VP - Chinese Grammar

Although there are currently over 4,000 Chinese surnames ( 姓 , x ì ng) in use in China, the colloquial expression for the "Chinese people" is the B ǎ i X ì ng ( 百姓 , "The Hundred Names") and a mere hundred surnames still make up over 85% of China's 1.3 billion citizens. In fact, just the top three  - Wang ( 王 ), Li ( 李 ), and Zhang ( 张 ) - cover more than 20% of the population. This homogeneity results from the great majority of Han family names having only one character, while the small number of compound surnames is mostly restricted to minority groups. This has not always been true in Chinese history: between the first and fifth centuries AD, a law against multiple-character personal names briefly popularized two-character surnames and a number of important figures like Zhuge Liang and Sima Qian possessed them.

Chinese surnames arose from two separate prehistoric traditions: the x ì ng ( 姓 ) and the sh ì ( 氏 ). The original x ì ng were clans of royalty at the Shang court and always included the 'woman' radical 女 . The sh ì did not originate from families, but denoted fiefs, states, and titles granted or recognized by the Shang court. Apart from the Jiang ( 姜 ) and Yao ( 姚 ) families, the original x ì ng have nearly disappeared but the terms ironically reversed their meaning. X ì ng is now used to describe the shì surnames which replaced them, while shì is used to refer to maiden names.

The enormous modern clans sometimes share ancestral halls with one another, but actually consist of many different lineages gathered under a single name. As an example, the surname Ma ( 马 ) includes descendants of the Warring States-era bureaucrat Zhao She, descendants of his subjects in his fief of Mafu, Koreans from an unrelated confederation, and Muslims from all over western China who chose it to honor Muhammad. Nonetheless, however tenuous these bonds sometimes are, it remains a minor taboo to marry someone with the same family name.

In modern mainland China, it is the norm that a married woman keeps her name unchanged, without adopting her husband's surname. A child usually inherits his/her father's surname, though the marriage law explicitly states that a child may use either parent's. It is also possible, though far less common, for a child to combine both parents' surnames. In the older generations, it was also common for a married woman to prepend her husband's surname to her own. This practice is now almost extinct in mainland China, though there are a few exceptions such as the name change of Gu Kailai, but survives in some Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan families.

Forms of Address

Within families, it is often considered inappropriate or even offensive to use the given names of relatives who are senior to the speaker. Instead, it is more customary to identify each family member by abstract hierarchical connections: among siblings, gender and birth order (big sister, second sister, and so on); for the extended family, the manner of relationship (by birth or marriage; from the maternal or paternal side).

The hierarchical titles of junior relatives are seldom used except in formal situations, or as indirect reference when speaking to family members who are even younger than the person in question. Children can be called by their given names or their parents may use their nicknames.

When speaking of non-family social acquaintances, people are generally referred to by a title, for example Mother Li (simplified Chinese: 李妈妈 ; traditional Chinese: 李媽媽 ; pinyin: lĭ māma) or Mrs. Zhu ( 朱太太 , pinyin: zhū tàitai). Personal names are used when referring to adult friends or to children, although, unlike in the west, referring to somebody by their full name (including surname) is common even among friends, especially if the person's full name is only two syllables. It is common to refer to a person as l ǎ o ( 老 , old) or xi ǎ o ( 小 , young) followed by their family name, thus L ǎ o W á ng ( 老王 ) or Xi ǎ o Zh ā ng ( 小張 , 小张 ). Xi ǎ o is also frequently used as a diminutive, when it is typically paired with the second or only character in a person's name, rather than the surname. Note that because old people are well respected in Chinese society, l ǎ o (old) does not carry disrespect, offense or any negative implications even if it is used to refer to an older woman. Despite this, it is advisable for non-Chinese to avoid calling a person xi ǎ o-something or l ǎ o-something unless they are so-called by other Chinese people and it is clear that the appellation is acceptable and widely used. Otherwise, the use of the person's full name, or alternatively, their surname followed by xi ā nsheng (Chinese: 先生 , mister) or n ǚ sh ì (Chinese: 女士 , madam) is relatively neutral and unlikely to cause offense.

Whereas titles in many cultures are commonly solely determined by gender and, in some cases, marital status, the occupation or even work title of a person can be used as a title as a sign of respect in common address in Chinese culture. Because of the prestigious position of a teacher in traditional culture, a teacher is invariably addressed as such by his or her students (e.g. Chinese: 李老師 ; pinyin: L ǐ L ǎ osh ī ; literally: "Teacher Li"), and commonly by others as a mark of respect. Where applicable, "Teacher Surname" is considered more respectful than "Mr/Mrs/Miss Surname" in Chinese. A professor is also commonly addressed as "teacher", though "professor" is also accepted as a respectful title. By extension, a junior or less experienced member of a work place or profession would address a more senior member as "Teacher".

Similarly, engineers are often addressed as such, though often shortened to simply the first character of the word "engineer" -- Chinese: 工 ; pinyin: G ō ng. Should the person being addressed be the head of a company (or simply the middle manager of another company to whom you would like to show respect), one might equally address them by the title "zŏng" (simplified Chinese: 总 ; traditional Chinese: 總 ), which means "general" or "overall", and is the first character of titles such as "Director General" or "General Manager" (e.g. simplified Chinese: 李总 ; traditional Chinese: 李總 ; pinyin: Lĭ zŏng), or, if they are slightly lower down on the corporate food-chain but nonetheless a manager, by affixing Jīnglĭ (simplified Chinese: 经理 ; traditional Chinese: 經理 , manager).

Content on this page from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_name#Forms_of_address

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