Hey all! I'm wondering if there happens to be standard name translations from English to Japanese. For example, the creator's name is マイコー. When you translate your name into Japanese from English, do you just find the standard translation, if such a thing exists, or do you simply make it up yourself? And if you do make it up yourself, how? As in, Michael could be マイコー, or it could be ミコル, or a whole host of other translations. What's to prevent your made-up translation from being so unrecognizable that nobody understands it? Or, on the other side of this dilemma, if it IS standardized, where do you find this standard translation? And what if there is none for your name? If there is a standard, could someone point me towards it? Thanks.
It's usually a phonetic approximation of your name. I don't know about anything "official", but standardised transcriptions of common names do exist. If you know of a celebrity who shares your name, you can pull up their Wikipedia page and switch it to Japanese. When I do this for mine, I get ゲオルギ, which is fine, but I prefer ギョルギ since it's a bit closer to the actual pronunciation. I've also tested it on a few Japanese people, and my version seems to be both easier to pronounce and more accurate.
I'm pretty sure there's no official body that says "this foreign name must be written this way in Japanese". What exists instead are conventions and established transcriptions.
Technically, I am マイケル - that's how I appear on all papers. The last couple of schools I taught at, though, instead of introducing myself using that, I told them "My name is Michael. Please call me that", and the pronunciation that grew naturally from that request was マイコー, so I kept that.
There is no "standard" translation. However, there might be some sound combinations or "weirdness" (for example, with v) that you may want to avoid in order to make it easier for people to hear and write down your name when interacting in Japan. My last name usually doesn't cause problems, but still, about 20% of the time people will mishear it due to the "rareness" in sounds.
Another question - do individual loanwords have a standard spelling in the Japanese dictionary? i.e., when an English word is being used frequently in the Japanese language, is there a standard dictionary spelling for that word? Or does it matter? I'd imagine it'd be much easier to recognize loanwords for what they mean if they had a standard spelling. If it is standard, who decides? Or is it just the most common spelling for that word that's used?
Some loanwords have multiple spellings, but most have only one in my experience. The Japanese spelling would be based more on the pronunciation than the English speaking. Max is an excellent example; it's pronounced like Maks, so マックス or マクス is probably the best in japanese. I would use the former because it kinda imitates the stress pattern in English
Hi there, my name is also Max! I put my name into a translator and got the result in my user name. A friend (N3 level) said it makes total sense and is perfectly usable.
Now I have a question about my name: my name, Quinn, is spelled with 2 n's, like you see, and I absolutely hate when people write it with only one n. Now would I write my Japanese name with one ン (クイン) or with 2 (クインン)? I think the first option is the most natural, but the second just feels more right. Are there any rules about this, or should I just follow what feels right for myself, instead of Japanese?
I agree that the second feels much more natural if we're talking about English, but in Japanese there is not a single word I could find other than "hmm" (んん) that has double N's. Because of that, I don't know if it would be a valid spelling, or if it would cause confusion. However, from what I've heard from others in this post, it really doesn't matter too much. So, maybe ask around and get a general opinion? See if others find it confusing or normal.
クイン is the standard transcription of "Quinn". Katakana represents pronunciation rather than English spelling, so extra letters aren't preserved. Writing クインン would be read as two separate ン sounds ("n-n"), which isn't really how your name is pronounced.
It's not like you can't do it, it's just unlikely to actually sound like your name.
If you have double ん, you're asking for confusion :( - there has to be a balance between fidelity with the original name (pronunciation, not spelling) and easy to understanding by the target audience.
In English a double consonant shortens the previous vowel, but in Japanese it actually lengthens the consonant (kinda) which is strangely close to Finnish.
Again, write it like it's pronounced, not what would match English with romanization. Quinn is not pronounced with a long n at the end, so you shouldn't write it with one.
