Names in different cultures
Raveena wrote a story about a family who have XXX as a "placeholder name" because each have only one name.
They come from northern China and a community where one name is the norm. One name wasn't enough, however, when the family applied for Chinese passports so they could emigrate. With nothing to put in the spot where the application forms asked for first names, a bureaucrat supplied XXX for parents and son.
It is an interesting story because it is a very real example of how we can easily assume something of other cultures — like having more than one name — which isn't really the case.
It reminded me of a blog post I read about i18n, which is an abbreviation of internationalization (there are 18 letters between i and n in the word).
James wrote about Thai personal names at his blog James Clark's Random Thoughts.
He gives some examples of the structure of Thai names. COmmenters also give examples from other cultures:
- Because names have to be considered appropriate by an government ministry Thais also have an informal given name. An example who was named "Mote" after a TV remote control.
- "I guess that historically the main reason for the dominance of given names in Thai culture is because family names are a relatively recent innovation: they were introduced by King Rama VI towards the beginning of the 20th century."
- Comment: "I have Thai friends at my school named Top, Benz, and Boom."
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