The Sun

[Aaron Gerow]

> So of course we should use what people themselves
> use rather than strictly following romanization rules.

In general, yes, but sometime I want to write a piece for a Japanese 
film magazine giving film people advice on romanization and other 
issues. When you see travesties like "Shoujyo" as a release title in 
the USA (when "shojo" is now in common use among American shojo manga 
fans), it is clear that there are dozens of people using dozens of 
different transliteration systems that are only causing confusion. An 
individual might have reasons for romanizing his or her name 
differently, but I would warn them on several fronts: 1) Libraries will 
not use that aberrant rendering; 2) In databases, the aberrant 
rendering and the proper rendering might end up as completely different 
entries, as if they are different people; 3) it causes problems 
whenever anyone tries to be consistent in publication (Joe Shishido may 
look OK, but it starts looking odd when as a scholar you have decided 
to maintain Japanese name order: Shishido Joe); 4) and frankly, in some 
cases, it still stinks of "datsu-A nyu-O", with Japanese trying to 
de-Japanify their names in order to seem more Western. Simply put, I 
would tell them not to create such names.

Aaron Gerow
KineJapan owner

Assistant Professor
Film Studies Program/East Asian Languages and Literatures
Yale University

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