Chinese names and Western journalists who don’t understand them

I read an article in today’s Wall Street Journal about the Securities Exchange Commission investigating a couple in Hong Kong over allegations of having made $8 million by purchasing and selling Dow Jones stock using inside information. In addition to doing a good job at illustrating how inside trading takes place, it also sheds light on something I have noticed very frequently, that the Western press does not understand the correct “grammar” on Chinese names.

 

The thing to keep in mind is that Chinese names are structured differently than those of Westerners. The biggest difference is that the last name comes first. For example, if Bill Clinton were Chinese, his name would be Clinton Bill. He would then go to Tsinghua University where on one fateful afternoon he would have the chance to meet Rodham Hillary in the law library. After years of clerking for the local Communist Party chief, the couple gets married and the wife’s name becomes Clinton Rodham Hillary. In many ways it’s almost the exact opposite of the customs in the Western world.

 

“Yesterday, the Securities and Exchange Commission filed a lawsuit against Kan King Wong and his wife, Charlotte Ka On Wong Leung, in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, charging them with insider trading in connection with their purchases of 415,000 Dow Jones shares. That's the equivalent of about 3% of the Dow Jones shares traded during the period when the couple were buying.” (Emphasis my own)

 

Let’s take a look at the paragraph above. The couple’s last name is Wong and the writers westernized their names by placing the last name at the end. The husband’s name is Kan King and the wife’s name is Ka On.. The wife’s English name is Charlotte, her maiden name is Leung, and if this article were written in Chinese, she would be referred to as Wong Leung Ka On, reflecting the Chinese custom of displaying the husband’s last name, wife’s maiden name, followed by wife’s first name.

 

The problem arises when writers westernize Chinese names and yet the westernization is not consistent across the entire article.

 

“In yesterday's complaint, the SEC detailed a "highly unusual" pattern of trading by the Wongs from April 13 through April 30, the day before the details of the offer for Dow Jones became public. On April 18, $3.1 million was transferred to Ms. Wong's account from her father, Hong Kong businessman Michael Leung Kai Hung, according to court papers. The SEC alleges that money was used to buy some of the Dow Jones stock in question.” (Emphasis my own)

 

See something funny here? The father’s last name is Leung and his English name is Michael. In Chinese, his name would be Leung Kai Hung but in accordance with the using the westernized formatting, he should have been introduced as Michael Kai Hung Leung.