Who is Joanie from Karma Cola: Marketing the Mystic East and what is their importance?

Joanie is an American tourist, a visitor at the ashram visited by the author in chapter three, is mocked by the longer term guests at the ashram because she hasn't adopted a name more appropriate to her spiritual search. She was mocked, one of the long-termers suggests, because her name was too evocative of everything he and the other seekers at the ashram were trying to leave behind.