Say Your Name
The central irony which controls the narrative and directs the themes it that Korean American author does not know how to say her own name as pronounced in Korean. This failure is portrayed in an embarrassing opening scene in which she becomes the subject of ridicule by an older Korean woman.
Before the Ridicule
Even before getting to the ridicule of the Korean woman working in the dry-cleaning store, there is irony associated with the author’s sense of identity. Practically the first thing she reveals about herself is that upon seeing that the woman behind the counter shares her Korean heritage, she immediately goes to the transactional possibilities inherent in this tenuous relationship. One might observe of her mercenary motives, “How stereotypically American of her.” Considering that the entire point of the essay is the conflict she feels over her split Korean American identity, things have already gotten deeply ironic by the end of the first paragraph.
I am (not so much) Korean?
Before the end of the first page—and still before she is actively ridiculed—the author reveals another ironic level to her confused identity. She can say “I am Korean” in English, Spanish, German and Latin, but—irony of ironies—not Korean. Then again, maybe this isn’t ironic at all.
Continental Ironic Divide
The author confesses “I know more about Europe than the continent my ancestors unmistakably came from.” This assertion is split down the middle between ironic on her part and not her fault at all. That she does know more about European history and culture points to systemic Euro-centric prejudice in the American education system which has forever treated Asian history only as it relates to European colonialism. On the other hand, it is disturbingly ironic that she managed to get all the way into graduate school while living in the same home with two parents born in Korean without ever seeming to have the slightest interest in discovering things about Asia school never bothered to teach.
Strange Irony
While not knowing how to say her own name is truly an existential irony, a much stranger irony must lie in wait until nearly the end of the essay. Referencing the maternal pressure placed upon her to produce grandchildren that look like the family, the author makes a very strange confession about being incapable of even imagining the idea of marrying a non-Korean man. This seems inexplicably ironic within the already established context that she grew up in a family so isolated from Korean culture that she was never even taught how to say her name.
