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Name Lineage

    The surname Shek

    A Chinese surname, carried by 622 people in the United States.

    1 syllable Soundex S200

    Shek: #36,048 of 162,253 surnames in the 2010 US Census #1Smith#160,975Doriott#10Martinez#100Jimenez#1,000Archer#10,001Dubon Shek #36,048, 622 people Shek: #36,048 of 162,253 surnames in the 2010 US Census #1Smith#100Jimenez Shek #36,048, 622 people
    Every surname held by 100 or more people in the 2010 US Census, most common on the left (162,253 in all). Shek is more common than 77.8% of them.

    Origin

    Chinese origin

    Borrowed from Cantonese 石 (sek⁶), when the initial was still [ɕ] during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

    One of 193 Chinese surnames on this site.

    Origin from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0).

    How common it is

    2010 US Census

    There were 622 people named Shek in the United States in 2010, about 1 in every 496,375 Americans. That is down 1.4% since 2000, when the Census counted 631.

    #36,048
    rank among US surnames
    622
    people in 2010
    0.2
    per 100,000 Americans
    -1.4%
    change since 2000 (was #34,038)

    Who is named Shek

    Race and Hispanic origin as people reported it in the 2010 Census

    81% of people named Shek identified as Asian and Pacific Islander, 12% as white (not Hispanic) and 3.2% as two or more races.

    • Asian and Pacific Islander 81%
    • White (not Hispanic) 12%
    • Two or more races 3.2%
    • Hispanic or Latino (any race) 2.3%
    • Black (not Hispanic) 1.8%

    Compare: most common surnames among Asian and Pacific Islander Americans.

    Spellings and sound-alikes

    Useful when a record has your ancestor under another spelling

    Surnames that sound like Shek

    Shek has the Soundex code S200, the code US census indexes have used since the 1930s. Every surname with code S200.

    Other Chinese surnames

    All 193 Chinese surnames

    Questions

    Where does the surname Shek come from?
    Borrowed from Cantonese 石 (sek⁶), when the initial was still [ɕ] during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
    How common is the surname Shek?
    622 people in the United States had the surname Shek in the 2010 Census, about 1 in every 496,375 Americans. It ranked 36,048th of 162,253 surnames.
    What ethnicity is the surname Shek?
    In the 2010 Census, 81% of people named Shek identified as Asian and Pacific Islander, and 12% as white (not Hispanic).
    Is the surname Shek getting more or less common?
    Less common. 631 people carried it in the 2000 Census and 622 in 2010, down 1.4%.