The Mayor of Kobe, 1971 . . .

[roddy]

宫崎辰雄 was the Mayor of Kobe, Japan in 1971. How do I write his name into an English document?

Roddy

[confucius]

The surname is Miyazaki. I am not sure of the pronunciation of the first character of the first name but I would guess it's "Tatsuo"

Those tricky Japanese developed multiple pronunciations for Chinese characters, so it's always a pain in the pigu to read their business cards.

[roddy]

No problem, I just skipped it in the end and wrote him out of this particular bit of history . . .

Roddy

[confucius]

I'm absolutely positive the surname is Miyazaki. If you ever by chance encounter this bloke again then you can simply refer to him as Mayor Miyazaki.

[Guest Emerald Eye]

not a bad idea to type the english version of his name into a google dot JP search engine

u can also check the words in an online dictionary

[roddy]

In this case it doesn't matter, but if I need to do something similar again, could you suggest an online dictionary?

Roddy

[Guest Emerald Eye]

I'm not sure how good they are, i usually use a real dictionary, here are some links plus links to others online

http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/wwwjdic.html

alc.co.jp,

http://dictionary.pspinc.com/scripts/ejedic/VB_BRIDGE3.dll

http://dict.pspinc.com/

http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/japanese.html

http://linear.mv.com/cgi-bin/j-e/sjis/tty/dict

http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp

[geek_frappa]

When you translate Chinese names and places how do you properly provide the translation? Do you need to include the pinyin? or do you just add the Name (ChineseCharacters)...

When you translate a Chinese name from someone else do you need to provide a source in your bibliography because different people give different translations...

:?:

[smithsgj]

Is this in the right place?

You're talking about essay writing then. Well at Leeds Uni they used to say give Pinyin without tone mrks or numbers for China names and places, Wade for Taiwan (that may now have changed but Taibei and Gaoxiong still look a bit funny to me), and the normal foreign spellling when there's an accepted one: Dr Sun Yat-sen, Confucius, Koxinga. Don't need Chinese chars, only need one of Pinyin / accepted translation not both.

Please illustrate yr 2nd para as it isn't clear to me what you mean.

[geek_frappa]

When you cross cultures there is often something lost. How would you document that loss? How do you show the reader that your translation is the best one? How do you prove your translation of the name if correct? Is this not even necessary?

[smithsgj]

You're talking only about translating names right? Can you give an example of a name you want to translate?

[geek_frappa]

sure. Yokohama Ichiro ... for example, when i translate to Chinese do I need to ask the nameholder how to translate his name or do i just find a way to transliterate his name? if i transliterate, should i use an expert as a reference or my best judgement?

[smithsgj]

If you're translating jap to chinese then just use the same kanji. But from a logographic writing system to say English just use the standard romaji or pinyin, just like you did in that post. No need to consult him.