"Wild Pink Kamome" approved by Japanese Govnt!

[Taro Toporific]

Strawberry, seagull, sparrow characters OK for names
Japan Today, Friday, June 11, 2004 at 15:41 JST
TOKYO The government should allow the use of 578 more Chinese characters for personal names, including ones meaning strawberry, seagull, sparrow, bellflower or wild pink...

[kamome]

Thank God! Because you know that kamome's gotta come in more flavors than one.

[tidbits]

I can't understand why can't they just allow all Kanji to be used in people's name. Imagine, my husband, a nikkei who can speak Japanese well but terrible in writing Kanji, and myself who know Kanji but can't speak Japanese well are trying to find a Japanese name for our baby now..

[djgizmoe]

Yeah, it's kind of ridiculous that there is an 'official' kanji list for names. Japan needs a few more Soleil Moon-Fryes...
And do you remember the flap a few years back about the parents who named their kid "Akuma" (devil)? Dude, I'd almost PAY to have my name legally changed to "Devil"...

[Mulboyne]

New options raise the stakes in the 'Name that Baby' game
Japan Times: By MARY SISK NOGUCHI
Since 1990, the Justice Ministry has limited the kanji allowed for use in Japanese personal names to the 1,945 general-use (joyo) kanji and 285 name (jinmei) kanji. Beginning last month, however, a wide range of new naming options became available: Responding to public pressure, the ministry has increased the number of jinmei kanji by 488, bringing the total to 773.
The working group charged with choosing the additional characters first drew up a proposed list...the public was then invited to voice its opinion. Approximately 90 JIS kanji were axed from the initial list --including "ant," "hemorrhoid," "mother-in-law" and "debauchery."

However, many of the characters that did survive the cut to become jinmei kanji seem unlikely to appear with any regularity on elementary-school rosters in the coming years. These include the characters for mundane household objects such as "chopsticks," "tiles" and "pots." Ditto body parts ("armpit" and "kidney"), sea creatures ("shrimp" and "sardine") and the verbs "to crawl" and "to lose weight." "Bee" also seems something of a long shot, with "honey" a bit more likely, perhaps for a girl's name. The odds seem long for the likes of "lonely," "claw" or "mochi (rice cake)" being widely used in names for either gender.

Some of the new jinmei kanji, however, do possess the potential to emerge as serious players in the 'Name That Baby' game. Watch for "Strawberry" to press its way into the top-10 list of girls' names within a year or so. Japanese parents are also now free to name their daughters "Apple," just as American movie actress Gwyneth Paltrow recently did. Given that girls' names containing the kanji for "peach," "pear" and "apricot" are already common, newcomers "melon" and "persimmon" may also attract interest.

The current boom in flower-kanji monikers for girls -- as demonstrated by "Hollyhock (Aoi)" and "Bud (Moe)" in the 2003 top-10 girls' names list -- is likely to continue: "Kikyo (bellflower)" and "nadeshiko (pink -- the flower)" are comprised of new jinmei kanji, and the Japanese media has them pegged to become hot new names. Other promising nature newcomers include "amber," "birch" and "raindrop."

For boys born in the next few years in the Japanese archipelago, look for newly allowed nautical-kanji like "rudder," "gunwale" and "sea gull" to make a splash. In addition to sea gull, a flock of other bird-kanji -- "swallow," "heron," "crow" and "wild duck" -- are new jinmei characters, but the soaring "eagle" seems the bird most likely to land in the list of boys' names.

[prancer]

Strawberry, seagull, sparrow characters OK for names
Japan Today, Friday, June 11, 2004 at 15:41 JST
TOKYO The government should allow the use of 578 more Chinese characters for personal names, including ones meaning strawberry, seagull, sparrow, bellflower or wild pink...

Taro T, the link takes me to a page that says the story is unavailable. Does JT have an archive where I can find it?

[Mulboyne]

Don't know where the Japan Today story has gone but here are other links:
Mainichi June 11th 2004: "Cancer," "excrement" among controversial Japanese name character proposals
Asahi Sep 28th 2004: In Japan, you can't name your kid "mistress" or "piles"

[Mulboyne]

More on names from the Japan Times "Kanji Clinic"

Unlike their jinmei counterparts, the joyo kanji have not been vetted for appropriateness of use in personal names, and there are some real stinkers among them too: "Pig," "death," "urine," "poison," "mosquito," "tears," "dirty" and "hate" are just a few of the over 300 general-use characters that name guidebooks for parents counsel steering clear of. So why doesn't the Justice Ministry give the public an opportunity to disqualify joyo characters it considers distasteful, just as it did for the new jinmei characters?
QUIZ: In each pair below, one is the English keyword for a new jinmei kanji, the other is the keyword for a kanji eliminated from the Justice Ministry's original list. Identify which of the two, if either, you find more inappropriate for use in names. Those actually eliminated are given at the end.
1. spine/armpit 2. puzzle/lie 3. jealousy/gloom 4. to leak/to get wet 5. to kick/to scold 6. turnip/animal feed 7. to bark/to give off a smell 8. to crawl/to shave 9. mother-in-law/old woman 10. male animal/old man

Answers: 1. spine 2. lie 3. jealousy 4. to leak 5. to scold 6. animal feed 7. to bark 8. to shave 9. mother-in-law 10. old man