Hard News: The sphere of influence
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"chris", in reply to
Sorry, while quickly editing I deleted a bunch of paragraphs that probably summed up my attitude more clearly, it was something along the lines of:
As China has opened further and as our window of understanding has expanded, I have noticed a decrease in the use of these alternative names. And I’m sure in the next generation this shift will be even more pronounced.
I’m impressed that you have a workplace where most of your number are comfortable using their given names Bart, that you are creating a climate whereby immigrants feel comfortable using their own names, that to me is as it should be.
If I seemed to take shining to Luke, it’s that living here, and having been told countless times that I must have a Chinese name, and having never done so except in a legal capacity, I guess I’ve become fairly tolerant of others’ mispronunciation. To me It’s just a fact of life when moving from country to country, from speaker to speaker that not everyone in this world will be capable of saying my name as I’d like to hear it. this comes part and parcel with most immigration.
What grabbed me in Luke’s example was not that he’d always asked to be called Luke, but that at a certain point he’d decided he could no longer tolerate your pronunciation of his name in this workplace (how many of you have let the side down here is unclear ;). And that perhaps in another workplace where everyone could pronounce his name correctly he may allow his given name to be used. Which could be complicated to any potential employers reviewing referees etc. But merely hypothetical.
Mostly my response to your example is informed by years of Chinese telling me what I can and cannot say, where I can and can not live, what I must be called on official documents, observing locals (usually family members, sometimes colleagues) telling one another what they can and can not say or do, what they must study, where they must work, who they can not marry, and the Government telling people how many children they can have, where they can and cannot live etc that it’s no longer possible for me to clearly distinguish between the motivation behind the pervasive control mechanisms that these various agent employ. This tendency to dictate terms seems culturally ingrained.
That Luke’s decision to change was due to intolerance of the butchery of his name, despite coming from a country which has 8 official, and a total of 292 languages, struck me as quite selective. it’s naturally his right to decide, and naturally mine to be incredulous as to his justification. if I may be allowed to.
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Chris Waugh, in reply to
has 8 official, and a total of 292 languages,
Is it that many? I didn't realise. But how does one get such a precise number of total languages when there's still so much discussion of how the Sinitic languages and dialects fit together...... I'd imagine there's a similar amount of grey area with the other languages, too, and Victor Mair did have a recent post at Language Log on the subject of linguistic diversity in Greater Tibet (though there is a lot of politics mixed up in it (beyond the obvious), as there always is with such things).
As for names, China has always been a bit more flexible than the West in such things, hasn't it? Still today Chinese kids are given a 小名 (xiǎomíng, a pet name for a baby or toddler, usually something cutesy involving a reduplicated character like Dingding or Dandan) often before they are given their "proper" name, and then there was a time when gents of certain classes would also have a 字 and a (or some) 号. Fast forward to modern times, and perhaps we could say that the internet has revived the 号, at least, in digital form? Pseudonyms are common enough outside the Chinese internet, and plenty hereabouts go by a pseudonym for a variety of reasons. The Chinese situation gives even stronger reasons for using pseudonyms and more drastic consequences, both official and non-governmental, for those who go by their real name or who are outed (by the infamous 人肉搜索, for example). But a very large part of it also seems to be about creating or expressing an identity in the online space.
Getting back to English names, yes, there is still a lot of the "stupid foreigner can't get my real name right, must give the barbarians an English name" attitude, and there are gazillions of problems with that, not least of which is the assumption that foreign=anglopone American and general ignorance of English naming conventions that results in phenomena from "Well, your English name is actually Spanish/German/Japanese/a language I can't identify except to say it's not English" to "Are you sure you really want to go around telling people, "Hi, I'm Simple", to worse.
There's also the imperialist side of things, with Westerners (still!) coming to China demanding that Chinese people have English names because they are too lazy to learn Chinese names. And yes, we've all heard all the arguments about creating the language environment, but.... none of my French, German, Russian or Chinese (yes!) teachers demanded I adopt a French, German, Russian or Chinese name (and granted that would've been as simple as dropping the final r and mimicing the appropriate accent for French and German, but still, the principle holds, and those teachers just called me Chris in their normal Anglophone accent even as they were speaking French or German), so on a personal level I don't buy that, and in any case the overwhelming majority of foreigners in China demanding Chinese people have English names are just plain too lazy and arrogant to learn their Chinese names.
