The simplicity of "Difficult Names" is not worth underestimating. Fiery passion and cultural strength saturate this short poem as Warsan Shire encourages readers (i.e. parents) to take a stand against society's dominant, patriarchal culture. According to Shire, such a culture oppresses the lives of women and girls, by excluding them from positions of power and opportunities to excel in a comparative manner. Hence, this is why she focuses on daughters instead of sons or even both.
One of the ways this culture oppresses women and girls is through the language and symbolism tied to their names, which emphasizes an ethnic clash as well as ethnic cleansing. For example, Shire personally resonates with this poem as a women of color possessing a Kenyan-Somali background, while based in London. Her name is not popular in this city, where Eurocentric names are favored the most.
In an interview with The Well & Often Reader, Shire discusses how she once wanted to have a more common, easier-to-pronounce name than the one her parents gave her. Essentially, she wanted to strip herself of the linguistic and symbolic nature of her name, in an attempt to mitigate the ethnic barriers she faced.
Yet her cultural perspective has matured to the point of loving her name for what it is. In the same interview, she said that Warsan means "good news" and Shire means "to gather in one place." Such a name is indigenous to her home country, which she is proud of. Despite the extra effort needed to pronounce her name, she strongly admires the sound of it.
"Difficult Names" is an attempt to encourage readers, particularly women and girls, to appreciate the beauty and power of hard-to-pronounce names. Shire wants daughters to embrace the cultural essence of their difficult names, for the sake of their history and dignity. She wants daughters to believe such names should earn them respect and nothing less.
