[ks-open] Re: Korean family names

[T.N. Park]

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Henny Savenije wrote:

> REPLY sends your message to the whole list
> __________________________________________
> 
> Sorry I did find a website,
> http://hanbat.chungnam.ac.kr/~s_atoz/culture13.html it says about names the
> following:

I'm not sure that this is quite what was earlier being requested, but I
thought I would dissect it anyway. By the bye, I believe Hollym publishes a
book that lists all family names, including a chart of their place of
origin.

FROM THE WEB SITE
>Irum(Names)

First, I gotta hand it to them for sticking with M-R (well, sort of, since
they omitted the breves and, at the web site itself, some of the
apostrophes). Although, to be fair, *ireum* (as in the 2000 system) comes
just as close, for N.A. native English speakers at least, to the original
pronunciation.

>The most basic form of personal expression in the name. Many Americans of
>ten ask Koreans "What's in a name?". A Korean name is made up of three
>Chinese characters. Each character is pronounced as a single syllable.
>As our readers may already be aware of , Westerners will say their first
>name first and their family name last.

Not always. This, to me, is an example of the many oversimplifications of
western culture. Why am I nitpicking? Well, I have always been uncomfortable
with the paradigm seemingly forced down Koreans' throats that "they are
completely different from us." It's deliberate, and it's wrongheaded. Maybe
I'm just in a weird mood this morning. Please ignore. This is the "open"
list, right?

> It is the opposite in Korea. We
>always say our family name first and then the rest of our name. So out of
>the three characters, the first character is the family name and the rest
>os the first name. It is important to point out that the last name could
>also consist of two characters.

Or that the "first name" could consist of just one character.

>There is a great variety of first names, but there is a limit to the
>number of last names. Presently in Korea, there are about 274 last names.
>Out of this number, 44 are very rare and the last names such as Kim, Lee,
>and Park account for approximately 45% of all the names in Korea.

Here is the actual reason why I first replied to this. Does anyone know of
any movement to begin *differentiation* of family names? For example, maybe
allow second or third sons to begin creating their own family names to use
(thus beginning a 21st century new clan), or borrowing more family names
from old Chinese or -- better yet -- pure Korean sources, or evening out the
numbers of people using some of the very rare names?

When the Korean government started issuing new *chumin-dûngnok-chûng* (ID
cards) they quickly realized there was potential for misuse in that, without
differentiating Korean given names further by writing them in Chinese
characters, some people with similar names could pretend to be someone else.
In one GMAT preparation class, I had *three* students named Kim Ch'ôl! The
best among them could, theoretically, take the GMAT for the other two. Usage
of the Internet, where one can easily find the location of others with a
similar name, makes the potential for personality theft (or personality
lending/borrowing, if it is voluntary) even more severe.

So, is there a "new clan" movement of any kind? I personally have always
thought it would be interesting to go back to some of the original Korean
family names, before the edict that Sino-Korean names be used. (Was Lim/Im
at one time "Sup"?). I would think another interesting idea would be to
allow certain clans to change their names to the place-of-origin of the
name. Thus, Kimhae Kims could change their legal surname to "Kimhae." I
would end up being "Miryang," which doesn't flow as well as Park, but I like
it. 

This, of course, would lead to a number of problems for people who end up
with four-syllable names. Computers, apparently, tend to throw them out. Of
course, if we take the tactics of those who "invented" the new Romanisation
system, if it doesn't fit on the computer, let's get rid of it (instead of
the relatively easier step of getting MS and HWP to more simply add what is
missing).

Wow. I didn't intend for that to be as long as it was, but it's something
I've been wondering about as of late.

>Since many people believe that a person's fate is influenced by the name,
>there are instances where a name maker, instead of parents or
>grandparents, will pick the name. "Changmyoungga" is a person whose sole
>job is to pick names which will have good influences on the baby's fate.

Hence, a number of women with masculine names.

>The origin of Korean last names is not clear. It is known, however, that
>many Korean last names were derived from the names used in the early Three
>Kingdom period in China.
>In the West most of the people call each other by their first names.
>However, this is a little bit different in Korea. It is okay for family
>members and close friends to call each other by their given names but for
>the majority of other instances, this is very rare. For example, in a
>family , kit is okay to call any person younger than you by their first name.
>But, in the reverse case, we have designated words for the older family
>members.
>For example, we would call our older sister "onni" or "nuna", and our
>older brother "oopa" or "hyong".
>Also in Korea, you rarely hear married couples addressing each other by
>their first names. For example, if a married couple has a child named
>"Hana", other will call her parents either "Hana appa" or "Hana omma".
>This literally means Hana's father or Hana's mother.
>This is also true even in a professional setting. People will usually
>address each other by their title or position.
>One aspect which is quite different from the West is that a woman after
>marriage gets to keep her maiden name.

interesting choice of words: she "gets to" keep her maiden name. Feminist
deconstructionists, perhaps, would look at it thus: in the west she has to
take her husband's family name because, traditionally, she was now his
property; in Korea, she *could not* take his family name because, though the
mother of his children, she was never fully a part of that family, with
little say in family affairs (especially his -- ha!) and no inheritance
rights.

BTW, can anyone tell me if, prior to its westernization push in the late
19th/early 20th centuries, if Japanese women generally kept their maiden
name after marriage?

Enough Sunday morning prattle... This *is* the open list, right?

T'NP