丽莎 and 莉萨

[carmentalis]

Is there a difference between the use of 丽莎 and  莉萨 where the name Lisa is concerned? The first is the one I know I learnt as the standard for Lisa years ago, and which my textbooks and dictionary confirm, but I've come across several cases of the second variation lately, and it's made me wonder. Is it just a matter of preference?

Comments

[jiawen]

There aren't really "standard" transliterations of English names in Chinese. Some transliterations may get used more often, but there isn't anyone to make official decisions about how a given name gets transliterated. Newspapers are probably the closest thing there is, but even they have significant variation in how they transliterate.

[carmentalis]

It's what confused me about it because it's such a standard name. I thought  丽莎 was the commonly accepted transliteration for the name, and that it had simply become habit over the years to use this because I saw it everywhere. I didn't expect to run into a second transliteration, when most historical persons go with  丽莎 either as a standalone or as a component of the transliteration of Elizabeth.

So both are equally acceptable, with no reason to prefer one over the other?

[jiawen]

"So both are equally acceptable, with no reason to prefer one over the other? "

Equally acceptable, I'd say, though as you noticed, one is certainly more common.

Occasionally, I've seen different transliterations used to evoke different meanings. Gender neutral English names, for example, may be transliterated very differently depending on whether they belong to a woman or a man. One great cafe in Taibei uses bizarre (and sometimes crude) transliterations of food names to hilarious effect.

But there isn't any particular need to use one transliteration over another, so far as I've seen.

[pne]

There aren't really "standard" transliterations of English names in Chinese.

Well, there's http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:%E8%8B%B1%E8%AA%9E%E8%AD%AF%E9%9F%B3%E8%A1%A8, which is *a* standard, if perhaps not *the* standard. Apparently, it's from 世界人名翻譯大辭典 by 新華社.

And it would transliterate /liːsɑː/ (as a woman's name) as 莉莎 :) (And 利薩 if it were a word but not a woman's name.)

[zn]

丽萨 ）））