Japanese Name-Kanji thread!

[tomodachi_dan]

Hey, I thought it may be a good idea to start a thread that deals with Japanese Name-Kanji queries.

I have a quick question, what's my friends name in Kanji: ABE, MIDORI

I want to write her a letter, but I'm unsure as to her Kanji.

 

[GaijinPunch]

Abe is most likely: 阿部
Midori is most likely hiragana

 

[epigene]

Guessing name kanjis is not a good idea because of the large number of homophones in Japanese. Take the family name Abe, for example. It can be written in at least 10 ways that I know of--and many more:

阿部
安部
安倍
河辺
綾部
安武
阿辺
安陪
阿倍
安辺

The same applies more for first names, because parents choose kanji carefully to give the baby a special name with special meaning. Midori does not always mean "green" and it can be written in hiragana, katakana or a variety of kanjis (can be one kanji or possibly up to three kanjis).

If you want to know the kanji for the name of your friend, the best and most courteous way is to ask exactly what kanji is used for the name. I personally will be offended by someone using the wrong kanjis for my first and family names.

Just to let you know so you won't make mistakes!

 

[GaijinPunch]

Well, I'm going off of people I knew (for both names). Indeed, guessing from pronunciation to kanji is probably not so fun. Kanji to phonetic much easier.

 

[lexico]

Names; where to look them up ?

On a personal level I couldn't agree with you more, Epigene-san. I used to get very upset when a foreigner couldn't get the family name pronounced exactly the way it should, and felt deelpy violated when my given name was mispronounced. I would say having it written incorrectly would just make the insult (however unintentional) 10-fold insulting.

As for looking up Japanese surnames for reference, the authoirtative source I was given was P.G. O'Neill's Japanese Names, A Comprehensive Indes by Characters and Readings, Weatherhill, Inc., New York and Tokyo, 1972, 4th printing 1995, ISBN 0-8348-0225-2. Just to add more flavor to Epigene's contribution, the book lists /Abe/ as the full surname in six kanji forms;

1. 安部
2. 安閉
3. 阿倍
4. 阿部
5. 安倍
6. 阿閉

As for the the other five forms, these probably come from a more comprehensive source which is you; 河辺, 綾部, 安武, 阿辺, 安陪, 安辺. This only goes to say that guessing surnames is really tricky business; something you do not want to use any guess work (or a dictionary) which might turn out very badly although you only mean well. Epigene-san, do you know of a reliable link or dictionary that surpasses O'Neill's ?

 

[epigene]

Hi Lexico-san!

I don't have any link in English...sorry

If you're willing to try this, you can enter Japanese names in half-width katakana or in kanji (limited to those used in Japanese) to show variations. This is a link Nagashima-san posted in the past:
全国の苗字（名字）１２万種

HTH!

 

[lexico]

Thank you so much, Epigene-san, Nagashima-san !
Suzaki's 全国の苗字（名字） lists 100,727 surnames in JIS levels 1, 2 & non-JIS kanjis. This should solve almost all cases of identifying the possible range of variant kanji's from the katakana readings.

 

[J44xm]

If you're willing to try this, you can enter Japanese names in half-width katakana or in kanji (limited to those used in Japanese) to show variations.

I was going to make a new thread about this, but here seems like a decent place to ask what the purpose of half-width characters are. I see them listed in the Unicode character set, and now here's a specific use for them. So what are they for?