broadened the gap between the rich and the poor, they turn to respect as a means of achieving phantom self-esteem. People are so conscious of respect that when they don’t get it they flip out, because they feel that one is undermining their status or amplifying their lack of it. People are even ready to slap you for defaulting in the use of the appropriate titles to refer to them. These same people are always ready to brag about their humility.
People have complexities that make them value respect codes over real virtues. It makes them very conscious of every action such as tone of language, gestures and the language itself. We seem to emphasize different respect codes over politeness. The lack of politeness for everyone, regardless of age and status, should be part of what constitutes disrespect.
Furthermore, I’d always thought that it was age difference that compelled the use of titles to refer to people. But as I grew up, I discovered that it was basically status and not age. This is the reason why your fifty-something-year-old mechanic might not be able to call you by your first name, even though he is quite older than you. Strange, isn’t it?
A person that has a lower financial status from yours simply finds it difficult to call you by your name, even if you were born in the same year or you are of the same generation. We ourselves expect it from them because we want an acknowledgement of the higher status that we have attained. We enjoy the false prestige that comes with the formality. We simply ride on it to intimidate people, put them in their ‘proper place’ because they have not made it yet or they are simply beneath us. So, because of relatively financial superiority, we automatically become Baba, Mama or Egbon to someone that can as well call us by our first name.
Since titles such as ‘sir,’ ‘ma,’ ‘madam,’ ‘brother,’ ‘sister,’ ‘aunt,’ ‘uncle,’ etc. are foreign terms to us, I wonder what we were using before the advent of colonialism, which diluted and complexified our cultures in Africa. Culture by my own definition is just how people have agreed to live and do things. It can be altered over a period of time.
In Nigeria, the question: ‘Am I your mate?’ has different layers of interpretation. We often judge people based on their looks. This look determines their potential age, financial status and in some cases, marital status. The one of age is most common. But as I pointed out earlier, there is no official age-difference that permits someone to ask this question of us. We don’t know if it is three, five or ten years. We just make assumptions and it is such an accomplishment when we get recognized for our advancement, whether in age or otherwise, over the other person.
Now, can we really say, what we consider respect and how we show it is African culture or a consequence of colonialism? The British gave us the term, ‘sir’. It was what we used to refer to them—our superiors. It seems we have so domesticated this titling that we want to continue the trend of the superior (colonial master) and the inferior (the colonized).
The western world that lent us their own titles seem to be closing social gaps and status gaps by adopting the use of first names both at work and at informal settings.
Well, culture is hard to change. As I have mentioned earlier, it is just simply the way people have agreed to live. Although flawed, it seems we have agreed on how we should live and do things, except posterity flips the script.