Mr. Baka and Ms. Manco

[lili...@mail.goo.ne.jp]

Hi All,

I may have asked this before, but I have been wondering about this
for a while now and would appreciate any input.

I once translated a business card and came across this name, Mr. Manco.
I confirmed the pronunciation with the client and katakana-ized it as I heard it,
with a note to explain the meaning of マンコ in Japanese.
The client immediately got back to me and we had a short discussion;
we mutually agreed to write it as メンコー in Japanese.

On another occasion, there was Ms. Elloy, and she was OK with
her business card being エロイ。In fact, she did not want it altered.
Her first name made it even more "erotique" when combined with
her family name, but since she wanted it that way, I did not have any objections.

On yet another occasion, there was a person who took it as an insult,
when I explained that his nickname "Chin-Chin" meant... what it meant...
in Japanese. I lost one client, and the job was quite bit bigger
larger than a mere business card... oh well.

Then, my translator friend was saying that whenever
he came across such "sensitive" proper nouns,
he does not bother checking with client; he simply alters it.
He said to me, "Why didn't you just change it to something like
シンシン or チェンチェン? They would not have known"

He also said that there were times that the client caught
what he was doing afterwards, and they were grateful.
"If you tell them hey man your name means C*NT, of course
they will get embarrassed and upset, but if you discreetly do it
and they find out afterwards, they will thank you."

So my question:
Were there any occasions you encountered a name/names
which meant something offensive/funny/vulgar in Japanese?
How did you deal with it, or, do you have any protocol?

Ai Matsuzono

[jmarc...@comcast.net]

Ai asked:

[snip]

I once translated a business card and came across this name, Mr. Manco.  
I confirmed the pronunciation with the client and katakana-ized it as I heard it,
with a note to explain the meaning of マンコ in Japanese.  
The client immediately got back to me and we had a short discussion;
we mutually agreed to write it as メンコー in Japanese.

[snip]

So my question:
Were there any occasions you encountered a name/names
which meant something offensive/funny/vulgar  in Japanese?
How did you deal with it, or, do you have any protocol?

Ai,

I have never encountered a situation like this (a foreign name that is offensive in Japanese), though there are also cases where certain Japanese names, for example Takeshita and Fukaya, can provoke amusement or embarrassment in English. And then there are some Americans who have trouble pronouncing Japanese names, so they mess around with them for sport. When I was living in Tokyo, I met a guy at a party in Tokyo one night who told me his name was Eiji Matsuzaka (I think he was a music producer), but when he was living in New York no one in his circle could pronounce it correctly, so some of them ended up calling him "AIDS Motherfucker"!

For other languages, one I remember is Sean Connery, whose last name sounds like the the French word "connerie", which means "BS" in French; presumably that gets a big laugh on occasion in France. Another one is the sociologist Gianfranco Poggi, whose last name means in Korean the same thing that Mr. Manco's name means in Japanese. 

So this problem is not uncommon and not limited to Japanese. I have no idea what to do about it, but I think honesty is probably the best policy, even if it carries the possibility of offending someone.

HTH,

John Marchioro

[Mark Spahn]

Another argument is that changing the pronunciation

of a name to avoid undesirable puns is just an extension

of the general practice of changing the pronunciation of

a name when it migrates from one language to another.

The pronunciation of an Italian name like Battaglia gets

anglicized to Buh-TAGG-lee-uh, and a German name

like Spahn gets anglicized from the German シュパン 

to the English スパン (and when deciding what should

appear on my meishi, I gave two-and-a-half seconds of

thought to reteutonifying it back to シュパン).

So changing the pronunciation of a name in another

language is no big deal.

-- Mark Spahn/Schpahn  (West Seneca, NY)

 

[BJ Beauchamp]

In my opinion, I can't justify the altering of someones name. If that's how
it is pronounced, that's how it's pronounced. If someone is going to laugh
and snicker about it, well that just goes to show you where their mind really
is. My name is a classic example of such a case. It's sad that despite my
age, I still get quips about it. But, in the translation world, especially with
foreign names and what not, I'd like to think that people have some sense
of tact in understanding that they'll sound similar to other words in their own
language.

