"How I Got That Name" is a poem about identity. Who am I? Where do I come from? Where do I belong? Whose pants are these? Oh wait—scratch that last one. The rest are the types of questions that Chin's poem raises. It is, after all, a poem that focuses on the immigrant experience. And the immigrant experience, as we all know, leads to all types of identity crises.
The speaker of "How I Got that Name" tries to deal with and reconcile the various aspects of her identity. Caught between China and the U.S., the speaker finds that she's got all kinds of issues to deal with as a Chinese-American. Thanks a lot, hyphen.
Questions About Identity
- What does the poem suggest about the relationship between identity and naming?
- How does the speaker's relationship to family shape her cultural identity?
- What are some of the difficulties involved in navigating the two cultural identities—Chinese and American?
- How does the metaphor of the "chasm" (87) relate to the question of identity in the poem?
Chew on This
Go ahead and try, Shmoopers, but our identity is fixed. We can't escape it, and we can't change it.
Our identity is determined by where we live. If we live in China, we're Chinese. If we live in America, we're American.