| Indonesian-sounding Name Adopted By Indonesian Chinese |
Website Links For Name |
Information AboutIndonesian-sounding Name Adopted By Indonesian Chinese |
|
During the Dutch colonial era (until Japan invasion in 1942), the Dutch administrators recorded Chinese names in birth certificates and other legal documents using an adopted spelling convention which was based primarily on Hokkien (Min-nan-yu), the language of the vast majority of Chinese immigrants to the Dutch East Indies and Southeast Asia. They used the closest Dutch pronunciation to record the names. Hence, whereas Lin (林, Mandarin) is Lim in Malaysia (using the closest English pronunciation), in Indonesia it is Liem. Cheng is Tan in both Malaysia and Indonesia. Huang is Ooi or Wee in Malaysia, but Oey in Indonesia. Wu is Goh in Malaysia, but Go in Indonesia. Ni is Geh in Malaysia, but Ge in Indonesia. Guo (郭) is Kwee. Yang is Neo in Malaysia, but Njoo in Indonesia. Zhang is Thio, not Teo as in Malaysia. Zeng is Tjan. Liang (梁) is Liong. And so on. However, as there was no romanization standard in Hokkien as it is in Mandarin with Pinyin , some romanized names varied slightly. For example, 郭 (Guo) could be sometimes be Kwik, not Kwee. The spelling convention survived well into Indonesian independence (1945) and sovereignty acknowledgment by the Dutch government (1949). It is even still used today by the Chinese-Indonesian diaspora in Europe and America, and by those Chinese-Indonesians courageous or famous enough to keep their Chinese names (e.g., Kwik Kian Gie , Liem Swie King ). The Indonesian government changed the Latin spelling twice, first in 1947 (Ejaan Suwandi), and again in 1972 (Ejaan Yang Disempurnakan, literally "Spelling Made Perfect"). In the Suwandi spelling, "oe" became "u", so Loe sometimes became Lu. Since 1972, Dutch-style "j" became "y", so sometimes Njoo became Nyoo. Many Chinese-Indonesian professionals used to list their Chinese names next to their latinized names. This was common practice until 127/U/Kep/12/1966 law was enforced. 1965 TO 2000 After Soeharto came to power, his regime created many Anti-Chinese Legislations In Indonesia . One of them was 127/U/Kep/12/1966 which mandated that ethnic Chinese living in Indonesia adopt Indonesian-sounding names instead of the standard three-word or two-word Chinese names. The Chinese Indonesian community was politically powerless to oppose this law. The Suharto regime wrongly but intentionally cast the ethnic Chinese as supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), which he brutally defeated in a power struggle in 1965. By doing so, the Suharto regime - a coalition of the Golkar party and the armed forces - extracted unofficial taxes from wealthy Chinese businesspeople in exchange for protection from occassional Pogrom s, such as the Jakarta Riots Of May 1998 . Chinese Indonesians have been quite creative in adopting Indonesian-sounding names. Some adopt western names for the first names, such as Johnny or Robert, and Javanese names for the family names. The adopted Javanese names were often based on their phonetics, but it was not always the case. Although two Chinese individuals shared the same Chinese surname, they may adopt different Indonesian-sounding names. For example, one with the surname 林 (Lin) may adopt "Limanto", and the other may adopt "Halim" as Indonesian-sounding names. "Limanto" and "Halim" both contain "lim" that corresponds to the 林 surname (Mandarin: Lin, Hokkien: Liem or Lim). The Indonesianized names - basically Hokkien syllables with western or Indonesian prefix or suffix - resulted in so many exotic sounding names, that people can tell accurately whether a person is an Indonesian Chinese based only on his/her name. 2000 TO TODAY After Soeharto resigned as president, the ethnic Chinese in Indonesia are again allowed to use their original names. Most no longer care and keep the Indonesian names. Some revert to Chinese names. They face an interesting question whether to use the Hokkien names that their grandparents used, or to use the more standard pinyin romanization. EXAMPLES OF CHINESE NAMES AND THEIR INDONESIAN VERSIONS SEE ALSO
|
|
|