Ich heiße Annete. Der Vater heißt Franz Mut.

Dear Sir or Madam:

I have a big problem that I could not solve. One of the books I am using contains the two sentences below. The book is authored by a Japanese writer. Perhaps you know that in Japanese we do not have articles, and that is a big problem for most Japanese. Is this formula really correct?

a) Ich heiße Annete, Annette Mut. Der Vater heißt Franz Mut.
b) Die Mutter heißt Erika Mut.

The translation seems, to me, "The father is… " I would think that a person speaking about his or her own father or mother would say "my" and not "the." So I was expecting the German "mein Vater" and "mein Mutter ."

However I am just in my first weeks on study. So the author may be correct. Can you please confirm that this structure is OK in the German language? I will really appreciate your help in this matter and any other input.

Looking forward to hearing from you soon.

Best regards,

Bah