Wednesday, March 03, 2010

名称学

我在上一篇中文post提出一个问题:

为何中国奇瑞汽车的英文名称是Chery而非Qirui?


Qirui是奇瑞的汉语拼音。但不懂中文的人,会把Qi唸成keyChery是一个比较『国际化』的名称。从市场学(marketing)的角度来看,Chery会比Qirui占优势。

再看另一个例子:日本Canon株式会社的创办人吉田五郎是佛教徒。1934年他研发出第一台相机,名为Kwanon – 观音,还用上了一个千手观音的商标。可是一年后相机推出市场时,他却决定将之改名为Canon。原因无他:Canon是英文字,比Kwanon更能为国际顾客接受。

如果阁下创办一家公司,已取了中文名,现在想要找一个罗马字母拼写的名称,汉语拼音是否适合呢?

一般来说,『国际化』的名称有其优点。不过如果要显突中华文化,中文名称也行。比如说:如果你开了家中餐馆,取名福满楼,可译为Fumanlou。但如果中国的全聚德想走向国际,最好用简写QJD。若用汉语拼音,讲英语的人会以为Quan的读法和quantity的第一音节相同,jude的读法和Jude Law的名字相似。

汉语拼音中的qiquri等音节容易唸错,应尽量避免。

当然,我们也可以索性采用『国际化』名称。譬如饺子屋,可译为The House of Dumpling,这比Jiaoziwu什么的要好得多。樱花茶餐厅,可作Sakura Café。李记茶餐室,就称为Lee Restaurant吧!

阁下如果想了解更多,不妨聘请我当顾问。我是MBA学生耶


P/S 新加坡华人已经全面拥抱汉语拼音。狮城最近出品一齣中文电影,片名是《玫瑰香》,译作Mei Gui Xiang。其实,Scent of the Rose会更好!

9 comments:

  1. 哈哈...你是顺便打自己的广告嘛...^_^

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  2. 完全同意你的意见,用汉语拼音好好像不伦不类的。。不会汉语的人又不懂。

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  3. 對囉, 要國際化就應該想個比較容易發音的名字吧?? 好像吳宇森闖好萊塢, 本來的John Ng也換成John Woo, 好讓外國人容易記得他名字..

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  4. 迷迭香
    Don't say like that... paiseh la...

    kikey
    ya ya... hanyupinyin sometimes 不伦不类...

    SK
    Haha... many Westerners have difficulty pronouncing 'Ng'.

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  5. i think i have also seen some funny han yu pin yin and i dont know people who don't know mandarin can pronounce the shop name at all

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  6. Sometimes we need to use English name to make our brand or name more...International. :p We cannot directly translate from mandarin.

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  7. 讚同你的說法。。。有些人認為放了英文名就比較standard。。。
    你順便在這個blog打廣告嗎﹖哈哈。。。

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  8. xin
    As mentioned, qi, qu, ri etc are difficult to pronounce.

    tekkaus
    But many Malaysian businesses directly translate their names from Mandarin.

    stacey
    给自己打广告,哈哈。。。

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  9. Most Chinese businesses in Canada have a Chinese name and an English name, and the latter is not always the direct translation of the Chinese name. It's actually funny!

    Westerners wouldn't know how to pronounce "difficult" words like "rui" or "qi". However, I noticed Cantonese business mostly use "cantonese name" and don't translate. Maybe Cantonese is easier to pronounce for Westerners...!

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