Japan goes new rules to limit its use
If you go to Japan, you could meet someone with an unusual name, such as “Nike”, “Pikachu” or “Pudding”. And, although they are still a minority, in recent decades their popularity has grown because parents have abandoned traditional Japanese names in favor of more original names. But this practice also aroused criticism, above all because it creates confusion in hospitals, schools and authorities, who do not know how to pronounce them. Now the government is taking severe measures against the so -called “kirakira” names (“sparkling”) and has launched new rules that will prevent parents from giving their children pronounced names in a unconventional way.
According to CNN’s story, the news received conflicting reactions: some users of social media have argued that Kirakira names are an expression of individualism, they are harmless and do not justify government regulation. “I’m not children of the nation, right? They are children of their parents,” wrote someone on X after the announcement.
But what is the basic problem? Japan uses three writing systems: the Kanji, based on Chinese characters, and two other phonetic systems. The names are typically written in Kanji, and it is here that the difficulty is born. Since these Chinese characters have been mixed with the existing Japanese language, each Kanji character can be pronounced in different ways, some with ten or more ways. The “correct” pronunciation is deciphered based on the clues of the context and the other characters present in a sentence or expression. In the Kirakira names, which have become more popular since the 80s, parents often choose a name based on phonetic sound (for example, wanting that the name of their child sounds like “pikachu”) and choose kanji characters with a similar sound.
The new rules of the Japanese government aim to limit this phenomenon, establishing that only the widely accepted pronouncements will be allowed, kanji characters. Parents will have to include the phonetic reading of the names of their children in the register and, if local authorities note that the phonetic sound of a name does not correspond to the pronunciation typical of its characters, they could refuse the name or request further documentation.
It is not the first time that the rigid denomination rules arouse debates in Japan where the law still requires married couples to share the same surname, unlike most other large economies that have abolished this tradition. Normally, wives take the surname of her husband, since marriages between people of the same sex are not legal in Japan.