Incidentally on the subject of altering pronunciations, my last name falls into
that rather gray category of multiple pronunciations. Most people still don't
say it properly even after I tell them how. Amazing.

-- BJ


--
--
BJ Beauchamp
University at Buffalo
Bachelors of Arts, Applied Linguistics
---
I'm a soldier and that means
I am both defendant and judge
I stand at both ends of the fire

I'm a soldier つまり私は
被告人であり裁判官
火の両端に私は立つ
---

[Toshihiro Nagasaka]

最近日本でも公開されたスピルバーグ監督のアメリカ映画 The
Adventures of Tintinでは、邦題が「タンタンの冒険」になっていまし
た。これはもともとベルギーの作家がフランス語で書いた作品で、フラ
ンス語では、タンタンと発音するらしいですが、おそらく、それとは関
係なく、日本側で気を利かせて「タンタン」という表記に変えた可能性
が高いような気がします。

http://rocketnews24.com/2011/11/10/150629/

1950年代に日本でも放映されていたアメリカの騎兵隊を描いたテレビ番
組に出ていた名犬リンチンチンは伝統的にそのままの表記で知られてい
ますが。

Cecil B. DeMille監督の「十戒」(1956)にもVincent Price演じるBaka
というMaster Builderが出てきますが、字幕では、「バーカ」と表記さ
れていました。
また、日本でもAlfred V. Ahoという人の書かれたプログラミングの邦
訳が何冊か出ていますが、それらはいずれもアホではなく、エイホと表
記されており、これらはいずれも実際の発音に近い表記が採用されてい
ます。

随分前にNottoli という名前の方にお会いしたときに、貴方の名前は日
本語では、high-jackerの意味になりますよ、とお伝えしたところ、随
分驚かれていましたが、これも実際は「ナットリ」に近い発音だったと
思われます。

逆に、HONDAやSEIKOがアメリカ人の発音にかかると、「ハンダ」や「ス
ィーコー」になってしまうのはどうにも日本人として抵抗を感じてしま
いますが<g>。

--
Toshihiro Nagasaka
長坂俊宏

[lili...@mail.goo.ne.jp]

BJ says,

> It's sad that despite my age, I still get quips about it.

and John writes,

> so some of them ended up calling him "AIDS Motherfucker"!

Hey, Matsuzono is a mouthful for English speakers...
I get "I, matzo balls" all the time:P

長坂さん、
映画といえば、「シッコ」はもう少し何とかならんのかと思ったものです（笑）

Ai Matsuzono

[Stephen Suloway]

On Feb 3, 2012, at 20:05, Mark Spahn wrote:

> So changing the pronunciation of a name in another language is no
> big deal.

I agree.

My grandfather Willi Fuchs (フィウクス）emigrated as a young man
from Austro-Hungary to the USA.

No surprise that he was always Bill Fox after that.

+++++
Stephen Suloway @ the name would be Solovieff if not for the helpful
folks at Ellis Island

[Shiki @NC]

日本語では、外国の人名や地名を原語の発音に限りなく近く訳すのが原則だと思います。Bakaがバーカ、Ahoがエイホなど、ローマ字読みせずに現地の
人が発音する音を真似てカタカナ書きにする、という方法です。

「タンタンの冒険」は、少なくとも1980年代頃から「タンタンの冒険」というタイトルで出版されていた絵本シリーズがありました。フランスの首都
Parisが「パリス」ではなく「パリ」と訳されているのと同じで、Tintinはフランス語圏の絵本キャラクターの名前で「タンタン」という表記が一
番原音に近かったのですよね。

お騒がせセレブのパリス・ヒルトンは、英語圏で生まれて名付けられて「パリス」と発音されているので、それを日本人が「パリ・ヒルトン」と訳してしまっ
てはおかしいと思いますが、スピルバーグが英語圏で映画化して「ティンティン」と発音しているのに、邦題が「タンタン」になっているのは不自然だ、とい
う主張は、少しピントが外れているように思います。（英語圏でフランス語をそのまま発音することはよくあって、同じフランス語圏の絵本・アニメキャラ
Caillouはカイユゥーという発音でアメリカでも紹介されているのに、Tintinはタンタンでなくティンティンとしてしまったほうがずっと不自然
です。）

