The misidentification of Black students on campus is ridiculous. We do not look alike. I repeat: we, as in the Black students, do NOT look alike. We all have unique features, hairstyles, clothing choices and most importantly personalities. Even when we have similar hairstyles or clothing choices, we still do not look alike. From my personal experience, I have been misidentified multiple times on campus and the person they called me looked nothing like me. 

For example, during my freshman year, I was mistaken for another Black girl in my wing and we looked nothing alike. I am 5’3 on a good day and the person they were looking for was at least 5’5. The only thing that we had in common was the fact that we  had the same hairstyle, but even then I had two braids in the front and they did not. At the moment, it is something I laughed off and ranted about to my other Black and minority friends. It was something we talked about and laughed at as a group because we all know that I look nothing like the person they called me.

Recently, I heard about an incident in class where a professor mistook one of their Black students for another Black student in a film in front of the entire class. Again, they did not look alike; they had two things in common: glasses and box braids. It was an honest mistake, but this is unfortunately a norm for people of color in predominantly white spaces. It has happened to me, to my friends and many other people of color. You can argue that it has nothing to do with race, but Zulekha Nathoo wrote a BBC article where she mentions how “experts say in majority-white spaces, misidentification happens more frequently to people of color.” She also mentions anecdotes from people of color talking about their experience with being misidentified. In the article, Akilah Cadet speaks about being called the name of the only other black women in the office even though she was shades and shades darker than her. Then, Anupma Baskshi speaks about how some workers continued to confuse her for another person on the team and how at first she brushed it off because she was new. However, after months they continued to do it even after having multiple face-to-face meetings with her, only to find out that they had nothing in common with the other person besides their ethnicity. 

Something interesting about Baskshi’s testimony is that she mentions “the funniest thing,” and then proceeds to list all the things they did not have in common. I do not think she found it funny, but it is one of those things that you have to laugh off or treat as a joke because if not you will start to think about who you are and whether or not you stand out from the crowd. Some people can easily brush it off and to them it is not a big deal, but to others it is. I do not want to be mistaken for anyone, I want people to look at me and see me for who I am because I do not know how I would deal with being misnamed everyday. Can you imagine working at a site for months and interacting with the people there, only to have them call you someone else’s name everyday, just because you have similar hairstyles or have something as simple as glasses in common? It is not a great feeling nor should it be treated as something small seeing as it has lasting effect. It is easy to make a mistake the first time but after those first few meetings where you have met everyone, then you should know a person’s name and if you do not then you can always ask them to be safe.

Photo by: Admar Kamosso via Pexels