But there are an awful lot of Chinese people who take an "English" name for a variety of other reasons. At the more negative end of the spectrum there's still that post-colonial insecurity and the desire to be Modern and therefore Western. But there are also more positive reasons about creating a certain persona for use in certain international contexts, and not with a view to obscuring or obfuscatiing anything, just a "here's who I am/the face I present to the world in this situation". We all do that, behaving differently when we're among family, friends, or colleagues, in a formal or informal situation, etc, it just seems to me that a lot of especially younger Chinese do that in part through the adoption of different names for different situations in both their online and offline lives, with English names being part of the mix.
And I resisted taking a Chinese name for a very long time, but for reasons that are irrelevant to this discussion, but just by way of full disclosure: I go by 王博 on my near-abandoned Kaixin001 account, on WeChat, and in real world situations where it may be more convenient than Chris, and I'm 红头发老爷们 on Weibo and its connected Sina blog.
As for Deyi Stone Shi, it certainly does look a bit suspicious if he's registering some companies as Deyi and others as Stone. But knowing nothing more about him than what's been appearing online over this whole sorry saga, I won't go speculating on the reasons for his choice of names.
I do have to say I like the Hong Kong approach of writing out names as 'Andy Lau Tak Wah', nice little combo of English and Chinese names and naming conventions - and always providing 汉字 for Chinese names, that's immensely useful too, not least because it helps those of us who read Chinese but speak Mandarin and not Cantonese talk about famous Hong Kongers with other Mandarin speakers.
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"chris", in reply to
Thanks for joining this tangent Chris, obviously I don’t wish to derail Russell’s thread here, hopefully people are okay skipping bits, mine, but I found your post both fascinating and informative.
Is it that many? I didn’t realise. But how does one get such a precise number of total languages
I may have fudged the number, wikipedia cited – Languages of China – from Lewis, M. Paul (ed.), 2009. Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Sixteenth edition. Dallas, Tex.: SIL International.
I found the wording on the Ethnologues site quite vivid.
The number of individual languages listed for China is 298. All are living languages. Of these, 15 are institutional, 23 are developing, 100 are vigorous, 128 are in trouble, and 32 are dying.
A specific figure was not so important as much as getting us into the ballpark. Through exposure we’re becoming accustomed to many of the English diaphones across both native and foreign accents e.g. dental fricatives /ð/ (as in them) /θ/ (thing) may become sibilants [s], [z], /v/ to /w/, /n/ to /l/, aspirated /h/ etc. So hearing a couple of Hunan chaps refer to their province as Funan, /h/ pronounced /f/ was a revelation to me in terms of the variation one could expect in these unalphabetized languages.
China has always been a bit more flexible than the West in such things, hasn’t it?
Absolutely, and so with regards to ‘Luke’ being unkeen to hear us butcher the name his parents gave him, I’d be as inclined to believe that as much as he simply enjoys the sound of the name or he’s a Star Wars fan.
Chinese do that in part through the adoption of different names for different situations in both their online and offline lives
Obviously with regards to online names that could be classed as a global phenomenon but I think what I’ve been grasping for here is that despite this fluidity informally, in most formal situations, and perhaps in spite of this plasticity, China seems far more stringent compared to New Zealand which seems either ill-equipped or under prepared to handle the inconsistencies being presented.
To register a company in China, foreigners will need to provide copies of Directors’ Passports, there would seem to be no legal dispensation for registering companies under separate names as seems to be the case with
Deyi Shi, known to his friends as Stone
As another example, though globally known as Jackie Chan, the Chinese language media will use 成龍 and very occasionally his birth name 陳港生, but never (as far as I’m aware) the Chinese equivalent of Jackie or at least Jack as I know it to be Jié kè 杰克. He is as recognizably 成龍 in the mainland as he is Jackie Chan to us.
Contrast that with a stuff.co.nz search for either ‘Qian Xun Xue’ or ‘Pumpkin’ and the headlines are all over the show:
Pumpkin’s father abandons murder appeal
Pumpkin’s father caught in US
Family to discuss future of Qian Xun XueThe fact that ‘Pumpkin’ isn’t even mentioned in this last article is problematic. Evidence of this inability to adequately present a coherent narrative is compounded over at The Age where Nai Yin Xue is referred to as Nai Yun Xue and even Nai Zin Xue in the photo caption.
Hunt for Pumpkin dad’s ex-lover
It’s almost as if it’s been placed in the Too Hard basket and as such expectations and standards have become incredibly lax.
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Soon Lee, in reply to
Can't resist the urge to reply anymore...
There is a real cost to retaining one's given name as shown by this Auckland University Business School study (pdf) where a CV with an ethnic name (especially Chinese) has a significantly smaller chance of getting to the interview stage. I chose to retain my given name (mostly) and wonder how my life might have gone had I chosen to be a Simon, Stephen or Samuel instead.
