ABSTRACT
As an African American cisgender woman from Pittsburgh with a name like Martina Estella Martin, I have absorbed more than my fair share of other people’s assumptions about my name, race, and cultural identity over the years. My name has Latin, German, and Italian roots, and I have learned to embrace its cultural ambiguity and the curiosity it fosters in others. Once, I applied for, and was offered, a job as an administrative assistant after successfully completing a phone interview with a hiring manager. I felt confident after the interview and believed that we had genuinely connected. On my first day, I arrived on-site and waited patiently in the lobby for my new supervisor to escort me to my office.
