Choosing your Chinese name

[doraemon]

@ ansileran: Well, I guess in girls can get away with having a manly Chinese name most of the time and vice versa (although a lot less common). It's nothing ridiculous or anything, but could be misleading for other people when trying to decipher your gender. But if you want people to know you're a female ten obviously having a feminine name would be the way to go.

But some women actually have more masculine names to sound stronger and less frail. There's this really interesting case of a woman I know whose name used to be 雅丽(ya3 li4) but because she kept getting sick all the time when she was a child her parents changed her name to a more masculine 亚利 (ya4 li4). Surprisingly her health improved significantly after she adopted a stronger-sounding name. Weird...

Anyway, I might not be 100%. I just think 晓明 sounds more masculine because there's this famous actor in China called 黄晓明 and that sort of just stuck with me forever.

[ansileran]

@doraemon :

Thanks for those precisions. I'm not looking for something that sounds "manly", it's just that I don't think I could get used to being called something like "winter rose"... It just wouldn't suit me and people who know me would find it hilarious. I asked a Chinese colleague and he just laughed at the thought. He said that if I were going to be called by a name with flower character, I should start dressing like a girl first...ugh.

董晓慧 seems fine to me (I'll ask my colleague saturday to see what he thinks of it). I also like the meaning of 慧, I just didn't know that character before.

[doraemon]

I'm not looking for something that sounds "manly", it's just that I don't think I could get used to being called something like "winter rose"...

Yeah, I kind of gathered that you might not be the type to be called a name like that. That was more of a suggestion for MGMT, but I wonder how she feels about it......? :unsure:

[ansileran]

I think she said in a previous post that she likes flowers... But it's really up to her. If she want something else, I think there are more than enough Chinese character to choose from, even if we limit the list to those with a pronouciation close to French !

I also think that names ending with 4th or 2nd tone sound better and 4th tone seems to be the easiest to pronounce (at least for me), especialy at the end of a name.

[MGMT]

Thanks doraemon! Haha, can't believe those two sound like names! I hadn't even realized it was the one you'd picked, ansileran; it takes me a while to recognize/distinguish characters.

I quite like those suggestions, mostly 兰晓燕 and 兰雪梅. It's funny because I hate my western name and the fact that it relates to flowers (like ansileran, I'm not really girly!), but in Chinese it doesn't bother me as much, and I find that I even likes having that similarity between the two. I'm gonna practice writing and saying them out loud (those two and n° 1, 4 & 5) and see which seems the easiest and best for me.

I really like 董晓慧, ansileran; and I agree 慧 is beautiful both in looks and meaning (I'd definitely have picked it were it not for the "hr" sound). Let us know if you pick it finally!

[jbradfor]

Since that's quite broad ("something to do with flowers" and "easy to pronounce"), some other ideas on picking the name.

I assume the user picked the name "MGMT" after the rock back MGMT; they have a super-cute song called Kids; maybe if you listen to it while think of flowers something will come to mind

[Later edit: humm, weird. I didn't see all the other posts show up even after a refresh before I posted the above.... probably not relevant any more since there was more comments....]

[Jane_PA]

Hi MGMT,

If you choose 兰 as your family name, then you could get very impressive and beautiful combination for your given name.

Even 兰雪 would be a beautfiful one (but not 兰梅，because that would have the same pronounication as blue berry...). 兰雪梅 is also good, but I might think since the 3 characters all have beautiful meanings, which may make the name to shining. A famous Chinese Peking Opera actor's art name is 梅兰芳.

[skylee]

It seems to be a fashionable way to name children using words that have the same pronunciation as the surname. If you want to use 蘭 (lan2, orchid) as your surname, you could consider using 嵐 (lan2, hill) or 藍 (lan2, blue) as the given name. 蘭嵐 and 蘭藍 look and sound good IMO. As 藍 (lan2, blue) is also a surname, 藍蘭 (lan2 lan2, blue orchid) is also very good.

Oh I write in the traditional script. The simplified form of the words are 兰, 岚 and 蓝 respectively.

[m000gle]

Thanks, everyone, for all the info in this thread. Its been really helpful to read through it all!

I'm about to start studying in China, so I'm actually in the process of figuring out which name(s) I should go by. I've found a few possibilities, but none have yet jumped out at me as the one.