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"chris", in reply to
Thanks for your reply Soon Lee, I’m sure New Zealand still has a long way to go, but you pave the way, and though that is certainly not as easy, it is courageous and necessary in the bigger picture.
Your post rather begs the question, how is your life going?
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Soon Lee, in reply to
No complaints here. Life is good.
The instances where I encounter overt racism have pretty much vanished, from a high in the mid-90s (thank you so much Winston Peters). And I tend not to be complimented on my English anymore.
I also have coping strategies in place of preferring face-to-face interviews or at the very least a phone conversation of the "Hi, I submitted an application for the position you advertised last week & wanted to make sure you have received it" nature. Said phone call where the real aim is to ensure that they get the chance to hear me speak (why yes, I am fluent in English) so they are making an informed decision when culling my CV from their shortlist.
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Stephen R, in reply to
New Zealand [...] seems either ill-equipped or under prepared to handle the inconsistencies being presented.
One example I encountered when helping a refugee from Iraq - his birth certificate, his passport and his academic qualifications were in different names, so it took quite some effort for the relevant authorities to believe that he actually had an accounting degree.
From what I understood at the time (communication difficulties might have affected this), it was quite common in Iraq for a man to change his name when his wife had a first son, to something equivalent to "father of <son's name>" and culturally that just wasn't something NZ coped with well.
Which all reminds me of http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-believe-about-names/
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I think people are perfectly entitled to use whatever names they like in an informal context.
But the Companies Office wants your full "government name", and for good reason. Either Mr Shi has changed his name officially to "Stone" or "Stone De Yi" in which case he should put that on all his directorships, or he should put his original name.
If one wants to take a charitable view, his accountant might have done the filing unknowingly. One would have thought that this would have created issues when they tried to open a bank account and couldn't produce a matching directors passport, but maybe the banks treat National Party insiders differently to mere mortals.
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Moz, in reply to
his birth certificate, his passport and his academic qualifications were in different names, so it took quite some effort for the relevant authorities to believe that he actually had an accounting degree.
That's one reason it's common for refugees particularly to sit a basic qualification in NZ. The other being that it's distressingly hard to verify qualifications from the source countries of many refugees. Often for political reasons, but also because after someone bombs the university into rubble and executes any survivors, it can be tricky to find someone to confirm degrees... Not that we would ever do such a thing, you understand, the coalition of the willing had a strict policy of, well, I'm sure it included not damaging non-military... well, anyway.
For more difficult names it's easier to just pick a local name and be done with it, rather than trying to train yourself to answer to Fong, Fung, Foo-ong, Foo-ung, Phuong, Phương and whatever other variations people come up with. Plus the bonus of name ordering variations, {christian name} {sire name} is not the only option, leading to official ID from different bits of the government having different names on it. When your driver's license says "Ngoc A Pham", passport "Tran An Pham", medicare card "An Tran Pham" and birth certificate "Tran An Ngoc Pham" life can be unreasonably difficult. Add a couple of credit cards and even picking up tickets at a venue can be a time-sucking experience "produce ID that mattches the credit card". Changing your name to "An from Viet Nam" starts to seem like a really good idea. Oh, sh!t, what country are you from again? For simplicity change that too, "An from Aotearoa".
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Moz, in reply to
I think people are perfectly entitled to use whatever names they like in an informal context. ... But the Companies Office wants your full "government name", and for good reason.
Define "government name". One branch of the NZ government has dealth with me under four variations of my last name (to my knowledge, there may be more) despite it being as english as English can be (it's the name of a town in the English Midlands), as well as under "the name I am commonly known by". It's both amusing and frustrating to have to grind through a pile of variations before they can find me in their system.
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I used to work on historical records. In one period, when the literacy requirement was pretty marginal (you could talk to the clerk) and the standard of names for the electoral roll was that you had to be able to be identified by it, there was a person listed as "James Conheady". With some analysis I managed to identify him in the following electoral roll as "James Kennedy".
I picture an immigrant going up to a clerk and saying in a strong Irish accent "I'm James Kennedy and I want to enroll to vote"
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
read herring aid...
an immigrant going up to a clerk
and saying in a strong Irish accent......I, Canard Lee Una Stan Word Jew Sane...
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Moz, in reply to
Canard Lee Una Stan Word Jew Sane...
I am totally going to change my name to this.
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"chris", in reply to
No complaints here. Life is good.
