A YASUTOMI writes:

> I am now thinking whether I should follow the Hungarian way of putting the
> names, namely, Lastname First (like Kovacs Laszlo) or not.
> For Hungarians, how would you feel if English (or any other Indo-European
> language user) people use the English way like Laszlo Kovacs in
> English-written documents?
> Can somebody suggest me whether I should stick with the Hungarian way to
> write Hungarians' names or not in my (englilsh) thesis?

      My rule is stick with the native custom unless the individual
concerned asks for something different, or there are  grammatical
difficulties raised by the transposition.
   That is, Deng Shao Ping is correct in Chinese, and should be so in
English.  But if he were a citizen of the United States, he would be
Shawn Deng.  A Hungarian from Hungary would be Kovacs Laszlo but one
living the US would be Larry Kovacs.
      Most American publicatians call Latin Americans Jose Pueblo y
Casa on first mention (father and mother's names) and Mr. Pueblo on
second.  But chicanos are Joe Pueblo.  Only if there are grammatical
reasons as in inflected languages would you change the name.  In many
Slavic languages, females automatically take the  -ova ending. Thus
Martina Navritilova, whose brother would be Navratil.
   But in the end, it is often a matter of pragmatism. Are you
writing for an American/ English audience??  Which would confuse them
least??

> By the way, this happens to Japanese (my native tongue) as well. When I
> read something in English and see Japanese names in Firstname-Lastname
> order i somehow feel different.

      How does Lance Ito feel?


    Jan George Frajkor                      _!_
 School of Journalism, Carleton Univ.      --!--
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