Nia brought home an intriguing assignment weeks after becoming a second grader.

A note from her homeroom teacher came attached with a worksheet and detailed a lesson using Kevin Henkes’ book,
“Chrysanthemum.” The lesson was intended to help learn classmates’ names while also demonstrating the harm of teasing: “In ‘Chrysanthemum,’ a little mouse is given a very large name…..when she goes to school her friends hurt her feelings because they think her name is too long. This lead us into a discussion about how teasing hurts others.”

The accompanying work page, titled ‘My Special Name,’ asked Nia to write why her given name was perfect for her and why her parents chose it.

While reading her assignment, I couldn’t help but recall a recent court case and two articles about ‘black names’ vs. more conventional choices.

One blog post on The New York Times website titled “Will a ‘Black’ name Brand My Son With Mug Shots Before He’s Even Born?” was written by expectant mother Nikisia Drayton and details the negative stereotypical connotations that certain names are saddled with: “…Any name not strictly used by African-Americans brought up no criminal photo galleries [in Google]. Smiling beauty shots for Jennifer and Amy, prison close-ups for Shaniqua and Laquisha. Same went for Keyshawn and Jaquan, but none for Shawn and Jason. Hispanics may have crime rates on par with blacks, but common male Hispanic names seem to be immune….Needless to say, Devonte and Tevin resulted in my now-expected display of unsmiling mugs.”

Another write-up posted on The Daily Beast, “Are Black Names ‘Weird,’ or Are You Just Racist?’ was more forthright in pointing out the disturbing double-standard applied when deciding who is ‘allowed’ to be creative with names and which arbitrary standards deem them unacceptable or not to begin with: “It’s not hard to find white kids with names like Braelyn and Declyn,” author Jamelle Buie wrote. “And while it’s tempting to chalk this up to poverty…the wealthy are no strangers to unique names. The popular Netflix show Orange is the New Black, written by a Jenji Kohan (a white woman), was based on the experiences of a Piper Kerman (also a white woman). And in last year’s presidential election, nearly 61 million people voted for a Willard Mitt Romney, at the same time that the current head of the Republican National Committee was (and is) a Reince Priebus.”

And what recent example is more outrageous than a Tennessee judge, Lu Ann Ballew, ordering a mother last month to change her African-American 7-month-old son’s name from Messiah to Martin because, in her opinion, “`Messiah’ is a title that is held only by Jesus Christ”? Luckily, that decision was overruled last week by a higher court, but the fact that Ballew designated her preference over that of his parents’ perpetuates the belief that anything not perceived as ‘white’ is automatically problematic and unacceptable.

There is a reason that some African-American parents reject conventional names: the majority of us, after all, bear surnames that reflected the names of slave owners rather than the ones we had before arriving in America.

Even without that cultural component, the practice of black parents distinguishing children with unorthodox first names isn’t any different than boys named “Tanner” or girls named “Bayleigh” and “Apple.” So perhaps the widespread disdain for names commonly perceived as non-white should be what is protested, rather than the unusual names themselves.

Since I appreciated my uncommon name as a child, I had no qualms about naming our firstborn daughter after the fifth principle of the Pan-African cultural holiday Kwanzaa. It means “purpose.” And right below my written explanation, Nia neatly detailed why she approves: “I like my name because it is beautiful.”

Is the moniker unsual to some? Maybe. But what matters most is how Nia sees herself and how she presents that inner belief to the world. And few will argue that embodying “purpose” is a great place to start.