Bizarre English names - Part 2

[quote=“Taffy”]Mrs Taffy much prefers her English name to her Chinese one - the logic being that she chose it, rather than it being foisted upon her as some superstitious result of stroke counting and the time she was born. Her Taiwanese friends and colleagues all use their English names with each other, especially the girls (Sarah, Joleen, Rebecca etc). Her male colleagues tend to go either by surnames and titles (for the higher-ups) or Chinese nicknames for the regular grunts: 小黑 Xiǎo Hēi, 大胖 Dà Pàng and 泡菜 Pào Cài (his mother is Korean).

I have a friend in England who insists on using Mrs Taffy’s Chinese name (once he had found it out), something which she feels is a little disrespectful, seeing as she has made it clear how she would like to be known. Of course, she was far too nice to ever say anything about it.[/quote]

Well, to give the Taiwanese some credit, the “English name-tag” might be a modern reincarnation of the ancient Chinese “courtesy name”, or 字. There was this “capping ceremony” like a rite of passage or something where the boys got a fancy little cap and a fancy little “courtesy name”. So in the end they had three names: the 性, the 名, and the 字. So, like, elders and teachers and the king would call you by your 性名, and the regular Joe Shmos would call you by your 字.

That also seems to be what X3M was told:

But, OK, maybe I still think it’s just pretentious. Like, I remember some people in the States who liked to adopt Indian names because they didn’t like their boring Anglo names. So, I guess the Taiwanese can borrow those unwanted Anglo names. But then, who’s going to borrow their unwanted Chinese names? The Indians?

[quote=“bababa”]
I think it’s usually the fact that they want an English name. The first time I taught Chinese students (at a university in China), I didn’t give my students English names because I thought it was racist (I still do, if forced because the Chinese is ‘too hard’ for the native speaker of English to bother learning). I learned their Chinese names, including how to write them in Chinese characters (a difficult task for me at the time). After a couple of weeks, the head of the department and her assistant came to me and more or less insisted I give the students English names - because the students wanted them. The class where we picked their names was one of the classes they were most interested in.[/quote]

It’s a real cultural 180.

In the West, you’ll grow up learning about all the evil things that “ye olde whitey” did; and in this case the evil sin is “cultural imperialism”. Obviously, the little white kids who are raised in a liberal American setting are encouraged to explore and appreciate non-western, non-whitey cultures. And you sound like you were raised among liberal thinkers.

But then the negative “cultural imperialism” turns to “globalization” which then starts to be desired.

Then you get to Asia and the people are like, “but we WANT your cultural imperialism! Force it on me!”

But after your liberal Western education and upbringing, you’re thinking, “but only cultural imperialist a-hole ‘ye olde whiteys’ do stuff like that. Not me! I want to esteem and value your non-whitey culture!”

And that kind of thinking is totally foreign to the Taiwanese. They see “positive globalization”, whereas the problem of “cultural preservation in the face of globalization” is a problem that the French and Japanese have; to the Taiwanese, that’s a non-issue.

Well, many of us have “Chinese names.” On learning this, my brother reacted with surprise–e.g., “Does Mom know?”

Me, I’ll call people by whatever they prefer, and let them decide what kind of name they want. Except Prince, who has abused the principle!

[quote=“Sinister Tiddlywinks”][quote=“bababa”]
I think it’s usually the fact that they want an English name. The first time I taught Chinese students (at a university in China), I didn’t give my students English names because I thought it was racist (I still do, if forced because the Chinese is ‘too hard’ for the native speaker of English to bother learning). I learned their Chinese names, including how to write them in Chinese characters (a difficult task for me at the time). After a couple of weeks, the head of the department and her assistant came to me and more or less insisted I give the students English names - because the students wanted them. The class where we picked their names was one of the classes they were most interested in.[/quote]

It’s a real cultural 180.

In the West, you’ll grow up learning about all the evil things that “ye olde whitey” did; and in this case the evil sin is “cultural imperialism”. Obviously, the little white kids who are raised in a liberal American setting are encouraged to explore and appreciate non-western, non-whitey cultures. And you sound like you were raised among liberal thinkers.

But then the negative “cultural imperialism” turns to “globalization” which then starts to be desired.

Then you get to Asia and the people are like, “but we WANT your cultural imperialism! Force it on me!”

But after your liberal Western education and upbringing, you’re thinking, “but only cultural imperialist a-hole ‘ye olde whiteys’ do stuff like that. Not me! I want to esteem and value your non-whitey culture!”

And that kind of thinking is totally foreign to the Taiwanese. They see “positive globalization”, whereas the problem of “cultural preservation in the face of globalization” is a problem that the French and Japanese have; to the Taiwanese, that’s a non-issue.[/quote]Crumbs. I wasn’t thinking about all that political stuff. I was just thinking that if someone doesn’t particularly want to have an English name, they shouldn’t feel obliged to take one just to communicate in English. I agree with you that many people do actually like having an English name. But I don’t think it should be obligatory!

