For the record, if you drop the silent H in front of my last name, it's pronounced exactly how it's spelled. A friend of mine with the last name Liao once complained that he had the most difficult last name in the world b/c Americans are not used to seeing three vowels in a row... yeah, I think adding a silent H tops that. I joke that it's b/c Americans watch too much Wheel of Fortune all the time. I joke but there's some truth behind it about how our linguistic mind is structured.
While I was at UT I did meet someone with my last name except his family Americanized it to the Shaw version that I mentioned. At one time in my life I did contemplate doing that as well. It would make my life and practically everybody's life easier. But I didn't. B/c my last name is part of my identity. Yeah, people have trouble pronouncing it but it's me. It's my family's name. My heritage. It's as unique as the birthmark on my elbow or my huge horse size calves that sets me apart from other people.
Back to the video... would it be easier to just adopt a different name? Maybe. Kind of like how Smyth transformed into Smith? Yeah. Would it be easier just to drop that silent H in my last name? Sure. What bugs me and the only part about this that angers me is the thought (or the lack thereof) behind it. For one, it's one thing if it's just my buddy and I drinking and joking about this name change but you're talking about legislation. A law. As in, do this or some of you civil liberties will be taken away just like going to jail. On top of that, Rep. Betty Brown doesn't strike me as someone that is "worldly." By "worldly" I mean she is a senile lady who should be at Luby's for the early bird specials, playing bingo and have her license revoked by the DMV on the account that she's so damn old. In about the 1:30 or 1:40 mark in the video you hear her asking about elections in China.... um yeah, there's no elections in China. Seriously, think before you speak. Think before you propose a ridiculous bill like this.
The root of the issue for me is this: Why should it be made easier for YOU? Why don't you take the effort to learn someone's name and have the government agencies correspond to make sure everything's consistent? God forbid that it should take a little bit of effort from your part. If not ignorant, it certainly is a very selfish thought.
I leave you with this: consider the scenario if it was flipped around, that there are too many Williams, Smiths, and Browns running around where it's becoming confusing and hard to identify who's who. What would you say?
2 comments:
Keeping the 'H' however instead of changing to shaw however as a means of keeping cultural identity. There are many ways to romanize mandarin into english. Depending on the system, your name can be spelled numerous ways. Xiao seems to be the most popular way at the moment. So you seem to have a loyalty to an arbitrary romanization system created by some old white guy a few decades ago.
The only marker of identity, if you really need it, is the chinese character. Hsiao, Xiao or Shaw - who cares? Most chinese in the chinese speaking world would find it laughable.
As for this old bat, who cares? She'll be dead in a decade. Obama is president. Her generation is dead and dying and has lost the country decades earlier than they should have. Don't see her with anger or outrage. The better attitude is amusement at a strange, almost quaint, old american way of doing things. We've already won anyways.
Man, that's ridiculous.
When my maternal grandfather's family came to the US from Norway, they had him change his name. Their last name was Rømen which is roughly pronounced Ruhmen (the R is different...sorry hard to explain). Anyway, they changed their last name to Johnson because the oldest male's fathers names was Johannes (or Johan? I can't remember now), and thus, he was John's son. Messed up, right?
You know what else is messed up? I thought I knew how to pronounce your last name. I feel like a jerk now. I don't know where I got my pronunciation from, but it's wrong. I need to hear you say it so I get it right. I won't even tell you how much I butchered your name. I'm sorry :o/
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