I live in China, and among other things I teach English and Culture classes at a university. Many of my students were either given ‘English’ names in high school from an English teacher, or chose one for themselves. Some of them are quite nice names (Gabriella, Rosemary, Lillian, Shawna, Cora, Kalila, Renee, Lucine, Daphne, Melody, Vinaya, Vivian, Leona, Cornelia), and a lot are really standard/common, decent names (Vanessa, Anna, Emily, Jennifer, Linda, Lily, etc etc etc). While other are kind of hilarious. Here’s a list of English names from students I have this year:
Lay
Cruel
Miffy
Sweet
Rainbow
Double
Sunny
Echo
Glacial
Florida
Green
Apple
Milk
Merry
Sissi
Cimble
Triple G
Aquarius
Deliency
Miracle
Imposter
Level
Ghost
Chocolate
Star
Circle
Win
Sunshine
Cherish
Note: You’ll notice these are almost all female names (aside from Double and Triple G). That’s because I teach English major students, and the classes are about 90% female.
Oh golly that is hilarious. I love Glacial, Milk, and Imposter. Are some of the stranger word names the English equivalent of their Chinese name? It always makes me so sad when I meet Chinese people here with adopted names and someone told them they should go by [name]Eunice[/name] because there was a “[name]Yu[/name]” sound in their name. REALLY? I mean, I guess they don’t know what is stylish here the same way I would probably choose the weirdest Chinese name if I went the opposite way, but still, no one should have to be called [name]Eunice[/name].
Some of them are chosen because of a similar sound to their Chinese name- [name]Rainbow[/name]'s Chinese name is Wen [name]Bo[/name]. But many of them are chosen seemingly at random (like Milk and Glacial). While others I think are chosen specifically to be funny (such as Cruel and Ghost-- who are both quite funny people). Others I really have no idea how they get chosen. I’ve offered to help them choose some better names if they’re interested in having a better name, but most of them seem pretty attached to their names, even if they’re strange.
As you say, I think there’s no particular context to what names sound ‘good’ to a native English-speaking ear, so I don’t think most of them really understand how strange their names really are. I’ve met quite a few foreigners living in [name]China[/name] who also have really strange Chinese names, also for the same reason, they don’t have much context to what sounds good so they just choose something that either sounds similar to their name or that has a sound they like or a meaning that is seemingly cool. But what names work out well is really cultural in nature, so it’s hard to pick out a name for yourself without more background in the roots of the language.
It took me five years of living in [name]China[/name] before I finally came up with a Chinese name for myself that I really wanted to stick with, that I like a lot (Zhi Yuan-- it means “to have a long term vision and work towards achieving it”) (I had to choose a solid Chinese name to stick with when I eventually went through the process to get my Chinese driver’s license, my Chinese name is actually the name listed on this particular official document (!), which is crazy cuz it’s really just a name I made up on my own)
I plan on teaching English in Japan, and I am trying to come up with a Japanese name for myself- I don’t know whether I would ever use it or not, but it still fun.
It is tricky, though, to pick a name from a foreign land that you weren’t raised in. Most likely, these students just picked up a name that sounded nice from American media. They don’t know that [name]Cherish[/name] and [name]Sunshine[/name] scream exotic dancer, and [name]Apple[/name] screams celebrity name gone wrong.
For example, in Japanese, Jamakusai means very troublesome, like a pain in the butt. A [name]Jamie[/name] or a [name]James[/name] might see/hear it somewhere and think “That’s a cool word- it could work as a foreign name for me!”
Your students might have also chosen names close to their own names in meaning.
I think having an English name but still living in [name]China[/name] allows for more freedom. As weird as some of the names sound to us, I’d think most people they interact with wouldn’t know the difference. A good friend of mine comes from a Chinese family and has her Chinese name and her legal American name. She’s [name]Stephanie[/name] and her sister is [name]Amy[/name]. Growing up in a very white area, it probably helped them feel less different from their peers to have easier names.
I’m Korean, born and raised in [name]New[/name] Zealand, and apparently my name is hard to pronounce by non-[name]Asian[/name] people. So I decided to adopt an English name, and did when I was 6. I really wanted to go with something masculine like Alex or Sam, but mum wanted something really pretty and girly like Sabina. I ended up with the name Grace but I still think it’s pretty girly. So that’s why I go by the name Gray instead
When I lived in Vancouver, most of my students and my children’s friends from [name]China[/name] (mostly from Hong Kong, actually) either retained their Chinese names or had what we joking referred to as “Baptist missionary” names, such as [name]Albert[/name] or [name]Edna[/name]. I do remember one family coming to our school with three little girls. Apparently, in Chinese their names meant the colour “purple” and when the mother asked the translator to translate the children’s names into English, that’s what she said. Despite our best efforts to convince her that [name]Violet[/name], [name]Lavender[/name], or [name]Lilac[/name] were okay “purple” names in English, the little girls all ended up as Purple [name]Wong[/name].
Miloowen, I am laughing your comment on “missionary names” because I once knew a man from HK whose English name was [name]Nicodemus[/name]. His sister overheard it at a school chapel service. He now goes by [name]Nico[/name]. My husband is Chinese, but from southeast [name]Asia[/name], and his name is also a little strange, as in usually heard on 80-year-old Jewish-American men. He has had quite a few people respond, “But you’re not Jewish, are you??” when he tells them his first name.
As long as the students are in HK or [name]China[/name], there is no real harm in having a strange English name… If they ever ever choose to study in an English-speaking country, Cruel and Imposter will likely realize that a name change is in order. I have a Korean friend who came to [name]Canada[/name] using the English name [name]Joy[/name]. Once he realized that it’s a girl’s name, he went back to his Korean name.
Nothing against [name]Grace[/name], but I’m a little bummed you weren’t allowed to go with [name]Alex[/name] or [name]Sam[/name]. [name]Both[/name] are completely reasonable names for a girl, at least as nicknames for [name]Alexandra[/name] or [name]Samantha[/name]. Then again, I may have a personal bias in this matter, being an [name]Alex[/name] myself.
I’ve come across Chinese kids with the names Elegance and [name]Flower[/name]. I think they directly transalate their Chinese names into English.
That’s so unfair. [name]How[/name] come I don’t get to choose a Western name? I’m [name]Indian[/name], and hardly anyone can pronounce my name properly.
This is somewhat off topic, but I’ve got a Japanese friend whose family came to [name]America[/name] when she was in elementary school, though she’d had several years of Japanese schooling there, and we had a great laugh when she pulled out pictures of her old classmates! Most of them wore shirts with english writing on them, but you could tell that they had no idea what they said! It was hilarious to see stuff like ‘lightbulb’ and ‘monster truck’ and ‘pretty’ written on these kids shirts. I imagine that’s the equivalent to people in [name]America[/name] picking out things with random [name]Asian[/name] writing.
I’ve seen a few websites where people send photos of tattoos with Chinese characters, and someone who can actually read Chinese comments on them. Let’s just say there are a lot of people out there with gibberish permanently inked on their bodies…
I like that! I was considering [name]Xander[/name] for my son’s name, but it doesn’t sound right with the last name. Plus, [name]Xander[/name] is getting pretty popular, but I think [name]Xandra[/name] is still not used all that often.
That’s funny. My friend can speak Chinese (Mandarin, I think) and she said for a long time she still thought in Chinese and had to translate in her mind into English, but she only learned to read and write in English. If she could read the characters, I would have taken her with me to my job at the tattoo shop so we could have laughed at people, although there are a number of languages that use characters that would be indistinguishable to average Americans.
If I did get want I wanted, I would’ve taken the name