I’m glad to hear that Soon Lee. The thing that struck me in that Auckland University Business School study is that I’d be hard pressed to name a country without some form of this type of discrimination or similar, at least until multiculturalism really kicks in.
I tend not to be complimented on my English anymore.
That’s always a good start, and I’m guessing you wouldn’t get too many New Zealanders introducing themselves to you as 李小龍, due to, y’know, you looking a bit like a 李小龍 to them, and them assuming you’d appreciate that.
But if such an unlikely thing were to occur, and you were to complain about this special service, I also doubt very much that you’d be dealt much in the way of remonstration along the lines of “check that yellow privilege a notch or two” from folk back home. =)
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BenWilson, in reply to
I’d change my name if I lived in Thailand. They got endless mirth out of “Ben”, because it’s (so I understand) like the verb “to be” in English, and has a few other meanings. Every meeting with a new person would go something like:
“Ben ben”
“Ben? Ben ben?”
<nods, laughs> “Ben ben”
<looking me up and down>"Ben BEN!”
“Ben ben ben!!”
<mutual chuckles>
“Ben ben ben ben…”
<outbursts of laughter>I think there were all sorts of jokes in there, something like:
“This is Ben”
“Ben? His name is really Ben?”
“This IS Ben”
“Big Ben!”
“Really Big Ben” (Thai is a language that uses double adjectives to emphasize stuff).
“He is big and he lives big...”However I can only really guess, since there’s tonality to the jokes and asking for explanation just drew more titters. I think there was some aspect of sexual innuendo in it all. Amusingly, after one such exchange the big guy who was pissing himself with laughter introduced himself to me as Matt. But his mischievous girlfriend told me his real name was “Mass”. He frowned. Clearly he’d heard before how much fun English speakers would make of a big guy whose name was Mass. I didn’t press it, and confirmed:
“Matt”. But his girlfriend wouldn’t let it lie, and played some more:
“Matt, Ben. Ben, Mass. Ben ben, Matt mass”. She then introduced me to his friend, whose name was Boom. I confirmed, punching my hand as I said “Boom”. There was a startled silence – they looked to each other and she said “How he know?”. Turned out Boom was a Muay Thai boxer. He was quite happy with how that went down in English.I think people choosing their own names is fine by me.
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Actually, it’s so automatic that I’ve even forgotten that I do the same with my own name here. Because my long-form name was a subject of annoying ridicule at primary school. Ben is a contraction, and if (as so many people seem to want to do), you guessed that I’m a Benjamin, you’d be wrong. My name even gets mocked in my own language!
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Chris Waugh, in reply to
Ben
Shift the vowel to something closer to Southern California and pronounce in fourth (falling - start high and slide the pitch down as you say the word, as if you're angry) and it becomes bèn, which in Mandarin could mean stupid, clumsy, awkward. Or go straight towards, in which case it's the first character in the transliteration of Benz, which is the name Mercedes cars go by in China. Third tone, běn, and it could be source, origin, or book (both measure word for book and the noun book), the second character in Japan (in both Chinese and Japanese, just pronounced differently in each language) 日本, or benzene. And the Chinese language being what it is, there are a multitude of other possibilities.
you guessed that I’m a Benjamin, you’d be wrong
That would seem to be the most common long form of Ben. My second guess, and it's the only other I can think of, is a name shared with a pope and a film star, and has a very good meaning, but an unfortunate final syllable for a young lad surrounded by other young lads looking for an excuse to run somebody else down.
One common Chinese mispronunciation of Chris comes out like curse (and my name is often misspelled with the r and i reversed), but what's most annoying is nobody seems to notice the obvious joke there - that the mispronunciation may well be more accurate from my students' point of view. Oh well.
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BenWilson, in reply to
My second guess, and it’s the only other I can think of, is a name shared with a pope and a film star
And a way of serving eggs. I like the name. But I keep it in reserve, making sure people have earned it. Also, a short name is a convenient name. People don't have to contract it to make it familiar. The familiar versions are my least favourite. Benny, Benjy, etc. They're names people give to dogs.
There's actually quite a lot of other possibilities. Benedetto, Benito, Bennett, Benson, Bentley, and all the various spellings and contractions amongst them. That's just European sources. But yes, Benjamin and Benedict would be the most common English variants, in that order.
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BenWilson, in reply to
Is a K+R sound unusual in Chinese? R is probably the most troublesome sound - even native English speakers have a lot of trouble with it :-).
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Chris Waugh, in reply to
Is a K+R sound unusual in Chinese?
Yeah, it's a consonant cluster that doesn't exist in Mandarin. Neither sound on its own is a problem for Mandarin speakers, the Mandarin versions being close enough to their English equivalents.
