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FriendlyPyre t1_jd9r8d8 wrote

>For China and Korea, if they did experience modernization in the European image, it was not to the same extreme of this name-order code-switching and thus never became the norm in those countries. In the last few years there have been moves in Japan to return to the traditional name order in Western languages, e.g. the

Side note, in Singapore and Malaysia (both ex-colonies of the UK with relatively extensive Christianisation & English Educated Elite), Chinese names are arranged as such in government records where applicable:

<English first name> <Family name> <Transcribed Chinese first name>
or
<Family name> <Transcribed Chinese first name> , <English first name>

Also note that it's <Transcribed Chinese first name> due to the mix of dialects and the fact that the registrar at the time did not have a standardised manner of transcribing names to English. Even the same family name of the same dialect could be transcribed differently; example, Ku vs Koo vs Khoo even though they hold the same character and pronunciation.

&#x200B;

Let's take the example of Lee Kuan Yew the founding father of the current government of Singapore. He was born Harry Lee Kuan Yew; Following the convention of <English F.n> <Family n> <Tr. Chinese F.n>. (Note that he did drop the use of his English first name at some point during his study years in the UK)

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