Chinese online learners or those who learn Chinese online or whose teachers speak Chinese tend to come across Chinese individuals who have English names that resonate with all other normal folks — David, Michelle or Steven. But they can also encounter Chinese people who are called Apple, Rainbow, King Kong or even Semen! These instances create uncountable internet debates of strange Chinese names.
Using English names by the Chinese started taking seriously in the 1980s and 1990s with the Reform and Opening up policy in China. Since China started accessing the world and English became a compulsory language in schools, adopting an English name became linked to international interactions and career development.
The easiest explanation behind using English names is that it is difficult to pronounce. The Chinese have names that are difficult to pronounce by the English. The sound of words that start with letters such as x that can resemble sh or c that can resemble ts may be confused with the English speakers who do not know pinyin romanization. Such a name as Xu Zhenqi gives real pronunciation challenges to people who are not Chinese.
Other than pronunciation issues, certain Chinese names come out to produce terrible misinterpretations in their romanticized versions. The Chinese character Shi Ting, translated as poetic and graceful, is translated into pinyin, Shiting, but it is too close to an English slang word.
Nevertheless, the culture of off-put naming that results in the occurrence of unusual English names has roots in the cultural differences in naming philosophy. The naming traditions in China are not focused on sounds. As an example, parents concerned with notions of light and brightness may pick among many characters including the sun radical (guang, ming, liang, can), and combinations of these elements (zhengti, xin).
This gives the world very personalized names that have distinct semantic information. The outcomes of this technique of Chinese people choosing English names according to this find-a-unique-meaningful-word method may sound bizarre to the Western ears.
Unsophisticated titles such as Shimmer, Sparkle, Destiny or Success adhere to the Chinese reasoning of using words with good connotation, but break the Western nomenclature tradition by not using them as first names.
The cultural focus of uniqueness of names also contributes. Since about 85% of Chinese residents bear a single one of 100 similar last names, parents make up by providing a given name that is unique. The same tradition of individualism has been applied to the selection of English names such that some Chinese are not willing to use a typical title such as John or Mary in the name selection.
There is a significant difference in the ways in which Chinese people choose to name their children in English. Most of the names are given by the English teachers in the primary or secondary school and in most cases they are given due to similarity in sound with the Chinese name or just because the teacher likes the name. Da Wei usually turns to David and Ai Li to Ally.
Other Chinese also give names that are inspired by their favorite celebrity which has resulted in many people named Kobe after the basketball player Kobe Bryant or Michael Jackson after the singer. On finding the popularity of the film Castaway in China, a considerable number of boys in China took Tom Hanks as their entire English name but not as Tom.
The phenomenon of the oddness of names has been tried to be solved by language schools. Even institutions such as GoEast Mandarin in Shanghai tend to talk to international students about what they want to be called in Chinese and recommend the student the correct Chinese name, in turn!- when necessary.
Guidelines have also been posted by Chinese state media on how people should not name themselves after great personalities such as Einstein, after foodstuffs such as Cherry, or one with innuendo sexual meaning. The impact of websites has come in to assist the Chinese people in choosing the right name in English by offering lists of the common names as per the country, year of birth and gender.
The practice is still controversial even in China. Other Chinese adopt their English names as convenient means of foreign communication and as a manifestation of another aspect of their identity. Other people oppose the practice as unnecessarily accommodating of culture.
Professor Gao Jian of Shanghai International Studies University had long been referring to James to foreign friends, but then after about ten years, changed his name to use his Chinese name, and he must make other people learn his name. He symbolizes an increasing feeling that the Chinese people need to keep their Chinese names and the westerners need to go out of their way to pronounce their names properly.
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