How to pronounce Ketanji? Name origin explored as US Senate confirms Judge Jackson as first Black woman Supreme Court justice 

On April 8, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, now Justice Jackson, made history as she became the first Black woman to be confirmed to serve as a Supreme Court justice in the United States' top court.

Justice Jackson has naturally been the talk of the hour on every news channel, but some anchors continue to falter over her unique first name, Ketanji. The public defender's given name has a heartwarming meaning and quite an interesting origin story.

---

Pronunciation and origin of Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson's first name

As far as names go, Ketanji isn't even all that difficult to pronounce. It's pronounced exactly how it's spelled — ke-tan-ji. For those of you into phonetics, that's /kɛtənd͡ʒi/.

American news channel anchors have an inexplicably hard time trying to pronounce her name, butchering it rather painfully. There have been variations of Ketonya, Kateen, Katenja, Kedonji, Kejanji, Kenjonji, Ketowni, Katani, Kajonti, Ketownie, Kentonji, Ketoni, Kentahji, Kontaina, Kontanja, Ketonja, Keytony, Katoni, and even Kontainja.

On day one of her Senate confirmation hearings to be voted into the Supreme Court, Justice Jackson took a moment to elucidate the meaning and origin of her name in her opening remarks.

She said:

“When I was born here in Washington, my parents were public school teachers, and to express both pride in their heritage and hope for the future, they gave me an African name, ‘Ketanji Onyika,’ which they were told means ‘lovely one.’”

The name was picked by Justice Jackson's parents, John and Ellery Brown, from a list titled “African girls’ name options”. The list was collated by her aunt, who was volunteering at the Peace Corps in West Africa at the time.

Though the Harvard Law School alum mentioned that her name 'Ketanji Onyika' is African, linguistic enthusiasts the world over would bemoan the lack of further elucidation about exactly which West African language it was derived from.

It is estimated that there are over 1500 African languages and hundreds of languages spoken in western and west-central Africa, all of which are their own unique languages and not regional dialects.

Many might not pay much heed to the former Vice Chair of the United States Sentencing Commission's given name. After all, what's in a name?

But Justice Jackson's quote from Maya Angelou perfectly proves its relevance in how even her name breaks the American mould:

"I am the dream and the hope of the slave."

African-Americans have faced no dearth of racism on U.S. soil, even percolating down to their names. A study conducted by Marianne Bertrand and Sendhil Mullainathan in 2004 studied how companies responded to fictitious résumés with typical White names versus Black-sounding names.

The experiment found that people with European names such as Emily, Greg, and Yvonne received 50 per cent more interview callbacks than those with what are perceived to be African-American or African names like Lakisha, Jamal, Hakeem, Aisha, and Kareem.

Another similar study in 2021 involving 83,000 fake résumés found that this discrimination still persisted, with African-Americans receiving fewer callbacks, albeit the margin was smaller than in 2004.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson setting such a landmark precedent without being coerced into giving up her African name, as most Black people are, is truly inspirational to African immigrants, especially women, across the world.

---