Cantonese and Mandarin speakers habitually provide characters in written Chinese for names of non-Asian celebrities and public figures, particularly in news reporting, the entertainment business, sports, among other areas. It is quite common for the same foreign name to be written differently in the diverse printed media, as in the name David Beckham (碧咸 vs. 貝克漢姆 ) or Novak Djokovic 迪祖高域 or 祖高域 vs. 喬科維奇 vs. 小德). The present survey-based study investigates the phonetic vs. non-phonetic tactics adopted by Cantonese and Mandarin speakers (and translators) in transliterating foreign names. Previous studies on loanwords and name translation (e.g., Hsieh, et al., 2009; Wiebusch and Tadmor, 2009; Wang, 2012; Li, 2017) have demonstrated that speakers and translators adopt various methods, resorting to sound-based transliteration, meaning-based translation, as well as both transliteration and free translation. Li (2017), for instance, shows that phonetic stress in the source language (like English) may correspond to particular tones of the Chinese characters chosen. However, the extent to which spelling may impact the choice of characters in the target names is so far understudied.

This study aims to explore the effects of spelling vs. phonetics of the source names on the adoption of the written Chinese versions. Forty informants (namely 20 Cantonese and 20 Mandarin university students) were recruited to transliterate forty football players’ names, grouped into five categories and chosen from three major European football leagues, i.e., Spanish La Liga, German Bundesliga, and English Premier League. To assess the effects of orthography, names with a silent (as in Hernandez and Wickham), names containing the Spanish (a velar fricative /x/, as in Jimenez and Rojo), Portuguese names ending in <-inho> (with pronounced as /ɲ/, as in Paulinho and Fabinho), and German names (pronounced as a voiceless palatal fricative as in Schulz and Schmeichel) were targeted.

It is found that a foreign name’s spelling considerably influences the target name in written Chinese. Both groups of informants relied more on spelling than phonetics, and tended to transliterate a name by assuming that a non-English foreign name is read according to English pronunciation rules. Moreover, Mandarin speakers are more likely than the Cantonese counterparts to transliterate a name based on the source spelling. Another prominent finding is that Cantonese speakers adopt shorter names compared with Mandarin informants, possibly due to the differences in syllable structures between Cantonese and Mandarin. This finding coincides with Cantonese speakers’ non-splitting strategy in dealing with the sequence, particularly when this letter sequence is followed by a consonant letter. Overall, the study broadens our understanding of (non-)phonetic tactics adopted in transliteration. Spelling in the source names is arguably as indicative as phonetics in predicting the ultimate form of a foreign name in written Chinese.