Hoang Vu
Chinese Surname
Huang (simplified Chinese: 黄; traditional Chinese: 黃) is a Chinese surname that means "golden yellow," or literally "yellow." While Huáng is the pinyin romanisation of the word, it may also be romanised as Houang, Hoang, Wong, Vong, Hung, Hong, Bong, Eng, Ng, Uy, Wee, Oi, Oei or Ooi, Ong, Hwang, or Ung due to pronunciations of the word in different dialects and languages. The surname is known as Hoàng or as Huỳnh in Vietnamese, and Hwang, Whang in Korean.
Huang is the 7th most common surname in China. The population of Huangs in China and Taiwan was estimated at more than 29 million in 2000; it was also the surname of more than 2 million overseas Chinese, 4.3 million Vietnamese (5.1%), and an estimated 1 million Koreans (The 2000 census of South Korea revealed it was the surname for 644,294 South Koreans, ranked 17th)
Chinese Names
Personal names in Chinese culture follow a number of conventions different from those of personal names in Western cultures. Most noticeably, a Chinese name is written with the family name first and the given name next, therefore "John-Paul Smith" as a Chinese name would be "Smith John-Paul". For instance, the basketball player Yao Ming should be addressed as "Mr. Yao", not "Mr. Ming".
Some Chinese people who emigrate to, or do business with, Western countries sometimes adopt a Westernized name by simply reversing the "surname-given-name" order to "given-name-surname" ("Ming Yao", to follow the previous example), or with a Western first name together with their surname, which is then written in the usual Western order with the surname last ("Fred Yao"). Some Chinese people sometimes take a combined name. There are two main variations: Western name, surname, and Chinese given name, in that order ("Fred Yao Ming") or surname, Chinese given name, followed by Western name ("Yao Ming Fred").
Traditional naming schemes often followed a pattern of using generation names as part of a two-character given name. This is by no means the norm, however. An alternative tradition, stemming from a Han Dynasty law that forbade two-character given names, is to have a single character given name. Some contemporary given names do not follow either tradition, and may in some cases extend to three or more characters.
Chinese Surnames/Family Names
A majority of countries in Eastern Asia adopted the Chinese naming system. Today, there are over 700 different Chinese family names, but as few as twenty cover a majority of Chinese people. The variety in Chinese names therefore depends greatly on given names rather than family names. The great majority of Chinese family names have only one character, but there are a few with two; see Chinese compound surname for more information.
Chinese family names are written first, something which often causes confusion among those from cultures where the family name usually comes last. Thus, the family name of Mao Zedong is Mao (毛), and his given name is Zedong (traditional: 澤東, simplified: 泽东).
Traditionally, Chinese women usually retain their maiden names as their family name, rather than adopting their husband's. Children usually inherit the father's family name. However, some married women add the husband's surname to their full-name (this is popular in Hong Kong but rare in Mainland China), but rarely do they drop the maiden name altogether.
Historically, it was considered taboo to marry someone with the same family name - even if there is no direct relationship between those concerned - though in recent decades this has no longer been frowned upon.