伟柏 (Trad. = 偉柏 ... Pinyin = wěi bó) - I was given this name in class last year, and it therefore has sentimental value (my first Chinese teach gave it to me) and is the most familiar. Its meaning is along the lines of "Great Cypress", with the first character being derived from my family name and the second from my given one. I really like this meaning, and how it is not simply a phonetic translation. My only real complaint about it is the similarity to the given name of singer Wilbur Pan (潘玮柏), since my name is not Wilbur =P

惠顿 保罗 (Pinyin = huìdùn bǎoluó) - A friend who was helping suggested this one as a direct/phonetic translation. The second word is the official translation of my English given name, while the first is our best guess/match for the surname. It's essentially the same surname as Walt Whitman (惠特曼), just with the third syllable switched to the ham/"um" sound found in Fullham/Tottenham/Oldham etc).

*both of these names are written with the family name first.

I'm obviously not going to ask everyone to choose #1 vs #2 as the only choices, but I am curious about your thoughts on them or if you have any suggestions. I'm also curious if it is more common to use a direct/phonetic translations for legal documents and another, less formal one around friends and coworkers?

[ansileran]

I don't know about official documents since the only time I went to China they were filled by the language school for me. I'll check what's written on my bank account though. I'm pretty sure they didn't use a phonetic transcription of my name (that would have been 7/8 characters...).

As for the way friends and coworkers call you, I think that your friends are probably going to give you a nickname anyway and your coworker (unless you count them among your friends) are going to use your surname only. So from what I recall and the advices that were given to me on this forum :

1- Better choose something that looks Chinese (at least in the number of character) if you are going to study/work in China. Besides, the space where you have to fill in your name might be too small to make more than 4 character fit.

2- Your surname should be something that you can easily recognise

3- Your first name... well, pick up something you like and then ask if it is suitable.

I can't tell which of the two names you should choose because I can't recognise what would be a good Chinese name yet. They mostly have three characters but I think I read somewhere that 2 or 4 characters combinations were possible though uncommon.

[doraemon]

Two character names are very common in China nowadays. I'm not sure whether there are as many of them as three character ones but they're completely normal and acceptable. I've never actually met anybody with a four character name. I think that usually happens when you have a two character surname like 东方 or 欧阳. But in those cases many people tend to just have one character for their name so it complements better with the two character surname. But I still think 3 characters sound the most Chinese...

[ansileran]

Hi everyone !

Just to keep you posted, I finally choose 董晓慧. I asked my Chinese coworker and he said it was fine. He also agreed with you : 董晓明 is a guy's name (he laughed at me again when I suggested it).

What about you guys ? m000gle ? MGMT ? What did you choose ?

Thanks to everyone !

[doraemon]

Congratulations, ansileran! Sounds like an excellent name for you! You can tell it's a girl's name but at the same time isn't too girly or flowery either.

[LJK]

Another hijacker here -- seems I'm on the right thread. I'm looking for a Chinese name for my daughter. It should have 高 in it (from my wife's surname); our first son is 高明. Is this a common one for girls, notwithstanding the above comment that gender differences in names aren't that big in Chinese? We thought of 高慧. Do you know women with 高 as part of their given name?

[rob07]

For example, Antoine invents his Chinese name of An Tang(an tang, 安唐), which sounds similar of his French name. What's more, the corresponding Chinese character "安"(which can match other character such as "安静“, quite; "安心”, feel at ease) and "唐"(literally make one recall the prosperous Tang Dynasty of ancient China) make his name "安唐" with strongly traditional chinese characteristics.

Doesn't this bring 安禄山 to mind, arguably the greatest villain of the Tang dynasty and responsible for its decline?

[skylee]

Is this a common one for girls, notwithstanding the above comment that gender differences in names aren't that big in Chinese? We thought of 高慧.

Along the line of 高明, which is a word meaning brilliant, perhaps you could consider 高雅 (elegant) for the girl?

I know a woman whose name is 高棉. Gao is the surname and Mian is the given name. The whole name means Cambodia, and she happens to be quite tall.

[LJK]

Thanks skylee, 高雅 sounds good and is certainly a desirable characteristic :-) 高 just seems a rare one in female given names, as far as I can make out. Most women I've found who have it in their name have it as their surname.

[Benjameno]

My English name is Benjamin, and as everyone knows, the standard rendering in Chinese is 本杰明 or 本家明, but I don't like them as they are obviously foreign. Recently someone suggested to me that I should change the first character to 王, as my surname contains a W. Is 王杰明 any more 地道 than 本杰明？

[skylee]

I think 家明 is a very simple and very Chinese name.

[icebear]

One strategy is to let a Chinese friend pick one for you, which takes a lot of the pressure off.

Beware though, if its your (at the time) girlfriend's father, he may pick 杰宪懿 because he's a journalist and likes fancy words (or just making a foreigner learn to write them) ;)