Re: Japanese name use single space between the last name and the first name?
Hi,
From: Osamu Aoki <debian@aokiconsulting.com>
Subject: Re: Japanese name use single space between the last name and the first name?
Date: Wed, 15 Jan 2003 16:15:01 -0800
> I may be the one to be blamed to cause this.
>
> When I saw my name in document maintainer section in English with first
> and my last name in one piece, I felt strange. I posted here and since
> no one replied, I fixed that page.
Ok. I posted the mail because the comment with cvs commit may
mislead non-Japanese people who don't know Japanese custom.
(The comment can read that Japanese name uses spaces everywhere
in every contexts; which is not true. I'd like Chinese translation
of DWN not to use spaces.)
I think a space may be used for Japanese name in English sentences.
Also, I added spaces even for Japanese translations if the name
is written independently in "()". However, I didn't add spaces
when the names appear in ordinary sentences because such a expression
is apparently strange.
> Very valid question. Most name references in the modern newspapers are
> spaceless and all in Japanese characters (I just checked.) I have been
> spelling my names with separated format since most of the document I sign
> are government/bank document where they have box for each section. Also
> my name tag in my elementary school days tends to separate them.
Right. Your explanation is consistent with mine, and I expect
non-Japanese members of this list will trust us. The keypoint
seems whether the name appears independently (i.e., book author,
sign on government/bank documents, name tags, and so on) or in
ordinary sentences.
> At any rate, mixed character group document is unconventional and I do
> not know what is right. My intent of adding space in the English was to
> clarify splits between first and last name.
I understand your intent. However, I am afraid that many people
will misunderstand that "Osamu" is "青木" and "Aoki" is "修",
while the truth is opposite.
> I do not care which way to write, IMHO. But it has to be consistent.
Ok. Since it is I who modify English version of DWN for Japanese
names (by a semi-automatic small Perl script), I can change the
policy and the script hereafter.
> Also, getting opinion of Chinese person's preference in English context
> may be interesting. I see most chinese names in Japanese web pages do
> not use a space between last and first name in Japanese.
I am also interested. Also, I can add items for my script for
Chinese, Korean, Russian, Greek, Thai, and any other
non-Latin-alphabet people. Suggestions are welcome.
---
Tomohiro KUBOTA <kubota@debian.org>
http://www.debian.or.jp/~kubota/
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