Goodreads Librarians Group discussion

So I'm currently working on writing up a cleanup thread for a Korean novella that's getting an English translation in the spring. The author of the book is named Park Seolyeon; Korean naming structure is that the person's surname goes before their first name. However, Goodreads has her listed as Seolyeon Park.

I know that there is a way to set up an author's name so that it's in the surname-first structure you see in some East Asian countries, but the surname is still treated as a last name despite being first. Korean author Han Kang, Chinese author Hao Jingfang, and Hong Kong author Chan Ho-Kei are all examples of this setup; if you added their books to your Want to Read list and sorted by author name, they'd show up as Han, Hao, and Chan rather than Kang, Jingfang, and Ho-Kei. So my question is: how would I go about asking the librarians to make this change to Park Seolyeon's author page? Is this some kind of superlibrarian operation, or can anyone familiar with the process do it? Is there any kind of specific phrasing that needs to be used?

Thanks for any and all help with this issue.

In the editing options for author pages, there are sections for name, sort-by name, and shelf-display name. Any librarian can update them as long as the profile is not claimed. (If claimed, Support will need to do it.)

That said, there's not a clear consensus as yet on whether to use GivenName FamilyName or FamilyName GivenName in these cases—see this thread for a brief discussion.

Thanks so much for your input.

Liralen wrote: "That said, there's not a clear consensus as yet on whether to use GivenName FamilyName or FamilyName GivenName in these cases—see this thread for a brief discussion."

Just as a note: A quick scroll-through of this list (https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...) of popular books with Korean authors on Goodreads shows that there are more books with their authors arranged as FamilyName GivenName than the other way around, but it seems that the distribution between FamilyName GivenName and GivenName FamilyName on the actual book covers is more even. I'm not sure if there are any plans among librarians and staff to work on a standardization, but I thought that should be brought up.

In the meantime, do you think it would be possible to change the format of Park Seolyeon's name to FamilyName GivenName since that's how it's listed on the cover of the novella in question? https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/8...

Another librarian may be game, but I'm going to hold out for staff confirmation of policy (which, sorry...might be a while), since there doesn't seem to be consensus on what to do in this sort of case, even with the cover.

Liralen wrote: "Another librarian may be game, but I'm going to hold out for staff confirmation of policy (which, sorry...might be a while), since there doesn't seem to be consensus on what to do in this sort of c..."

Understood, hopefully we can get some more input from other librarians in here too.

One final note: there are two separate author pages for the same author: Seolyeon Park and Park Seolyeon. These should probably at least be merged into the same author, right? (And if I'm not mistaken, I believe that's a superlibrarian job?)

I would put both versions of the names.
That way no matter what people will be able to find the author. Put the way it is on the cover in the first slot, and then the other way in the next author slot. I've seen this done for authors who changed their names from one release to the next. The most important part is that people can find the author in question.

I watch figure skating, and depending on which country has the feed the names flip-flop all of the time. When the Olympics roll around it is always interesting to see and hear how they handle the names, especially the new teams who no one is familiar with yet.

Tawnya wrote: "I would put both versions of the names.
That way no matter what people will be able to find the author. That way no matter what people will be able to find the author. Put the way it is on the cover in the first slot, and then the other way in the next author slot."

That actually isn't necessary. If an author's name is listed as Familyname Givenname, you can search it as Givenname Familyname and get the same results. Try typing Han Kang into the searchbar, then Kang Han. Same results both times. Adding the name both ways would just result in a lot of unnecessary clutter.

I've merged the two profiles (no super needed—if either profile had been claimed, Support would have to do it). If we get a ruling on name order soon, I will happily update further as needed.

Liralen wrote: "I've merged the two profiles (no super needed—if either profile had been claimed, Support would have to do it). If we get a ruling on name order soon, I will happily update further as needed."

Thanks a bunch for the help, it's very much appreciated.