this post was submitted on 16 Jun 2026
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Why is English complicit with the "FIRST to LAST" sequence instead of the opposite? (piefed.social)
submitted 2 days ago by Shadow79@piefed.social to c/languagelearning@sopuli.xyz
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I’m mainly talking about the positions of Rank / Position & Surname in which most languages comply with (Rank / Position) followed by (Surname) like this: Col. Smith but in Japanese that’s reversed (スミス大佐) and that’s the same thing on law enforcement, they would instead say it as ヘンダーソン刑事 instead of Det. Henderson for example. Basically the same crap with names since 宮本茂 becomes Shigeru Miyamoto (but closer to Miyamoto Shigeru) as Japanese is ordered from LAST to FIRST NAME but that’s inverted in English ordered from FIRST to LAST NAME.

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[–] Lumidaub@feddit.org 4 points 1 day ago

"Complicit"?

Trying to interpret your post, are you asking why names that are surname first are reversed for English audiences?