I have two brothers in my class, one named ‘Sunrise’ and the other? You guessed it - ‘Sunset’ :slight_smile:

(Singing:) “Swiftlyyyyyy flow the yeaaaaaars…”

China’s good for the whacko names thing. I’ve had job applications from “Shopping Jew” and “Welly Margin”.

It’s a “don’t care” thing. I just ask them for their Chinese name if they come out with some nonsense name or just call them “Dave” and “Stella” if they won’t tell me their Chinese names. I introduce myself as anything ranging from Mao Zedong to He Biwen to Wai Guoren to these kinds of people and we have a laugh. Er, I have a laugh. Anyway, they don’t care about their silly names, I don’t care about their silly names, so we just get down to the business of trying to rip each other off. China, eh? Great stuff.

I just read this article
news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070403/ap_ … _metallica

I figure people should be able to name their kids whatever they want but I have run across some interesting ones in my time.

Examples

Two twins named Gold and Silver

A dude named Omega but he was the first child, he even said his parents were idiots.

Numerous kids named after the liqour there kids were conceived on. Examples Tequila, Covassey(spelling?), Hennessey,

Named after cars, Cadillac, Caprice, Mercedes,

I once knew a man named “Ether”. It wasn’t a mistake. He knew what it meant, but he liked how it sounded.

My little sister named her son Auborn. What the hell? My brother’s kids are all M names. The latest is “McKay”… WHAT THE HELL? Worse is that McKay has a sister named Mackala. (Pronounced like McKayLa) WHAT THE HELL!!

April, May, June…

My mom’s name is June simply because when she was born (in June) her parents couldn’t speak much English yet as they had just immigrated to Canada from Denmark. We often joke that she should be glad she wasn’t born in February.

I was subbing at a friend’s kindy over winter break and there were some whacked names there… a 6 year old boy named Bunny, another boy named Pheobus, and a little girl named Miffy.

My Aunt’s name is June too. Except her birthday is in May. My 5th name is “Kristofer”, but I gave myself that one.

[quote]I figure people should be able to name their kids whatever they want but I have run across some interesting ones in my time.[/quote]To a certain extent I agree, but what about the kids ? What happens when they go to school ? Don’t they have a right to not a stupid name ?

We have lots of threads on silly names already.

I teach a kid named KingMark :unamused:

[quote=“bushibanned”]My mom’s name is June simply because when she was born (in June) her parents couldn’t speak much English yet as they had just immigrated to Canada from Denmark. We often joke that she should be glad she wasn’t born in February.

I was subbing at a friend’s kindy over winter break and there were some whacked names there… a 6 year old boy named Bunny, another boy named Pheobus, and [color=red]a little girl named Miffy[/color].[/quote]

One of my classes had a little girl called Muffy… :smiling_imp:
Also had a little boy called Golden… :unamused:
My favourite is still Satan… :astonished:

And of course there are the mispronounciations and spelling:
Dannis (pronounced Dennis)
Code (pronounced Cody)
Claire (pronounced Cli-er)
Batty (pronounced Betty)
Jammy (pronounced Jimmy)
Hiro (pronounced He-lo and sometimes… :unamused: Hero, which, trust me, was a definite contradiction in terms)
And they never want to change the spelling.

My grandmother is (my) winner of all time “too many names,” with Faith Judith Cornelia Dinah. We just called her Judy.
My sister’s kids have some presumptious ones: Savannah (as in the grasslands - and pornstar), Kyle (odd because the kid is so not English - she married an Afrikaans guy) and Phoebe. On the surface these names may not sound odd, but as I say, she married an Afrikaans guy who (along with the kids) can’t speak English very well, if at all. They’re all in Afrikaans schools (my father almost had a heart attack), which would bring wierd problems of it’s own.
Strange one, my sister.

[quote]My favourite is still Satan[/quote]To get back on topic a bit. The Swedish authorities also stopped someone calling their child Satan.

My older brother’s name is Zichory Zachary. Our last/sur/family name begins with a Z. My boy is named (partially) after my older brother.

My wife’s family name is 白. Had we a daughter, her Chinese name would be 白日夢. Her English name would be Sunshine Daydream, after the Grateful Dead song that usually follows Sugar Magnolia. My boy has already agreed to name his daughter, should he have one, 白日夢. Dunno if his wife will go along with Sunshine Daydream. :idunno:

I almost named one of my dogs 香肉.

Incidentally, Big Fluffy Matthew is a far-out groovy name.

I’ve named students Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, as well as Barney, Betty, Fred, Wilma, Pebbles and Bam-Bam, but the mother didn’t like it so it got changed to Dino. Also Bert, Nan, Freddie and Flossie (The Bobbsey Twins), Joe Frank and Fenton (The Hardy Boys and their father), as well as Greg, Marsha, Jan, Cindy, Bobby, and Peter. I gave these names to Jiayi kids about 17 years ago, so they should all be in their mid-twenties by now. hehehehe

Mercedes is a real name. It was the car that was named after the engineers daughter…

Ahem. [Bizarre English names - Part 2