Cho or Chou is a Japanese name meaning butterfly but is rarely used alone. Usually as a compound name like Chouko or Chocho (Akimichi Choji's daughter in Boruto). Granted, I would have to take a look at the kanji in the last case because it's possible for it to be a naming pattern for the entire Akimichi clan. I think naming for specific butterflies is more common (i.e. Ageha - Swallowtail butterfly). Though I think Cho must be fine as an old-fashioned name, at least, since Konami did greenlight the script.
So when I was a kid, I used to headcanon that Cho Chang was half Japanese because it made no sense otherwise. The Chinese translation has her name as Zhang Qiu (meaning Autumn btw), because people with better grasps on the language than me couldn't make it work. And Cho Chang sounds too much like Mandarin for "melancholy" which would be unacceptable in a Chinese family where names and the possible meaning of homonyms means A LOT. A mixed family though, might be more willing to let things slide.
It's quite fun to look at how the original culture translates a character supposedly from that culture but written by foreigners. The Hong Kong dub for Cardcaptor Sakura has like a hilariously long bit of word vomit explaining Syaoran on his first appearance.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Disclaimer: I am not Japanese, just a Chinese person who can discern a lot of shit from kanji.
Date: 2018-12-28 08:12 am (UTC)So when I was a kid, I used to headcanon that Cho Chang was half Japanese because it made no sense otherwise. The Chinese translation has her name as Zhang Qiu (meaning Autumn btw), because people with better grasps on the language than me couldn't make it work. And Cho Chang sounds too much like Mandarin for "melancholy" which would be unacceptable in a Chinese family where names and the possible meaning of homonyms means A LOT. A mixed family though, might be more willing to let things slide.
It's quite fun to look at how the original culture translates a character supposedly from that culture but written by foreigners. The Hong Kong dub for Cardcaptor Sakura has like a hilariously long bit of word vomit explaining Syaoran on his first appearance.