tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Dec 29 08:12:25 2010
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hypertransliteration (was Re: klin zha)
- From: "ghunchu'wI' 'utlh" <[email protected]>
- Subject: hypertransliteration (was Re: klin zha)
- Date: Wed, 29 Dec 2010 11:08:52 -0500
> nal qo'me'reQ qeSte'reQ ;)
I'm not trying to single out this phrase for attention, or the person
who posted it. It just reminded me of a practice that I've found
slightly uncomfortable for quite a while.
When transliterating a word or name, there are occasionally times when
it is necessary to add sounds to the original in order for the result
to be smoothly pronounceable. "Quark" gets an extra syllable to become
{quwargh}, for example. But I too often notice people using what I see
as inappropriate glottal stops that seem intended only to carefully
separate syllables that aren't quite so carefully separated in the
source word's pronunciation. One at least as often finds sounds being
*omitted* in transliteration, as in {DIlyum} "trillium" and
{'entepray'} "Enterprise".
In this particular case, if I'm speaking tlhIngan Hol and I try to say
"khomerex" (Klingonaase for "structure which grows") without
contorting my mouth, it comes out as a very unstilted *{HommereQ}.
Similarly, "khesterex" (Klingonaase for "structure which dies") ends
up sounding like *{HeStereQ}. I could accept {q} as the first sound
without too much objection, but there are absolutely no glottal stops
in either word.
(As a preemptive answer to the possibility that someone will try to
use {Suto'vo'qor} as a counterexample, I will point out both that the
transliteration is theoretically *from* Klingon into English, and that
the typical spelling is "Sto-vo-kor" with explicitly separate
syllables.)
-- ghunchu'wI'