Spelling test: Why we spelled figure skating champ’s name ‘Kim Yuna’

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I have received many e-mails about Tribune newspapers’ decision to spell the name of the 2010 Olympic women’s figure skating champion ‘Kim Yuna’ (no hyphen) instead of ‘Kim Yu-na’ (hyphen), as is common usage when one transliterates South Korean names into English. With the frenetic work schedule at the Olympics, I have not had time to respond to all of them.

So I will do it here by linking you to my response to this question when a reader posed it after Kim won the 2009 world title in March.

As you will see, I did research before deciding to spell it as we did.

Click here to read that blog post, titled, ‘No Matter How You Write It, Kim Spells Greatness.’’

-- Philip Hersh in Vancouver, Canada

Kim Yuna does an Ina Bauer at a gala Saturday. Credit: Matthew Stockman / Getty Images