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Principles for foreign spouses and offspring to pick up Chinese names

Principles for foreigners, stateless persons, and their offspring to acquire Chinese names are stipulated as follows:
1. When a foreigner or a stateless person gets married with a national of Taiwan or applies for naturalization, he or she and his or her offspring must acquire a Chinese name each for residence registration.


2. The Chinese name that a foreigner or a stateless person and his or her children picks up should comply with the naming convention in Taiwan, that is, the surname should come first and be followed by the given name. If the applicant does not have a surname, he or she can register only his or her given name. The Chinese name can be any Chinese characters, provided that they can be found in a Chinese dictionary. Self-created characters should not be allowed. Segment symbols, such as “.” or “,” or “ (space)”, should not be inserted in between the surname and the given name.


3. A foreigner or a stateless person and his or her children who applies for surname alteration, attaching surname, alteration of given name or an alteration or correction of surname and given name should do so in accordance with the Civil Law and the Name Act.


4. A foreigner or a stateless person and his or her children may apply for alteration of his/her Chinese name only one time.
In accordance with the letter No. 10100882492 issued on February 3 2012 by the Ministry of the Interior.

  • Data update: 2023-05-24
  • Publish Date: 2012-10-11
  • Source: Civil Affairs Bureau
  • Hit Count: 522