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Check that privet hedge…
Chinese privet is used in traditional herbal medicine. The decoction of privet leaves or bark helps to treat diarrhea, stomach ulcers, chronic bowel problems, chapped lips, sore mouths and throats, and a wash for skin problems.
Some species produce a fruit, which is mildly toxic to humans. Symptoms from eating privet fruit include nausea, headache, abdominal pain, vomiting, diarrhea, weakness, low blood pressure, and low body temperature. In large amounts, the odor produced from privet’s flowers can cause respiratory irritation and its pollen can cause an allergic reaction</Chinese Whispers: Round I>
;- ) -
Ian Dalziel, in reply to
Anyone for tenors?
(Ben) That’s just European sources
Let's not forget Beniamino....
Well, it is Mothers' Day tomorrow...
:- )(What about Michael Jackson's rat...?)
</coat>
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"chris", in reply to
I think people choosing their own names is fine by me.
That’s a very liberal answer Ben, but I’d be interested as to where you draw the line. We’ve touched on a number of examples, triggered by Deyi “Stone” Shi, and the Companies Office left wanting, as Stephen R pointed out this is not always as easy as it sounds.
As Moz said;
For more difficult names it’s easier to just pick a local name and be done with it,
Luke has to date used two names in the work place, and is free to choose again in the future I assume. This in itself is harmless, accountability wouldn’t seem to be so important in that environment. However were he a lawyer, a financier, a doctor, an engineer, a member of the police force etc. then I’d feel considerably safer knowing there was recourse for any of the above and others to provide their legal name when solicited in a professional context. Perhaps this is already the case.
Soon Lee on the other hand has largely retained his given name. And although this has limited the chances of being short-listed for job interviews, this decision has decreased the chances of him finding himself employed in a racially hostile environment.
For my own part, Chris pointed out the curse of Chris on the previous page and I’ve also be exposed to the odd Christ on occasion. And I don’t know, to me a name is an identifiable sound or scribble, not some sacred fanfare. Be it an Indian’s or a Southlander’s pronunciation, I’m equally interested in hearing the variation. It’s never the same sound, ever. And I’ll admit that I have a bit of a fetish for seeing it printed in Calibri.
As Chris noted China has always been a bit more flexible than the West with regards to names but when people who would ordinarily use their given name with locals introduce themselves to me with some name they were given in year 6, I’m still on occasion put out. As I’m sure any immigrant will tell you, these racially motivated reminders that you’re not from round these parts tend to get old pretty quick.
Informally, I don’t know if I’d be so happy letting anyone who’d chosen to conceal their real name babysit my child, or even my cat. I know I probably wouldn’t be incredibly amused to find an aquaintance had maintainted a fake name specifically with me without good reason, and I’d most certainly feel pretty disappointed to find that person I’d been with in what I felt was a genuine relationship had likewise assumed an alias, because they chose to.
A paragraph of hypotheticals but I think it’s safe to say we all draw the line somewhere.
That link Stephen R posted reminded me of how at work, my interaction with students is pretty limited, I hear them speak, and whatever name they’ve chosen is on the screen. At the conclusion of a class I grade them and write their report. If they happen to choose to change their name mid-class and if I happen to miss that then that’s me now writing an additional report to the CR department on another website.
But that is online, a more fluid reserve, and though there are those who would have us forced to use our given names on the net, I am in no way an advocate of this, I appreciate the freedom of expression it enables, and I say that sincerely in a way only Russell can truly appreciate.
I recall an instance once Ben where you asked me if me and Chris Waugh were the same person. I answered honestly to the best of my knowledge. I felt that to be a common courtesy.
Communal etiquette imposes expectations people largely conform to. Where cultures meet and merge exists the opportunity for both exploitation and examining our own culture with a broader scope. In doing so we may more clearly comprehend which limitations are imposed by necessity and which are merely folly.
So I’m genuinely interested in your answer here:
Where do you draw the line?
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Sacha, in reply to
Where do you draw the line?
aspie vs aspie.
nobody wins. -
"chris", in reply to
Blazing Saddles! The speed at which you read all that and commented and yet seemed to miss the entire point was impressive Sacha.
[task]
Seek clarification on Ben’s point. Illustrate my understanding of the topic to date, provide some triggering examples, restate the question. Promote discussion on this living parchment.BTW, I've been hooked on the Access posts since your initial post, they're what roped me back to the site, for better or worse. I've nothing to contribute, but my mind has been blown on a number of occasions reading them.
And that's my annual word quota.
Post your response…
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