Hello,

Assembling Chinese names can be a frustrating thing.  I have been doing a profile for "The Banquet" (or: "Ye yan" in Chinese).  I am never 100% certain which is the first name and which is the family name.  What about Zhang Li, Ma Lun or Cui Kai to name only a few.  I am told that there are only appr. 100 Chinese surnames used.  Is there somewhere an easy list available to check the names or to include a list as an internal control mechanism.  This would be very useful as the number of Chinese films grow by the day.  There are simular problems with other languages I suppose.

Quoting skipnet50:

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Yes, Asians do have a rather strange, by Western Standards for dealing with names

Skip, that comment is bordering on offensive, please re-edit your post.

@Marnix,
at the moment it's very difficult to deal with Chinese names as you are right, it's very difficult for us Westerners to decide which is the family name and which is the given name.
For now the best we can do is try and ignore our cultural standards and try not to assume that "first name" and "last name" refer to given name and family name.
As this is "western" software I would say simply go by "first name" is the first word and "last name" is the last word, regardless of whether they are given or family names or not.
We are hoping for an update which lets us catalog Asian names more accurately, but for now we have to try and fit them in as best we can.


Edit: one thing to mention, just to muddy the waters even more! The Chinese read from right to left, therefore Zhang Li could be equally read as Li --> Zhang.

Again, North, when put into the context of a bunch of other credits, the culture issue does not apply. I read a lot of comments, some from you that i consider borderline offensive or downright offensive...so what. You don't have to read it, not respond to it and neither do I.

I have yet to see any thinbg like this in any film credits

*Note: Oriental names are read from right to left, please make the necessary mental adjustment.

As long as the name appears as IT APPEARS ON SCREEN that is all that is relevant, I don't give a flip about ANY culture other than the screen culture.

Zhang Li should be just as well aware of the soem other culture as we are expected to be of his, thus he could EASILY have his name contractually appear so that it would be more culturally" friuendly to those in the audience of the film he is watching.

John Wayne
Zhang Li
Martin Balsam
Bruce Li

2 American Actors, one Americanized Asian Actor and One Asian Actor, all appear on screen in the same form. WE get all worked into a swivet about the cultural niceties, obviuously the actors don't if they did then the CORRECT way to display the above names before an Anglican audience would be

John Wayne
Li Zhang
Martin Balsam
Bruce Li

Maybve i should get equally offended thatAsian actors insist that their procilivities realtive to naming should be followed before a foreign audience.


Skjip

Quoting northbloke:

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Quoting skipnet50:

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I read a lot of comments, some from you that i consider borderline offensive or downright offensive...

Please quote one. I'd like to know what I've said in the past that has offended you so.

Back to the topic in hand. You claim you're not applying any cultural standard but you are - you're applying a Western standard to the credits of a film, in this case, that was made for an Eastern audience.

I disagree.  The categories are First Name and Last Name, not family name and given name.  There is no cultural change being made.  By reversing it, you are changing their names.  Their first name is their family name, their second/third names are the given.  That's how it is (usually) displayed on screen.  That's how (IMHO) the program should handle it.  But we've never had an official answer from Ken or Gerri, so we'll continue to argue until we do.

Quoting synner_man:

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I disagree.  The categories are First Name and Last Name, not family name and given name. 

Last Name is a synonym  of Family Name.

My problem is that they do not always apply the same order in the end credits or at the movie review sites on internet for Chinese actors.  Probably because there are few people how know for certain which is the first and which is the surname of the less well-known actors.  Of course you can apply that the first mentioned is the first name and what follows is the surname.  I can assure you that lot of these names get mixed up once you have a number of Chinese movies in your collection.  Luckely still these names are mostly translated in English, mostly not in French, German,... else it would be unsolvable.  We should be more conscious of what happens outside the Western cultural sphere, that's true.  I am always eager to learn.

Quoting northbloke:

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Quoting synner_man:

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I disagree.  The categories are First Name and Last Name, not family name and given name.  There is no cultural change being made.  By reversing it, you are changing their names.  Their first name is their family name, their second/third names are the given.  That's how it is (usually) displayed on screen.  That's how (IMHO) the program should handle it.  But we've never had an official answer from Ken or Gerri, so we'll continue to argue until we do.

That's the crux of the problem. Most people (myself included) assume that last name equals family name. It's even called as such on legal documents here in the UK. And there are people who want all family names in the last name field for sorting purposes. There's even the option in Profiler to display names as "first last" or "last, first" which suggests that Ken also feels the same.
You're also assuming that we read the credits left to right. But if we're looking at the credits of an Asian film, which name comes first if we read them from right to left?

There's the crux of the problem, north. And xradman, never ASSUME.

Skip

What's sad is that it will come up again, martin, and again and again.

What's even sadder is that the Alias system provides a solution, but some seem too caught up in cultural correctness to see the answer that is right in front of them.

Back at north for a second. I am applying ONLY the culture of the film data. You state "you're applying a Western standard to the credits of a film, in this case, that was made for an Eastern audience."

Not true. I have nothing to do with designing film credits. Your comment implies that Asians should not be allowed to appear in Hollywood productions or English Actors in Far Eastern films, which is silly.

I am saying quite simply that all data is handled the same

John Wayne
Chow Yun-Fat
Martin Balsam
Some make the argument that due to culture Chow Yun-Fat should be treated DIFFERENTLY from John Wayne and Martin Balsam and I say that is utterly absurd.

Conversely if a Hong Kong Epic starred the same actors credited as follows
Wayne John
Chow Yun-Fat
Balsam Martin

I would say list Wayne John AS Wayne John NOT John Wayne. Why...because I do not bow at the altar of culture, the culture is the data and the data ONLY. How soes the data APPEAR ON SCREEN. That was the basis for As Credited and remains the basis for Credited As with the Alias system.

Skip