How long will it be...

[LesCanadiens]

...until people around the west stop saying "Hong Kong" and "Macau"? How long until they start saying "Xianggang" and "Aomen" instead? The last two are the correct romanizations of those two placenames, since the Pinyin romanization is now the correct one to use in the Xianggang SAR since China has owned it since 1997.

And by "people," I mean Westerners.

Anyone?

 

[Fuschia]

Forever, because most people just do not care enough to bother...

 

[SeleucusNicator]

When those become easier to say for non-Chinese people? In other words, not anytime soon.

 

[LesCanadiens]

When those become easier to say for non-Chinese people? In other words, not anytime soon.

They're both fairly easy for me to pronounce, and were long before I took Mandarin in school.

 

[Fifty]

What exactly is the problem with different languages using different words to refer to the same thing? In other words, who cares and why is this a noteworthy case?

 

[Masquerouge]

As soon as the Chinese say France instead of Faguo

 

[Verge]

It'll be a couple of generations, if ever.

 

[LesCanadiens]

What exactly is the problem with different languages using different words to refer to the same thing? In other words, who cares and why is this a noteworthy case?

Well, you know there's a reason we say "Beijing" and no "Peking," "Chongqing" and not "Chungking," "Guangzhou" and not "Canton," "Xiamen" and not "Amoy," etc. I see absolutely no reason to not do the same for Xianggang.

 

[Ansar]

As soon as the Chinese say France instead of Faguo

I need to hear a sound clip of that!

 

[GinandTonic]

yeah what they all said.

Added to which Hong Kong was a totally insignificant island with double didgit population before it became Hong Kong. When it reinvents itself again enough to inpact the popular mindset.

 

[LesCanadiens]

I need to hear a sound clip of that!

Fa-guo.

Not Fag-uo.

 

[LucyDuke]

It's not going to change. The "correct" versions you indicated aren't any more correct than the terms used. Different languages have different words for different things. It's always been that way, and there's nothing wrong with that.

Your gripe is prescriptivist, therefore illegitimate!

 

[LesCanadiens]

yeah what they all said.

Added to which Hong Kong was a totally insignificant island with double didgit population before it became Hong Kong. When it reinvents itself again enough to inpact the popular mindset.

So was the rest of the country. And yet, we refer to Beijing by its proper name, and we don't use Peking anymore.

 

[LesCanadiens]

It's not going to change. The "correct" versions you indicated aren't any more correct than the terms used. Different languages have different words for different things.

Then why do we use the correct names for all other Chinese cities? Why the exception for Xianggang?

 

[Shadylookin]

what's wrong with Hong Kong? It's just easier to say in english. We do this all the time, for instance Spain's name is actually espanya

 

[LucyDuke]

Then why do we use the correct names for all other Chinese cities? Why the exception for Xianggang?

Why is the English word for France closer to the French word for France than the English word for Germany is to the German word for Germany?

What's your point?

 

[North King]

So was the rest of the country. And yet, we refer to Beijing by its proper name, and we don't use Peking anymore.

Beijing wasn't administrated by the British for 99 years.

 

[LesCanadiens]

Why is the English word for France closer to the French word for France than the English word for Germany is to the German word for Germany?

What's your point?

My point is that it's really stupid to insist on using obsolete Romanizations when the English language is perfectly capable of offering a direct transliteration. And like I said, you didn't answer the question, why do we use correct romanizations for cities like Beijing and Chongqing, but not Xianggang?

 

[GinandTonic]

So was the rest of the country. And yet, we refer to Beijing by its proper name, and we don't use Peking anymore.

No the rest of the country was the most populous on earth, with the power to break the westen capitalist system with the demanding silver biz. Couple of wars over it. The second of which resulted in the surrender of the Kowloon Bay - not HK itself as is often misunderstood.

HK, the island, was a milaria infested rock (something of an achevement in itself), before it was settled. It was meaningfully uninhabited, and thus is known by the name the people who created the city chose to give it.

What was New York called when thirty Native Americans lived there?

 

[Verge]

My point is that it's really stupid to insist on using obsolete Romanizations when the English language is perfectly capable of offering a direct transliteration.

It might just be me, but I happen to like the obsolete Romanizations. Maybe everyone else does as well. The name "Hong Kong" just evokes certain images that the more appropriate translation completely lacks.