台湾出身のお友達でChing-Chingという名前の人(女性)がいて、表記は「青青」(繁字体で)でした。初めて会った時、日本語でChing-
Chingというのは何なのかその人自身がすでに知っていたようで、「私の名前、ヘンなのよ」と恥ずかしそうに言っていました。でも、私は「青青」とい
う表記を見て「きれいな名前！」と思いました。カタカナ表記にすると「あれ？」と思ったかもしれません。

Ms. Baca Zinnという人にも出会いました。初めて見た時「え！馬鹿人？！」と思いましたけど（ごめんなさい）、もし私がこのお名前を日本語
表記する必要に迫られたら、「バカジン」だとちょっと受け入れられにくいかな？「バカズィン」「バーカズィン」「バッカズィン」？の辺りで迷うかもしれ
ません。

アフリカ旅行に行くと、旅行者をからかいがてら話しかけてくる現地の人が「クマモト」という言葉を連発すると聞いたことがあります。知り合いのアフリカ
出身の人にそのことを話すと、顔を赤らめていました。（スワヒリ語ではkumamotoが日本語で言うMs. Mancoと同じような意味？）だけど、
「熊本」は「クマモト」、Kumamotoとしか読めない(表記できない)ですよね・・・

話が反れますが、アメリカのスーパーでも椎茸を普通に売っていますが、お店の人でもShiitakeをどう読めば良いのかわからない人が多く、友達
で”Shit Cake”　と読んでた人がいました(笑)　だいたい、シーターキィ　と発音をする人が多いので、私もそれに倣っています。

やはり、固有名詞はできる限り近い音に訳すのが原則だと思います。そのお名前のご本人と接触できる場合は、相談すると良いと思います。
自分の名前を覚えてもらいやすいように、自分で発音しにくい部分や覚えにくいスペルを変えて自己紹介したり、友達同士で呼びにくい名前を冗談交じりに
Matzo Ballsなんて言い換えたり　：D　するのは、あくまでも本人了解の下で行われているわけで、翻訳者が勝手に名前を変えてしまうのとは状
況が違いますね。

少し話がそれると思いますが、アメリカに移民がたくさん流入してきた時代、英語話者にとって「発音しにくいから」といった理由で、多くの人の名前が変え
られたり短縮されたりしたのは、多くの場合英語話者側の怠慢、移民受入国の横暴であって、「よくあることだからそれでよし」という考え方には私は違和感
を感じます。それに今の時代は、個性の尊重、セキュリティなどの理由で、潮流はその逆（名前のスペルの変更は難しい)？

Shuko Jacobs

[Anthony Bryant]

On Feb 4, 2012, at 12:43 AM, Stephen Suloway wrote:

> On Feb 3, 2012, at 20:05, Mark Spahn wrote:
>
>> So changing the pronunciation of a name in another language is no big deal.
>
> I agree.
>
> My grandfather Willi Fuchs (フィウクス）emigrated as a young man from Austro-Hungary to the USA.

My old Miami buddy back in the 70s, Mike Kuntz, took great pains to emphasize his name was to be pronounced Koooooontz, rather than.... the other way. His parents? They pronounced it the other way.

Tony

[Mark Spahn]

> My old Miami buddy back in the 70s, Mike Kuntz, took great pains to
> emphasize his name was to be pronounced Koooooontz, rather than.... the
> other way. His parents? They pronounced it the other way.
> Tony

Actually, there are *three* plausible pronunciations
of "Kuntz": with the vowel sound of either
(1) "food", (2) "book", or (3) "up".
How to pronounce the name of the thriller writer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dean_Koontz ?
Wikipedia doesn't list a pronunciation, but at
http://www.forvo.com/word/dean_koontz/
an Australian pronounces it as (2),
which is how I have heard it too.
-- Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)

[timl...@aol.com]

(2) would never do in the North of England.

Tim Leeney

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