Chinese language romanisation in Singapore

The romanisation of the Chinese language in Singapore is not dictated by a single policy, nor is its policy implementation consistent, as the local

romanisation system for Mandarin and the standard of Chinese education, the general lack of a romanisation standard for other Chinese varieties

results in some level of inconsistency. This may be illustrated by the many variants for the same Chinese characters often found in surnames such as Low, Loh, Lo; Tay, Teh; Teo, Teoh; Yong, Yeong.

The surname Zheng (traditional Chinese: 鄭; simplified Chinese: 郑) alone has several variations including Teh, Tay, Tee, Chang, Chung, Cheng, and Zeng. The variations Tay or Tee come from Singapore, while Teh or Tee normally have roots in Malaysia, Chang, Chung or Cheng from Hong Kong, and Zeng or Zheng normally from Mainland China.

Place names

Since the founding of modern

Southern China, Chinese placenames began to enter local vocabulary in place of traditionally Malay-based names mostly given by the Orang Laut

communities. These names, however, are usually referred to in the dialects of whichever group accords that place a certain name, with some places having entirely different names for the same feature. In most places, however, the same name is used but referred to by an individual's dialect.

When there was a need to record place names by the British administration, Chinese place names were anglicised using an almost ad hoc means of finding the closest set of letters reflecting local pronunciations of these names; a situation which often spawned conflicting spellings, some of which still persist to this day. The older spelling of Chua Chu Kang (

Choa Chu Kang New Town

take on the newer spelling.

From the mid-1980s, the drive to encourage the use of Pinyin filtered down to place names, resulting in some amendments. Aukang (also spelled "Aokang") is

Nee Soon Camp

and in the names of political subdivisions.

In contrast, pinyin was generally welcomed in

Bishan New Town

. To the local Chinese, Bishan, although actually similar in name to Peck San in Chinese, is as good as a different name by virtue of its different romanisation spelling alone.

Another controversy surrounded the renaming of

Zhujiao Centre

, which is the pinyin version of that name. However, to locals, especially non-Chinese, the new word was both hard to read and pronounce and bore no resemblance to Tekka. Eventually, the complex was officially named Tekka Centre in 2000 after two decades of public pressure.

Personal names

A large majority of Chinese people in Singapore are

Xǔ), etc., are very common.^[2]

References

^ Tan Sai Siong (1998-01-02). "OK not to use Tekka BUT let's not forget it's [sic] history". The Straits Times. Archived from the original on 2012-04-15. Retrieved 2012-05-08.
^ 罗健明《新加坡华人姓氏拼写法研究》

External links

[1] Tan Sai Siong (1998-01-02). "OK not to use Tekka BUT let's not forget it's [sic] history". The Straits Times. Archived from the original on 2012-04-15. Retrieved 2012-05-08.

[2] 罗健明《新加坡华人姓氏拼写法研究》

[2]

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