Vol. 55 No. 4 (2007)
Research Article

Two Worldviews Regarding Chinese American Names

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  • Emma Woo Louie
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1179/nam.2007.55.4.363

Published 2007-12-01

Copyright (c) 2007 Maney

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Abstract

Abstract

The one-language one-nation concept that arose as part of the rise in nationalism in China is alive and well in America. The existence of two worldviews and the growing dominance of Mandarin speakers in the Chinese American population have implications for Chinese Americans whose names, especially those of Cantonese and other dialect origins, do not comply with Chinese standardized spelling rules. Nevertheless, non-Mandarin names and non-Mandarin sounding surnames constitute links to the regionalects of China.

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