RL folllowing SL: Name restriction in China

One of the early bewildering facts of SL is that you can only choose your SL names from a limited selection. Or more precisely, you can create any first name, but had to choose from a given set of last names. As example, my SL name is AlanLau (my choice - sorry for not being very creative) Nirvana (chosen from some 20+ last names allowed).

Seems RL is catching up with SL: China will be announcing that all characters in a new-born's name needs to come from 8000 "standard words" set by the National Language Committee. So RL parents are "restricted" just like in SL when you create an avatar! This is partly to stem the trend of overly-creative and strange names. Stories have popped up at least since 2005, when Chinese parents started using unconventional characters like "C" (to stand for China, showing their patriotism to the country), or "@" (to stand for Ai, since @=at and when pronounced, it sounds like love in Mandarin) as their child's first name.

Apparently among names in use today in China, there are 8000 characters which simply doesnt exist (the committee said these are simply "wrong" characters - I wonder what Xu Bing will say about that? Maybe the committee can cross-reference these characters in "Book from the Sky"!). Of the 7600 last names in use, 2000 are used by only 1 person - indicating that these are "made up" last names. (Interstingly, made-up last name is the norm in Indonesia - as far as I know. For example, if your father's name is X, then their child's last name is Xputra for a boy, or Xpetri for a girl). So I guess naming - and family tree tracking - must be a mess and near-impossible task there?!

On reflection, one can say that the new regulation in China is simply redundant. In today's electronic world, if you cannot type a character out (which I imagine you cant for the random or wrong characters above), does that character still "exist"? In some ways, hasnt the digital world impose restriction already on what are acceptable Chinese words?

Naming is only one implicated area of the official 8000 characters guideline. Many noted that complicated characters (used in HK and Taiwan) are not "revived" for official use, disappointing some linguists and those that maintain only complicated characters reflect the true history and heritage of Chinese words.

So, fewer strange names, more order, but less creativity, also in RL...


遏制怪异名字 限8000字內挑選
2009-4-12【大公網訊】爲遏制亂取名、取怪名現象，今後新生兒取名只能在即將公布的「規範漢字表」8000餘字中選取。廣州「羊城晚報」引述參與編製「規範漢字表」的中國國家語委副主任李宇明表示，「規範漢字表」是在1988年的「現代漢語常用字表」和「現代漢語通用字表」等基礎上整合修訂而成，共有8000餘字，目前已完成專家學術研究工作，等候行政審批，如無特殊情况，今年內大致能够面世。報導又引述「規範漢字表」後期研製工作的專家組組長、中國語言學會副會長、北京師範大學教授王寧指出，「規範漢字表」是對過去已有規範的整合與修訂，包括重新複查、確定了字級、字量、字形，對姓氏、地名、科技等領域的字作出補充，對簡化類推作出嚴格限制，正體字與异體字的關係也作了一些必要的調整。王寧强調，這次修訂工作經過全盤考慮，慎重從事，但「規範漢字表」不會恢復繁體字。她又說，該字表一經公布，今後中國大陸新生兒的取名用字必須從中選取，亂取名、取怪名的現象將得到遏制。王寧强調，人名用字是社會用字的一部分，必須要符合漢字使用的規範，這樣才是真正的保障姓名權。報導又引述中國公安部門透露，大陸換領第2代身分證的過程中發現，竟有大約8000個字找不到。據專家研究，這約8000個字中，至少有一半是錯字、別字。此外，目前中國公民的姓氏用字大概有7600餘字，但其中竟有2000個字所代表的姓只有一個人在使用。也就是說，這些姓幾乎都是硬生生造的或胡亂編出來的，而非歷史傳承的。

One more article on the subject, with more stats:
http://news.lnd.com.cn/xwzx/htm/2009-04/12/content_627360.htm