this post was submitted on 20 Jan 2026
20 points (95.5% liked)

Asklemmy

52325 readers
848 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy ๐Ÿ”

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

  1. Open-ended question
  2. Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
  3. Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
  4. Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
  5. An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~

founded 6 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Different countries do things differently. Some have different alphabets, or just additional characters. Some allow middle names as separate from first or family names, while some instead do not not allow middle names, but instead allow multiple first names and/or family names. In some countries its normal to get your mother's maiden name as a middle name or as a second part of your first name, while other contries again dictate that any and all first names should be commonly recognized as a first name and not easily mistaken as a family name.

Does all this lead to people having different "offical" names in different countries? How do your passports look if name structure or characters aren't the same in the different countries? Does it make a difference if you were born multinational, or if you obtained it later in life?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] msrb711@feddit.org 8 points 5 days ago

I'm a maultinational that lives in Germany.

I come from a country that at some point in time did use different alphabets other than latin (two, not one). Even though I have all offical documents written in latin alphabet and all are in my native language + English (especially made for easier international legibility), the average german (police officer/office clerk/ etc.) is still unable to find his way around it.

It also just so happens to be that my name doesn't contain a single vowel, so them trying to pronounce my name usually ends up being funny and lightens the spirits.