“Cling, bonding,” my therapist yelled

The first violence that affects a newborn baby is the name that he or she or them never chose themselves. There will be much more after that: potty training, learning to walk, talk, compulsory schooling, et cetera. It is best to change a first name later in life. My sister did, but it only helped a little. I run into her every year, just this week at the Javaplein in Amsterdam. She sits there forever being 29 years old, I walk up to her expectantly, it's now or never, and as I hear myself talk I know it's in vain.

Me: "Do you know me. We know each other, don't we?” and I know the answer the moment I ask the question. No. A pretty young woman, ethnically mixed, with a head of curly hair and some freckles on her nose. Elsie. My sister. Already 30 years dead. Later in life she called herself Tilasmi, a name given to her by the Baghwan. Still later I was allowed to say Elsje again, and I still do that in my mind.

Sister was also adopted, she was Surinamese/Curacaos/Indonesian and Dutch. A moksi, a mix. Was calling her 'Elsje' necessarily a colonial act of my parents? I do not believe it. I know a very Surinamese lady called Els. 'Kwame' is not for everyone. Parents appropriate a child, especially culturally, and I wouldn't know how else to do it.

Now I read Trouw columnist Babah Trawally, and I do so more often, usually with pleasure. This week he wrote: “You cannot adopt a black African child and then call her Wietske or Tjitske. This is like writing a scientific book without citing the source.”

Would it? Raising a child has nothing to do with writing a science book. 'Cultural appropriation', to put it in good Dutch, is even a necessity in education. “Cling, bonding,” my therapist used to yell.

The phrase 'black African child' is, of course, just as nonsensical as 'white European child'. Trawally herself knows best that Africa is not a country.

In relationships that really matter, people appropriate each other: in love, in the parent-child relationship, in friendship also a little. It is a necessary evil, because without it love cannot flow. You have to be very prepared for it, because 'too much' is lurking. But without it it doesn't work at all.

This 'cultural appropriation' has been a source of reproach for years now. Sometimes rightly so: when you obscure the copyrights of entire cultures, you have to rectify. But love without appropriation does not exist.

Stephan Sanders writes a column here every Monday.

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