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I saw a scene in an anime recently, where someone’s name was misread because the first Kanji in the person’s family name could be read multiple ways.
That got me a bit interested in how Kanji is used for naming in Japan. I searched around the web a bit and have come to understand that there’s a different set of Kanji other than Joyo Kanji that’s used in names.I’m simply curious, does that mean that people would have to learn a whole other set of kanji just to read names? I’m a bit unsure about how that would work, or if I’m just horribly misinformed. Mind clearing that up for me?
And, does every family name in Japanese consist of 2 kanji?
It isn’t a different set of kanji, rather the joyo kanji are a subset of “all” kanji. Joyo kanji came about simply as a means for establishing a baseline for general literacy while also standardizing (to an extent) the teaching of said kanji. You can find much more complete explanations elsewhere (wiki), but suffice to say that the ~2000 joyo kanji are pretty much the minimum for native adult speakers. Names are definitely a common way people pick up non-joyo kanji (or unusual readings)– particularly place names, though they’ve been busy integrating those into joyo. So basically the more friends you make, the more kanji you’ll learn! As for the number of characters, there is no designated length– 新（あらた）is one example (last name).
Oh, and as for how people actually get their names, well… unless you have a more meaningful method (naming in honor of someone else, for example) people can basically browse kanji until they find a few which they like the sound, look, or meaning of, at which point they can be smushed together in various ways until the desired effect is achieved. Fun, right? Single character example: じゅん can be written a variety of ways: 純, 潤, 隼 to name a few. Assuming you like the sound, which kanji you pick is up to you! :)
Not so much a different set as a bunch of extra kanji that may be used for names – otherwise people with long distinguished family lines may suddenly find themselves having to use kana, which wouldn’t really be fair. The most common names are all comprised of Joyo kanji, though. It’s not that people need to learn a whole new set of kanji, but that the might need to be able to recognize a few extras.
As a point of interest, the ten most common surnames are (or were, at the time this list was published): 佐藤 (さとう), 鈴木 (すずき), 高橋 (たかはし), 田中 (たなか), 伊藤 (いとう), 渡辺 (わたなべ), 小林 (こばやし), 中村 (なかむら), 山本 (やまもと) and 加藤 (かとう).
Single-character names do exist – the list of the top one hundred names includes 森 (もり) and 原 (はら) – as do three-character names – like 長谷川 (はせがわ).
To give fun examples of even commonly-spelt names that can have multiple readings, 吉田 can be read as both よしだ and きちだ, and the single-character name 林 can be read as both はやし and りん. Names can also contain implied particles – 木下, for example, despite being 木 (き) + 下 (した), is typically read as きのした.
Even native Japanese speakers can occasionally bump into a name that they might not be able to read, so don’t lose heart – it’s why furigana is often included on business cards. =)
Thanks, both of you, for the plentiful info here.
I know what Joyo kanji is. Forgive me if I put that out wrong and made myself seem ignorant. >.<
Anyway… So naming is usually based on whatever sounds good, like most American names. I had thought that they had put alot of thought into the meanings behind names. Bad assumption I guess; I don't know where I got that idea from… :S
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Let's say you were reading a long list of Japanese names. You would have to make a few assumptions on how to pronounce some of the names, right?-
This reply was modified 12 years, 4 months ago by
Vaslor.
Well, the easy rule of thumb is that the most common reading is the most likely. Otherwise, memorise on a case-by-case basis. You probably wouldn’t encounter any of the non-Joyo kanji very often. Have you got a specific list of names you’re looking at?
That said, thanks to Ian mentioning place names, I’ve remembered one of the real sneaky ones – 神戸. Unless you can recognise it, you’ll never be able to intuit the reading for that…
I don’t know how much thought is put into the meaning of names, but I’m sure that more is put in than Ian says in his post. 勇気 (ゆうき), meaning “courage”, is a common boy’s first name, to give an example. 一郎 (いちろう), meaning “first son”, and other similar names are also common. Then you could expand it to, say, 健一郎 (けんいちろう), healthy first son. Girls’ names quite often to end with 子 (こ), meaning “child”. 花子 (はなこ), flower child, or 雪子 (ゆきこ), snow child. Mind you, you can also have 花 and 雪 without the 子. I think 子-names might be getting less frequent in modern times.
As a matter of interest, here are the five most common boys’ names for children born in 1994: 健太 (けんた), 翔太 (しょうた), 拓也 (たくや), 翼 (つばさ), 翔 (しょう). And girls’ names: 美咲 (みさき), 愛 (あい), 萌 (もえ), 愛美 (あいみ), 遥 (はるか)
If you ever need to do some more reason, they’re called 人名用 jinmeiyou , if you understand the basic meanings of the kanji you’ll be pleased to know its very easy to remember.
I remember in Dragon Ball, the people always had trouble pronouncing Goku’s name. Doesn’t really make sense in the English dub, but anyone learning Japanese gets the joke haha :D
Again, thanks for all the info. Jinmeiyou… I’ll go look that up.
No, there’s no list or anything I’m looking at. I was just bringing up an example for a question. It’s good to ask questions about which you’re learning, right?
I’ll admit to a little facetiousness… ;) Meaning-based names are perhaps the most traditional and therefore most common method, but it’s good to realize that the are other ways to start at least which are pretty common in modern Japan. On the other hand, my fiancée’s mom’s name has no kanji (deliberately).
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This reply was modified 12 years, 4 months ago by
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