Should NBA, WTO and KFC be banned?
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We are not talking about Chinese words being converted into English; we are talking about new words and concepts that come to China from the rest of the world. As far as I recall, there was no Wal-Mart in China during the "cultural revolution" (1966-1976), and that Western concept has been happily imported. Sure, it is important to pronounce it as "Wo er ma" otherwise a taxi driver might have trouble knowing what one means, but there has been no need to define it as "the large box store from America that sells goods at low prices". There is no problem using "dishi" (taxi) or "qiaokeli (chocolate) either.
The efficiency of using abbreviations, initials, or acronyms is not lost on the Chinese. I no longer walk past local banks displaying signs Agricultural Bank of China and Shanghai Pudong Development Bank - these fine institutions are now labeled ABC Bank and SPD Bank respectively. I see these as a global trend.
It has been a very long time since Britain's HSBC has been called "Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation" - people know what the brand stands for. "Citi" has become useful shorthand for America's Citibank Group. Will KFC be okay to use, or should it be translated into the "Chicken Frying Company from Kentucky"?
Thus, surely the efficiency, legal preciseness and lack of confusion that result from use of internationally accepted acronyms is not something that China should be prevented from taking advantage of in its own communications. It is unlikely that such a ban will have any impact on their use in other contexts or disappear from the landscape. Legislation is probably not the best way of allowing a language to develop. Custom, tradition and practicalities of use are what matter.
Put simply, if enough people start using a term, then that term has becomes part of the language. It is a sign of modernization and it benefits China to embrace globalization.
To ban such acronyms is surely over the top? What do my Chinese friends say about the question that locals may not be familiar with some of these global terms? They have a simple answer: Rather than try to find a complicated cumbersome Chinese translation, schools and other institutions should teach what these universal terms mean so that they can be readily used exactly as they are, and understood in Chinese language media broadcasts.
The author is an economist and director of China Programs at the American Institute for Foreign Study, a US-based organization that cooperates with Nanjing University and Beijing Language and Culture University.
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