Japanese and Chinese names

[Mycernius]

Just a quick question. Are Japanese names written in Chinese different to how they are written in Kanji and visa versa? I ask this because I have just watched House Of Flying Daggers and one of the actors is Japanese and I wondered if the Hanzi was different to the Kanji rendering of his name.
Thank you for any help

 

[Glenn]

I imagine that if there is a Japanese simplified character in his name then it would be written in its traditional form, assuming that that's the form used in the movie's credits. If the movie's credits uses simplified, then his name's characters would be written in the simplified Chinese characters. If the characters are the same in all three scripts (which I doubt would happen -- I'm sure it's rare that one character is the same in all three), they would stay the same.

 

[pipokun]

When you have J names with Katakana or Hiragana, first apply Chinese characters for Katakana/Hiragana, then pronounce in the Chinese way.

宇多田ヒカル Hikaru Utada
1. 宇多田光
2. yu duo tian guang
浜崎あゆみ Ayumi Hamasaki
1.浜崎歩
2.ping qi bu

When it comes to Western name, there are 2 ways:
1. To apply phonetically similar character
2. To apply a character with the same meaning

Ask Chinese readers for more info.

 

[nhk9]

In House Of Flying Daggers, the half-Japanese, half-Chinese actor Kaneshiro Takeshi, is written exactly the same way both in Chinese and Japanese. I don't recall that there were other Japanese actors/actresses in that movie.

 

[Tsuyoiko]

Kaneshiro Takeshi ga suki! Sorry that is not a useful comment, but he is great! Have you seen The Returner?

 

[GaijinPunch]

Isn't he half Taiwanese half Japanese? I'm not sure about Japanese->Chinese but the other way, they generally write them the same way, but pronounce them in "japanese" so to speak.

 

[moofs]

Isn't he half Taiwanese half Japanese? I'm not sure about Japanese->Chinese but the other way, they generally write them the same way, but pronounce them in "japanese" so to speak.

Yep, although I'm not sure which side is which.... I think his father is taiwanese and his mother is Japanese.

Anyway, pipokun basically nailed it. If the Japanese name is just in katakana, they'll apply a phonetically similar character. For example, Kakashi from the Naruto anime would be 卡卡西 (ka1ka2shi4).

 

[Tsuyoiko]

His father is Japanese, his mother is Taiwanese and he grew up in Taiwan. He visited Japan for the first time when he was 18.