Let a hundred transcriptions bloom!

[muckefuck]

After all this time spent focusing on ourselves and our dwellings, it was refreshing to get out into the world and see a few people I haven't for a while. One of them is a librarian at DePaul who is preparing for an upcoming trip to China. monshu and I promised to share our tips on what to see in Beijing (such as they are) and I volunteered to help design name cards suitable for handing out to strangers. I figured nothing fancy--just a transcription of his name accompanied by identification of his institution. Easy-peasy, right? I mean, DePaul University's not the biggest and most famous college in Chicago, but you'd still figure that it would have a standardised Chinese version of its name.

"Ha!" I say. Here's what I've collected so far:

1. 德堡大學 (152,000 Ghits)
2. 德保爾大學 (5,180)
3. 德保羅大學 (4,580 Ghits)
4. Depaul大學 (4,030)
5. 帝博大學 (2,940 Ghits)
6. 帝寶大學 (237 Ghits)

So in this horse race, it's "Virtue Castle" ahead by a mile, followed by "Virtue Defends You" neck-and-neck with "Virtue Defends Gauze" and "Depaul", then "Emperor Is Learned" with "Imperial Treasure" bringing up the rear. 德堡大學 seems like the obvious choice, but I was hoping to find some indication that it has the imprimatur of the institution itself. How parochial is it that a school with hundreds of Chinese students, a respected Chinese programme, and a campus in Hong Kong only offers an English-language version of its website?

Comments

[marnanel.livejournal.com]

What does it say on the front of the HK campus?

[sconstant.livejournal.com]

I am so used to half-comprehension of your lj that it only occurred to me after a few seconds of thought that "Ghits" isn't a colloquial term in some other language for popularity.

[pne.livejournal.com]

I like the 德保羅大學 spelling myself, since it contains a traditional way of rendering "Paul"-the-Biblical-figure.

[bunj.livejournal.com]

Hmmm... Are there any transcriptions of St. Vincent de Paul's name (either on a list of saints, or a website for the St. Vincent de Paul Society)? Lacking anything official from the university, this may be the best way to find a semi-official transcription.

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

The Taiwanese EB gives 聖味增爵(保羅的), with the "de" coming after "Paul" for reasons that are obscure to me. (Note that this is a completely different transcription of "Vincent" than the one I have typically seen, which is 文生.)

[bwillsouth.livejournal.com]

I thought the whole point was to bring those slanty-eyed opium-smokers to the Light of Jesus, not to have a way of writing an institution's name in their arcane heathen hand.

[niemandsrose.livejournal.com]

...maybe your Depaul friend should ask one of the Chinese language faculty at Depaul what they use one *their* cards!

[aadroma.livejournal.com]

I've seen on the Chinese Wikipedia page 帝波大學 -- that certainly doesn't mean that this is official or that anyone actually uses this (and Lord knows I've seen another transcription elsewhere on another Chinese Wikipedia page. Consistency rules!!).